There is no more urgent need than to address the fears that surround us. We live in a fearful world and these are not made up fears but very real ones. Our nation is not simply divided but suspicious of others and fearful of the future. Our lives have been threatened with the rampant violence that fills the news and disasters that threaten our homes and families. Our world has become accustomed to things that our grandparents never could have imagined – from life so fragile it can be ended in the womb to the right of the sufferer to end life when they choose to a world in which people live and work from home and depend upon digital friends and technology to answer their loneliness.
The voices that cry out to us seem always to be warning us of something. There is only so much we can bear. Our lives and our well-being are both at a tipping point. In the Dune series, Frank Herbert wrote that fear is the mind killer. Indeed it is. We are afraid to leave our kids, afraid to let them grow up, afraid to marry, afraid to have our own kids, afraid of the people who call our phones, afraid of the people who show up at our doors. These fears are killing us and stealing our joy and, even more importantly than these, they are choking our faith.
The disciples are out there in a boat – a boat that seemed even smaller as the wind and the waves push against it. Scripture tells us that they were making headway painfully, fighting for every foot they advanced toward the shore. They were afraid and rightly so. The danger was not in their minds but all around them. And then the unthinkable happens. Jesus walks by. He just seems to saunter along tiptoing over the very waves and in the winds that were threatening to sink them.
Was Jesus really going to pass them by if they had not seen Him? Does Jesus ever do that? The storms and their fears became tools in the hand of God. The Lord was working to make them realize the danger and look past themselves for an answer. The fact that they called out to Jesus may seem like they were panicked. Could this have been their greatest moment of clarity? They called to the Lord because they were afraid, of course. But they also called to the Lord as an act of faith, crying out because they knew the Lord was their answer. They did not simply know their fears, they knew the answer to their fears was in the face of Jesus. They called to the Lord not as an act of desperation but as the voice of faith. And the Lord answered by setting them free from their fears.
Do not be afraid is not some mantra we must learn so that we trust in ourselves but the gift of God in Jesus Christ. Do not be afraid IS the Gospel. Do not be afraid of your sins but confess them and the Lord will set you free. Do not be afraid of enemies because the Lord is stronger than them all and has already obtained the victory for you. Do not be afraid of the threat of the Law because Jesus has kept the Lord for you and then covered you with His righteousness. Do not be afraid yesterday because it is covered by the blood of Christ. Do not be afraid of today because the only today we have is the one we have in Christ our Savior. Do not be afraid of the future because God is even now working all things for our good. The Lord who walks on water is the same Lord who suffers in your place and dies to pay once for all for your sin and who lives so that you cannot be imprisoned to death anymore.
We all face the storms of a wild sea and the winds that blow against us every day. The Lord has walked out on the water of our troubles and rescued us from the sea, giving us refuge in the holy ark of the Church. We are not looking to be saved but we are already the saved. This is what it means when the Scripture says “Baptism now saves you.” Your fears have been answered not by a safer fortress or a bigger gun or a financial cushion or a pill to make every disease go away. Your fears have been answered by the one strong enough to answer them – with His own self-sacrifice on the cross. The challenge is not to find where Jesus is walking when the storms of life come but to trust in the Lord first.
Baptism ruins us for the devil, the world, and our own sinful wills. We are not who we were. We are not the lost who don’t even realize we are dying but the saved who count upon the mercy of God for everything. Our sins cannot shame us and our enemies cannot kill us because we belong to the Lord. Do not be afraid. God knows all your secrets and still He loves you. God knows how weak you are and still He loves you. God knows you have nothing to offer Him and still He offers you all things in Christ. The whole of the Gospel can be summarized in those four words – “do not be afraid.”
What is the worst your enemies can do to you? What is the worst you can suffer in this life? What is the worst that you fear? Christ has answered them all. Your enemies cannot steal you nor can they rob you of the everlasting life Christ has given you. Your sufferings are not aimless pain but you suffer in Christ and for Christ who suffered for you to win you salvation.
Fear is not simply the mind killer, it kills our hearts when we surrender our hope and our confidence to the things we are afraid of. Yes, your enemies are real and on your own you are weak. But you are not alone and Christ is strong. Yes, your sins are big and death is real but Christ has forgiveness bigger than every sin and His life is even more real than death because it is eternal.
Do not live as a people caught up in the grip of fear. Everyone and everything has an enemy but you have a Savior. You have been pulled from the waters that would drown you and rescued from the storms that would sink you. We think we are swimming alone or face the storms alone. We do not. Christ is with you. Do not be afraid. God is good. He is not just but merciful. He is not nice but gracious. He does not toy with you the way you toy with Him. He does not taunt you the way your troubles do. His love is honest and true. He has elected you to be His own and to live under Him in His kingdom without end. Rejoice in this. It is enough to belong to Him. It is enough that He walks on the waters of life’s storms and reaches out to keep you safe.
We think the test of life is to be holy – to find a way to give up sinning forever. God is not foolish like we are. The Lord knows that the real test of life is faith – trusting that the Lord is who He says He is and has done what He said He did and will do what He has promised to do. Holiness cannot grow out of a heart of fear but the Spirit works from faith to build in us a holy life now, completed in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting. Do not be afraid. The Lord is with you. Amen.
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