Running Scared Chapter Three
Fear Speaks

“. . . fear is speaking, and we should listen” (p. 37). That’s the gist of chapter three. Fear’s most obvious message is that there is danger, but Welch hopes to help us listen carefully enough to get beyond the obvious.

After acknowledging that the world is full of real dangers, the author points out that fear speaks not only about our situation, but about us. “Something can be dangerous, but you can still be safe” (p.39). When we admit we are afraid, we’re saying not only that something is dangerous, but also that we feel vulnerable. “Danger points at the threatening world around us. Vulnerability points to ourselves” (p.40).

Welch goes on to observe that we often express our vulnerability in terms of what we think we need; comfort, approval, love, admiration, etc. “Whatever you need is a mere stone’s throw from what you fear” (p.41). Both body and soul reflect neediness or vulnerability.

Linked to what we “need” is what is valuable to us, or we could say, to what we love. “The cluster of things attached to fear is growing. What began as a study of fear and danger has enlarged to include God, control, need, love, trust, and being ruled or owned by something else” (p.45).

Finally, Welch points out that as powerful as all of these factors are, the specter of death and the afterlife can make them all seem trivial.

In this chapter, the author wants us to understand that fear does more than simply help us label what’s dangerous “out there.” Our experience of fear says a lot about who we are as individuals. As such it can give us insight into our souls and prepare us for the grace of God to be applied.

My own journey

I find this clarification that fear is saying something about me, not just about my situation, very helpful. There is something hopeful in it. If fear is only about what is external to me, then all I can do is hope to avoid the danger. But if fear is also something about me, then maybe there is a more satisfying answer.

I think it may also affect my prayer life. Praying that God will remove the danger (whatever it may be) is certainly legitimate. But I can also pray that God will increase my trust so that I am less vulnerable.

Discussion

What are some personal illustrations of the idea that something can be dangerous and you can still feel safe?

How about the opposite—are their situations that are safe and still make you feel afraid?

What do you make of that observation?

Review some of your fears and ask: “What do these fears say I trust in? What do my fears say I love?”

Running Scared Chapter Two
Your Fear

I have a new philosophy. I only dread one day at a time. – Charlie Brown

“Rather than minimize your fears, find more of them. Expose them to the light of day because the more you find the more blessed you will be when you hear words of peace and comfort” (p.28).

In this chapter, Welch encourages us to inventory our fears. Acknowledging that not everyone is struggling with hourly panic attacks, he encourages us to look for clues to what lies beneath the surface. The author suggests these rocks to look under:

• Background fear and anxiety (related to anything you love or want deeply—for example: fear for your safety or safety of loved ones, fears about living a meaningful life, fear of being unloved and alone)
• Phobias (heights, paper cuts, the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth – arachibutryophobia)
• Dreams (specifically those that betray fear and anxiety)
• Physical clues (what physical symptoms indicate tension?)
• Stress (“when we are aware that anxiety has registered at a physical level”)
• Busy and driven (maybe the driven person is running from something)
• Depression (a passive way of responding to fear)
• Anger
• Overprotection
• Superstitions (When my wife and I visit a particular relative, we can’t leave without salt flying, a cryptic comment about cats and ladders, and an incantation or two. And never, ever say ‘pig.’ The neutralizing ritual for such a cosmic faux pas would extend your visit an extra day” (p.35).

My own journey

I’ll spare you a complete inventory. It’s best both for my own sense of dignity and for your endurance. Two signs of anxiety come most readily to mind. Worry filled days are often filled with stressful dreams. The theme of these dreams is almost invariably being responsible for a test or for a speaking engagement–and not being prepared. On the physical side, stress registers quickly in my nervous stomach.

I’d say both of these symptoms say something about my desire to be respected and appreciated, or conversely, a fear of failure.

Discussion

• Are you a person who readily identifies your fears, or one who feels a certain sense of mastery over fears?
• Which of the clue categories listed by the author leads to your most productive fear search?
• Have you ever shared your fears with anyone? Who would you be most likely to share them with?
• Do you think that a fear inventory is a path to blessing as the author suggests?

