Global warming with rising, tempest-tossed oceans and perilous heatwaves continuously make the news. Deadly viral variants drift across the country like smoke as cautious people uneasily try to resume their lives while others argue about the efficacy of masks, vaccines, and medical advice. Stewards and stewardesses are assaulted with increased frequency while trying to keep their passengers safe. Paranoia and xenophobia grow daily. Fear-crazed random acts of violence in department stores and on street corners occur daily in a nation where “civil blood makes civil hands unclean.” Racial tensions boil over at the latest unarmed black motorist shot or suffocated by the very same people charged with protecting them. Children are abducted from their beds in the dead of night, and videos of these unspeakable acts are played back again and again on network news. Our streets, even our Capitol is not safe.
Even now, as I begin to write this, I notice that there is a news story from overnight which begins: “At least two people were killed, and 20 to 25 others injured, when three people got out of an SUV carrying assault rifles and handguns and started ‘shooting indiscriminately into the crowd” outside a concert in Miami early Sunday.” Another part of the tragedy is that many of us have become desensitized to these weekly mass shooting. Others of us feel cold or numb while still others feel nothing at all. This is what Emily Dickinson calls the Hour of Lead. “First the chill, then the stupor, then the letting go.”
Cry Havoc, And Let Slip The Dogs Of War
Escalating international tensions, hypersonic guided missiles and rumors of war form the icing on the cake. Where will war break out? Will it be in the Ukraine? Korea? Taiwan? The Arctic? How will it begin, and how will it end? The world—and our country–seems crazier and more dystopian than ever, and you feel like you are part of a Hieronymus Bosch landscape or a person trapped in a Lord Byron poem. Are our nightmares becoming our reality? Is there any hope? What is to become of me? Of you? Of us?
It’s important to keep perspective though. The world has never been truly safe. There have always been natural disasters, invasions from foreign armies, cholera and plague, famine and misfortune. Thucydides (circa 460 B.C. – circa 400 B.C.), perhaps the first political scientist in the history of the world once said: “In this life, the strong do what they will and the weak suffer what they must.” Pure Darwinism. So, while it seems that we often live in angst, terror or outright fear for our lives, this is really nothing new.
Are we all becoming shrooms?
That does not mean that the status quo in our homeland is acceptable or that we should be resigned to whatever happens. Or, that it can’t get worse. Much worse. As far as the United States of America is concerned, our unity is devolving into clans and tribal warfare. Noted American historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. once said: “We’ve got too much pluribus and not enough unum.” One reason things are getting worse is because historically, we’ve committed ourselves to make the peaceful coexistence of competing ideas a reality, including and especially the peaceful transfer of power between the parties after an election. That was the bottom line—the rules of the game. Now, it is all about winning. Forget the rules. And if winning means violence in the streets with militias, anarchists and white supremacists, then there are wackos who are standing back and standing by. And our babies and children, our seniors, and we ourselves are in danger of becoming “shrooms,” mushrooms in a game of Centipede who are caught in the crossfire. This another reason we must change—before Baltimore becomes Beirut and before Miami becomes Mogadishu. Fortunately, we have cooler heads whose voices are being heard, but unfortunately, there are not enough of these voices speaking up. Especially among our elected representatives. Five months ago, these same members of Congress were hiding under their desks or locked in their offices while potentially dangerous people were roaming the halls freely and yelling “Where is Mike Pence?” A makeshift gallows had been set up on the lawn of the Capitol. Was it all theater? Have we lost our ability to tell right from wrong, the good guys from the bad guys? To see the status of the FBI investigation, please click here.
The hatred and violence in the world comes from sin and rebellion against God and God’s ways. God wants to build us up. He offers us abundant life while the devil wants to pull us down and destroy us, making us utterly miserable in the process. Martin Luther who launched the Protestant Reformation, said once “I don’t fear the devil. What I do fear is the devil in people!”
As things get increasingly crazy and we become increasingly fearful, disillusioned, even disoriented, we continue to try to cope. There are certain compensatory mechanisms, such as avoidance, escape, limiting our expectations, asking for help, etc. that most people resort to when squeezed. But as the stressors become even more strident, we begin to decompensate. We become less focused, more distracted, and our mental—and physical–health start to slip.
