“Fear: The Opposite of Love”

"This teaching from Jesus points to a radically different way we are meant to live in this world. What Jesus teaches us is always in direct opposition to our society’s cultural wisdom. Even the brief phrase, 'fear not' is countercultural. We often call this spiritual wisdom of Jesus unconventional wisdom or upside-down wisdom. What dawned on me is that WE are the ones who have it upside-down! Jesus was trying to tell his 1st century CE audience that they had it all wrong-valued the wrong things, ignored the right things, were afraid because they had strayed so far from God’s vision for humanity.

Here we are 2000+ years later, still valuing the wrong things (wealth, power), ignoring the right things (connection, compassion), living more in fear than in love. As followers of Jesus, we have the mandate to be countercultural, to live out of more love than fear. We can recognize our connectedness to all creation and to God and arrange our lives to reflect that. When we are occupied with being the fate of each person we meet - and seeing them as our fate - our hearts will be too full of the treasure of each moment to leave much room for fear. May it be so."

Meditation by The Rev. Tonya Barnette, preacher

Sunday, August 10, 2025