We're into season two now, where the villains linger from the season before: the Master and the Anointed One. If you're not a Buffy fan, no worries. You pretty much need to know they're villains who plot to destroy the world. And yes, that's true of every single season in some way. The Master, in all his evil mastermindy-ness, talks about humans, saying something very similar to: "What do you think the greatest force in the human world is? Love? No, they'd like you to believe it's love. It's fear. Fear is what drives and motivates."
It probably sounds more dastardly when he said it. I'm not rewatching for the quote right now. I might already spend more time than I'd like doing that.
But I do rewatch, reread, revisit because it's easy to forget. There's no way I'd have remembered that line from the last time I watched Buffy, likely three years ago. And you know what? The Master spoke the truth.
He spoke what is painfully true apart from God.
I feel the fear right now. Sometimes it's masked in anxiety. Friends speak of sleepless nights for many reasons. Some can name their fears. On the liberal side of things, the echoes are painful: I'm afraid for my healthcare, my kid's school, my safety. I fear for my marriage. I fear what comes next.
Before that, though, I remember the others fears: Muslims will try to convert me and my children; bombs will fall here; I can't find a job to feed my family. The fear of hell looms in some other issues named as evil: abortion, gay people, trans people. Even if I think the fears are unfounded, I do not deny their reality for the people who are so fearful. Unfortunately, a person's reality is often not something grounded in facts, alternative or not.
As I watched the Master, the vampiry-est vampire of the vampires, breathe these words, I remembered, "Perfect love casts out fear." Some book from the Bible called John taught me that. Much more I didn't remember.
Well, luckily, the internet makes searching even easier. Here's more from the bit of text I remembered. The translation is different than the one I used then, but I liked this one. It's from 1 John 4 starting in the second half of verse 16: "God is love, and those who remain in love remain in God and God remains in them...There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear expects punishment."
There's a lot more in there, of course. Somewhere, I knew it before: fear has no place with God.
For us, who are all trying to assuage fears of our own, we could end up with a good set of questions to help us live, especially right now:
- Am I calming fear? If so, you are likely doing some good. I'm not talking about the "Trump won't be as bad as you think," version. Let me tell you, anyone afraid because of Trump will just want to punch you in the face. I'm talking about taking their fear seriously and offering something that might actually do some good. I'll fight for your marriage, too. I'll register, too. I'll introduce you to the refugees I know.
- Am I creating fear? There's talking about issues and there's creating fear. Which are you doing? Fear paralyzes. Issues motivate. Which are you doing?
- Are you punishing someone? Y'all. This is the "You got your eight years, now let us have ours." Or the "She had sex so she has to deal with the results."
I'm not pretending for a moment that those questions solve everything. They do go a long way, though.
May our love drive out the fears of others.
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