Reactions

Some people like being scared.  They actually enjoy it!  I’m not one of them.  I can deal with it when it is a part of taking the next step in life.  Yet the idea of putting my “self” in a situation where I am going to be scared, especially in the virtual world of imagination, isn’t my idea of fun.  I cannot see the point.  I hate the feeling of being artificially controlled.  It feels like I am allowing others to manipulate my emotions and soul. 
 
One cannot prevent being scared.  Certain events, things, and even ideas are frightening.  The most powerful are the ones which go beyond the superficial or imagination and touch our reality.  When we know a life is at stake, scaffolding hanging from fifty floors above the streets of New York, our souls shiver uncontrollably.  As one confronts the unknown, especially in the darkness of a cold night on an unknown street, you can taste fear.  Occasionally “something” reaches out and touches one’s heart in a way that causes a tremor at one’s core.
 
I recently encountered a reflection of my soul in context of God.  I realize the very attempt to describe something defying description is confusing.  It seemed like a bright stage where my future actions, in context of my life, were being played out with God and myself in the audience.  The scene wasn’t pretty.  The flimsy reality I often I in was revealed for what it really is.  The only advice I could act on was to “clamber into caves in the cliffs, duck into any hole you can find.  Hide from the terror of God, from his dazzling presence, when he assumes his full stature on earth, towering and terrifying.” (Isaiah 2.19)  Yet Divinity’s reaction wasn’t aggressive or full of justice.  Actually the God I know reacted quite differently.  The only words I found myself left with were compassion, love laced in sadness, and resolute.
 
I need to rediscover an intimacy with God, accepting my fear and working through the unknown.  God gives all an open invitation.