Love… And… Fear

TUES., FEB. 1, 1994, 6:38 AM
FARM, STUDY

As you introduce classes to an holistic perspective (and this is that time of year) you talk about emotions. Inevitably you mention love, an emotion that emanates from the spiritual force of love, and all of this comes from Me, your Triune God, Who Is All There Is. Though the Preacher put it as “a time to love and a time to hate” this morning I name its yin/yang opposite as fear.

Just as I have said that there is a time to hate (though it certainly is not equal to a time to love), so there is a time to fear. As an emotion, fear is often valuable and life-saving. Your discipline of health education has always used fear as at least an attention-getter and sometimes as a motivation for positive health behavior. Fear is the reminder that there may be… or are… undesirable consequences from certain actions or situations. Fear can be a helpful balance to cockiness and over confidence. In this best sense fear is a protective mechanism that urges you to be careful, to fight for your life or rights, or to flee the situation of the “odds are against you.”

So fear can be a positive emotional balance to the emotion of love, as it often is used. One may “love” to drive a car fast, as fast as it will go, but, hopefully, there is fear of an accident or of arrest that modulates the actual behavior. One may just “love” to eat excessively, but again the fear of getting fat or of disease conditions… or even discomforts that develop from such gluttony… help to restrain behavior. It is not ideal, from My perspective, to have such fears be necessary, but it is a safeguard that I “engineered” within the human creation. Fear, as an emotion, is often useful and good.

Moving beyond the mundane, Holy Scripture urges you to both love the Lord and fear the Lord. With you I have emphasized love much more than fear, but some Christians need the fear of My power to punish to bring them to and keep them in My Body. The balances can and should be different for different servants of Mine, for, as you know, I love diversity. Yet even one who fears Me greatly and stands, or even cowers, in awe of My power and majesty, needs to feel My love and acceptance as a balance to fear of consequences.

Moving back to day-to-day life, but with Me as a constant companion, love is both an emotion and the potentially powerful essence of spirit. You can love others because I have and do love you. You can love those who work against you and try to harm you, in several and many ways, because I love all in this earth, despite their evil actions and lack of respect for Me. If you are willing, your spirit can love because it is “hooked into” Mine, and My love multiplies and enriches your capacity to love, and how you actually do love. With his “connection” love is the first and most natural response to any situation.

In contrast, I have no fear. I have nothing to fear, and I do not abet the emotion of fear that anyone can feel. So fear remains an emotion that can counter and negate, even, the love which comes from the spirit. Without Me fears can multiply and expand. You can be afraid of germs, of bodily deterioration, of certain other people, of institutions, of situations, of responsibilities…and… Without the balancing power of love, fear feeds on itself. Fear of one situation encourages fear of another somewhat like it, and of another…