Haunted houses. Bungie jumping. Swimming with sharks. Slasher movies. We willingly do things that scare us.
Scary movies have never been my thing. Maybe it is because I am typically fearful by nature, but I just don’t want to spend a couple of hours watching a story that creates fear in me. Though I don’t go see them, not only do many people go see fear-inducing movies- by choice- but they get excited about them! That makes me curious: what does that say about us that we not only want to be scared, but we will even pay someone to scare us?!
I believe that everything we do whether good, bad, or indifferent tells us something about who we are…what we deeply long for. We may choose actions that are destructive to ourselves and others, but even the (twisted) action is a hint to something in our nature that God created for his glory and our good. We are always (at least unconsciously) longing after something beautiful in Jesus even if we seek something ugly from the world.
Maybe we seek to be jump-scared because our hearts secretly long to be full of fear- a Godly fear. Maybe the ways we scare each other are substitutes for something better.
When Jesus calmed the storm that was swamping his boat, his disciples got silent too. They had been in real danger. They had been swamped by real fear. Then they watched as the wind and the waves “bowed the knee” to Jesus of Nazareth, Mary and Joseph’s son. Then, as the scripture says, they were afraid. A deep, profound, life-changing fear. A fear that did not cause them to fight or fly, but to follow Jesus more closely. Awe overtook them. They were awakened to a man who was more fear inducing to them than the storm they just lived through.
Maybe we go see scary movies or jump out of planes or swim with Great Whites as a weak substitute for an encounter with One who would create real fear in us, make us feel smaller than we would choose to see ourselves, but also fill us with a deep sense that the fear is profoundly good.
Join us Sunday evening as we explore Jesus’ authority over his creation…a creation that willingly obeys his commands. By God’s grace we will encounter the same kind of fear that the disciples experienced…and the same life-giving awe.