Running Scared Chapter One
A World of Fear

Welch surveys our experience with fear from childhood to adulthood. His conclusion is that fear is natural—we have don’t have to learn it. Furthermore, fears don’t go away. With greater freedom and responsibility, fears multiply throughout life.

Welch offers a nice chuckle on the psychiatry of fear: “There was a time when adults were neatly categorized into one of two groups: you were either neurotic or psychotic. Psychotic meant that you were out of touch with reality and afraid; neurotic meant that you were in touch with reality and afraid” (p.22). He goes on to point out that even with the ever-expanding list of psychiatric disorders, fears continue to make up the largest category.

Treatments for fear such as medication, psychology, and systematic desensitization don’t seem to get at the root of our fears and worries. Welch suggests that we look outward to the source of our fears and inward to the way we interpret our situations.

My own journey

I’ve got my share of fear stories: “what’s under the bed” fears from childhood, overactive imagination when working on a ladder, dreams of being unprepared to preach.

At forty-five years of age I suppose I work around or work through most of those things. I guess what I’m more interested in, or am more aware of lately is how little anxieties, hardly conscious at all, might be affecting my choices. Am I hesitant to make a phone call? Am I putting off an unpleasant task? Am I putting my head in the sand when it comes to something I’d rather not face?

I wonder if these fears are little fissures in my faith?

Discussion

• What’s your fear factor on a scale of one to ten (one being the least)?
• What would it be like to live completely without anxiety? Is it possible?

“God Almighty has set before me two great objects, the suppression of the Slave Trade and the Reformation of Manners.” — William Wilberforce

Last night, our family watched the movie Amazing Grace. Good show. I felt the storytellers failed, however, to communicate the duration of the struggle and the power of Wilberforce’s endurance.

I did some quick research and discovered that Wilberforce made his first speech in parliament against slavery in 1789. The final bill that abolished slavery in England passed in 1831 (although the tide had already turned by then), three days before his death. That’s 42 years by my count. What incredible tenacity!

We shouldn’t be surprised at the ferocity of the battle. After all, the culture considered the slavery of black Africans a divinely ordained right. History validated it. A large part of the economy was based upon it. What’s noteworthy is the fight in William Wilberforce.

That’s why I picked the quote above to lead this jot. “Why do you think God put you on the earth, William?” “Oh, I don’t know—I’m thinking it was to abolish slavery and reform the morals of a nation.” Wilberforce had a sense (some might say an inordinate sense) of God’s purpose for his life. He also had an amazing courage to embrace that purpose. Who accepts a burden of that magnitude?

As I mull over his example, I’m wondering what missions God puts before His people that we dismiss outright. Too big! Not my responsibility! Impossible! And I’m not so much thinking about reform on a global scale—although obviously God calls some to undertake it. I’m thinking of loving wives and honoring husbands, investing in children and serving God’s people. I’m thinking of a habit of listening to God and speaking for Him in my own circles. I’m thinking of simple living and lavish generosity.

I’m wondering what “great objects” God has put before me; and what small objections I’ve put before Him.

The Ukraine mission team assembled an informative and encouraging video discussing their trip to the Ananiev, Ukraine. To maintain the audio quality, the file size is quite large (about 18 MB) and can take time to load – several minutes – before playing begins. The missions video is a little over 32 minutes long.

Master, they say that when I seem
To be in speech with you,
Since you make no replies, it’s all a dream
–One talker aping two.

They are half right, but not as they
Imagine; rather, I
Seek in myself the things I meant to say,
And lo! The wells are dry.

Then, seeing me empty, you forsake
The Listener’s role, and through
My dead lips breathe and into utterance wake
The thoughts I never knew.

And thus you neither need reply
Nor can; thus, while we seem
Two talking, thou are One forever, and I
No dreamer, but thy dream.

Poems, Ed. Walter Hooper (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1964), 122-123.

Joy is not a requirement of Christian discipleship, it is a consequence. It is not what we have to acquire in order to experience life in Christ; it is what comes to us when we are walking in the way of faith and obedience.

We come to God (and to the revelation of God’s ways) because none of us have it within ourselves, except momentarily, to be joyous. Joy is a product of abundance; it is the overflow of vitality. It is life working together harmoniously. It is exuberance. Inadequate siners as we are, non of us can manage that for very long.