F42.9 Obsessive-compulsive disorder, unspecified
For example, I have a tendency towards OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) when under pressure. People wouldn’t know it just by observing me. But when I’m fairly stressed, I tend to “double-check” things like whether the oven is turned off, or the door is locked, or whether the alarm on the clock is set. Sometimes, I’ll check these things as often as three times in succession. A tension inside me builds after checking once, and I can only relieve that tension by checking a second time, or even a third. But then, on other occasions, I will refuse to check more than once, because I do not want this OCD to have power over me or to define me in some way. And, under stress, I can become irritable in ways that I normally am not (interestingly, the word for “stress” in the Greek of the Bible is translated “tribulation,” and it comes the Greek word that means “to squeeze” as in a winepress that squeezes the juice out of grapes. We sometimes hear people say that they feel they are “between a rock and a hard place.” These people are feeling squeezed between an irresistible force and an immovable object in some metaphorical sense.)
Help is at your fingertips
Our practical response to whatever is threatening us depends on what the threat is. We may need to call the police, or leave a dangerous environment in the home before someone is hurt. In these cases, there are shelters in many cities in the U.S. Sometimes, churches can help, but often they are not equipped or trained for providing refuge or social counseling. Crisis lines for runaways, people contemplating harming themselves, crisis pregnancies, victims of sexual assault, people with eating disorders and so on are often useful. These are trained people who are interested in helping you. Here are just a few of the hotline numbers.
We also need to take personal responsibility. This starts with simple things such as making welfare checks on our neighbors during a heatwave or power outage. Or, joining neighborhood watch groups, volunteer fire departments, or deputy sheriff reserve units. If you hear of, or read Online about threats of violence, you need to step up to the plate and report these threats to the authorities. Lives may be at stake and these lives may depend on what you do.
How to stress-proof your life and reserve a seat on an incredible trip
But there is much more that you need to be aware of, and these talking points will have repercussions in your lives that will last for eternity. So, let’s jump in.
This is not what God envisioned for us. Far from it. He does not want us to live in angst, alternating between panic attacks and angry outbursts. He has a completely different destiny in mind for you and I, if only we’ll let go of those issues, hurt feelings and fears. He wants us to be literally transformed from the inside out, and all we have to do is accept the free gift that he is offering.
God wants you
God wants you in His life. Other people may not, your family may not, but God does. In Isaiah 1:18, the prophet writes: “’Come now, and let us reason together,’ says the Lord: ‘though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool.’” God will wash the blood, the filth, the guilt off of you. Remember Lady Macbeth? She would walk the palace at night rubbing her hands, trying to rid herself of a stain that she alone could see. Her crime was so heinous that she became stark, raving, mad. There may be horrors we’ve seen and things that we’ve possibly done that have changed our lives for the worse. Drugs won’t soothe the pain and alcohol won’t make us forget. But God can. God spoke to Isaiah as reported in 43:25, telling Isaiah “I will blot out your sins for my own sake and will never think of them again.” Paul writes in Romans 8:1 “Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” To this, the apostle John adds “If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything” (I John 3:20.) If God can forgive you for your sins, then why can’t you forgive yourself? God forgives us because He loves us: David writes in Psalm 103:2-12
“The Lord is compassionate and gracious,
slow to anger, abounding in love.
He will not always accuse,
nor will he harbor his anger forever;
he does not treat us as our sins deserve
or repay us according to our iniquities.
For as high as the heavens are above the earth,
so great is his love for those who fear him;
as far as the east is from the west,
so far has he removed our transgressions from us.“
Come as you are
Secondly, God wants you as you are right now. The apostle Paul writes: “Now is the time of God’s favor, now is the day of salvation” (II Corinthians 6:2.) Don’t put it off. That would be playing right into the hands of the devil.
Rock of ages
Thirdly. If you confess your sins to God and ask Jesus into your heart, and trust in Him and accept His help, God will be your rock and your salvation, your fortress; You will not be greatly shaken (Psalm 62:6-7.) You may be shaken, but not unbearably (greatly) so.
Sailors, mariners know the importance of an anchor. It stabilizes a ship, keeps it from being dragged or dashed to pieces against the rocks. It’s important to have something constant in your life. Something you can cling to. I knew a lifeguard once who told me how he has seen drowning people desperately cling to a Styrofoam cup, hoping that it will keep them from sinking under the ocean waves. The question is, what are you clinging to?
In Malachi 3:6 God says “I the Lord do not change.” We may hear in television commercials that change is good, but it is not always so. There is much to be said about coming home after a chaotic period in your life to familiar settings including old friends, the house you grew up in, your room just as you left it. Because God does not change, the promises he made to us are forever.
Jesus is the intermediary between us and God. His death on the cross atoned for our sins and His resurrection from the dead is a promise to all who believe that there will be a place in heaven for us as well.
Please contact me if you have any questions. I’ll be glad to answer if I can.
Feature photo credit: AB Photographie (Shutterstock)