“Do not be afraid.” That’s the key phrase I think in the gospel
today. It’s something Jesus says many
times to His followers. “Do not fear. Be not afraid” and He adds, “I am with you
all days, even to the end of the world.”
Not in this gospel but in another place He adds that. “Be not
afraid.”
So is Jesus telling us not
to fear at all, that we have nothing to be afraid of? Not really.
Not really. He makes it very
clear in the gospel today there are some things to be afraid of, but the thing
we really have to be afraid of is not what’s out there—but what’s in here. Of ourselves.
Of our own capacity for evil.
That’s what He tries to say in the gospel today as well. And he says it in another way, where He says,
“Do not fear those who can harm your body, fear those who can harm your
soul. Fear those who have you thrown
into Gehenna”, or as we would say in other words
perhaps, “Go to Hell”.
But who is the one that can
put us there? There is only one person
who that can put me there. There is only
one person that can cause me to sin, that’s me.
See we can sometimes put it out there, fear the devil. But see the devil never makes us sin. The devil can tempt us but he can’t make us
sin. And the reality is, if you look at
it closely, what we need to fear is what we ourselves are capable of. The evil that we are capable of.
You know sometimes when we
talk about evil we talk about it in general about all the bad things that
happen or can happen to people. That
would include for instance the floods, people losing their lives and losing all
of their possessions like in floods, like in the recent floods that have
happened. People losing their lives
because of natural disasters. But in a
very real sense, although we can say that’s evil, that’s nature simply being
itself and the results are simply the results of nature being itself. You know the only ones capable of choosing
evil, the only ones capable of cruelty in this world are human beings. Animals are not cruel. They’re simply true to their nature. Human beings can be and are often cruel. It’s we who cause more suffering to one
another than nature could ever cause to any of us.
Jesus says simply, “Be
afraid.” You can be afraid. But be afraid of what you yourself are
capable of. And that’s a lesson that I
have somewhat learned in my life and want to continue to learn. It takes a lot of self awareness,
self-examination to see that, to know that.
On the other hand for all
the evil that we are capable of, we’re capable of that much love and good as
well, or more. And that’s the other side
of the coin. And that’s the reason that
we would say “Do not fear.” “You need
not be afraid.” The only thing you need
to be afraid of is evil, evil that you yourself can commit, that you can
cause.
Now, sometimes when we think
of that though we say well then how can God allow all that suffering? All the suffering in the world? And I don’t have and answer to that. I wish I did.
The only answer that I know of is that Jesus himself, God himself
accepted the suffering. With us, like us
and at our hands. He Himself chose to
die from human beings human cruelty to one another. But Jesus Himself proclaims it’s okay because
love with counter even that evil.
You know when we celebrate
baptism there is a rite in the very first part called the “The anointing of
exorcism” or the pre-baptismal anointing, but the real word is exorcism. So here I am anointing these little 6-month
old, 8-month old, year old babies, children, and anointing them with the
anointing of exorcism. Now you all know
what exorcism means right? I ask the
parents at this, “What does exorcism mean?”
Eventually it comes out that, they can’t figure out why I’m asking but,
it comes out that it means to cast out the devil, control a demon, cast out a
demon. They say, “So does this little
child have a devil then? Are we casting
out the devil in this innocent child?”
No, that doesn’t make sense.
Usually they don’t think that makes sense. So what is it? And that anointing to me is very
meaningful. It is still very meaningful
because we live in a world of evil. We
live surrounded by evil of many kinds, of many forms including as I said, the
worse kind which is human. The evil that
humans do, the hurt that they cause one another.
We live in a world full of
that and we know that. So I look at the
parents and I say, “Do you want to protect your child from all harm, from all
evil?” Like she was just crying you
know. You want to protect her. Do you want to? Of course, yes. Can you protect your child from all harm,
from all evil? At first they say,
“Yeah.” Then all of a sudden it dawns on
them, “No, I can’t”. That’s probably one
of the most difficult things for parents.
They can’t protect their child from all evil and that’s what this
anointing is about. It’s about asking
God for that protection and asking God to give us the strength and to give that
child the strength to fight against evil.
They, when they are old enough, you for right now. And for that reason it has real meaning to
me.
And so we can’t protect even
our loved ones from the bumps and bruises of these children, from illness, from
death. And you know what, neither can
God in a sense. God can’t protect us
from all those things. God doesn’t
choose to protect from all those things.
That would be silly to think so because it can’t happen, it can’t be
that way.
And most of all, if you
think about it, God cannot protect us from the evil that other people do to us,
and from the suffering that comes from that.
And you know why God can’t do that?
God is helpless in the face of our free will, our free decisions because
God gave us free will. So God cannot
enter into that place and that is an incredible thing to think about and an
incredible responsibility for us as human beings.
So what is the final
thing? Is there no hope in all of this
then? I think there is. And the hope is in this, that we are all
God’s children. Through baptism we are
God’s children and God cares for us, and God will care for us always. And He will console us and He will strengthen
us and He will help us. And as Jesus
said, “I will be with you.” In the
gospel Jesus says, “God takes care of the birds of the air,” and “even counts
the hairs on your head.” But more than
that we are God’s children and that’s how much God cares for us.
And so when Jesus says, “Be
not afraid” what does that mean? It
means we can count on God to care for us, to be with us in our sufferings. Not always to take them away, but to be with
us, to strengthen us and in the end to bring good out of every evil. That is the heart of our faith, that in the
end God brings good out of every evil.
So let us listen to the
words of Jesus today and take them really to heart. Perhaps as we come up to Communion today, we
see Jesus, perhaps we can listen to him say to us in our own hearts, “Be not
afraid, I am with you. You are loved and
you like Me are a beloved child of God, Our Father.”