We try to get it through entertainment. We pay someone to make jokes, tell stories, perform dramatic actions, sing songs. We buy the vitality of another’s imagination to divert and enliven our own poor lives. The enormous entertainment industry in America is a sign of the the depletion of joy in our culture. Society is a bored, gluttonous king employing a court jester to divert it after an overindulgent meal. But that kind of joy never penetrates our lives, never changes our basic constitution. The effects are extremely temporary—a few minutes, a ew hours, a few days at most. When we run our of money, the joy trickles away. We cannot make ourselves joyful. Joy cannot be commanded, purchased or arranged.

But there is something we can do. We can decide to live in response to the abundance of God and not under the dictatorship of our own poor needs. We can decide to live in the environment of a living God and not our own dying selves. We can decide to center ourselves in the God who generously gives and not in our own egos which greedily grab. One of the certain consequences of such a life is joy, the kind expressed in Psalm 126.

Eugene Peterson, A Long Obedience in the Same Direction, p. 96-97.

A while back — I suppose it’s been a few months now — the water dispenser in our refrigerator stopped working. I don’t know what the problem was. The appliance isn’t even a year old. But it really wasn’t urgent enough to squeeze out anything on my “to do” list. I replaced a filter that was due and when that didn’t clear things up, I let the item slip back down to the end of the list. Things like that just happen.

And for my wife and our 5 year-old daughter, things like that are just simple enough to ask God to fix. He did.

And then, not too long after the miraculous flood, the rock once again refused to gush. Taking a lesson from Moses, I set my rod aside and did not strike. But it was enough to make one wonder whether there had ever been a miracle. For our daughter though, the “fix” had already been discovered and applied. It simply needed to be “serviced” again. So she prayed, and once again we were ice-cold refreshed.

Now it’s been weeks. The enthusiastic “hallelujah!” is past. But the thing has become a fixture in Rachel’s bedtime prayers just as regular as “Heavenly Father” and “amen.”

“And thank you Lord for fixing the refrigerator water.”

She just won’t let it go! I don’t suppose I ever explicitly decided there should be an expiration date on thanksgiving, but her tenacity has surprised me even so. And challenged me.

One of Jim Henderson’s best observations is the idea that the “cup of cold water” of our day is attention. Think about it! I think you’ll agree it’s a great application.

The cup of cold water that Jesus talked about was certainly a common thing in His day — common that is, in the sense of being familiar. Availability was, no doubt, another thing altogether. Isn’t it just so with attention in our day? If you could bottle it, water would go out of style! The desire to be recognized is a craving as common as thirst. We’re not necessarily asking for a parade, just someone to notice we’re living.

The desire to be noticed is not just yours. The point is that we can offer a cup of cold water in Jesus’ name simply by offering free attention giveaways.

This week ask someone: “How are you?” Actually listen. It’s another ordinary attempt!

The Friesen family went camping this week. I’d like to conjure an image of “Man v. Wild” but alas, a little cabin must and mildew is as wild as it got. I can say with some satisfaction that we did complete the Nebraska camper triathlon — sunburn, mosquito bites and ticks!

We made a bit of an observation regarding the three plagues: insect repellent and sunscreen offer little protection without application. No one suffered because of lack of sensitivity to the issues. But careful planning and packing were little consolation for the itch and the burn. James 1 comes to mind: “humbly accept the word planted in you, which can save you. Do not merely listen to the word, and so decieve yourselves. Do what it says.” I’m confident the object lesson has lasted as long as the burn. I hope it will have the tenacity of a tick!

These little getaways are important for the Friesen clan. Carolyn and I watched the hearts of our children turn once again toward each other. In an unhurried conversation, we reflected on how utilitarian relationships can become in the hustle and bustle of schedules and agendas. Even within families, people can become simply a resource or an obligation pretty quickly. It’s true, love can be, no must be expressed by serving one another within a busy routine. But we want more than that. Spending time together “away from it all” reminds us what it means to cherish each other.

I’ve got a renewed determination to give the Lord that kind of unqualified time too. No doubt that will require He and I to “get away from it all” occasionally, but I hope that the effects will follow me back from camp.