Fear, punishment, love

The things that keep you awake at night. Your feet are too cold.  The room’s too hot. The room’s not dark enough, the duvet’s too light. The sheets are crumpled, all the covers are inexplicably on the opposite side of the bed. The things that keep you awake at night. The neighbours are having a party— it’s Saturday, they don’t have to be up for work tomorrow. The foxes are having a… party too though their, erm, socialising always sound like they’re murdering each other. The mice in the attic banging around with their head clamped in the trap, the tiny fly that snuck through the window you opened because the room was too hot and is now brushing your face with it’s minuscule wings, the pigeon making his way home after closing time that flies full pelt into your patio doors. I mean it’s dark, he can’t see. And while we’re talking dumb animals, the bed-shaking snoring that’s been going on the past hour mere centimetres away from your head, and  the surprised yeowll and bemused whimpering that fill the darkened space when you resort to violence to shut it up— it’s the only way. The wind rattling the letter box, the rain beating on the roof, the police helicopter hovering overhead, the ambulance alarming up Croydon Road, the boy racers donuting down Beddington Lane. The things that keep you awake at night. That’s why you’ve got permanent bags under your eyes, that and your age, but mostly the nightly stentorian serenade of your bedfellow. Eventually the local residents, the local wildlife and the local weather conditions call it a night and a blissful silence falls. For a minute. And then, your brain, noticing that you’re awake now, decides it’s time to start thinking about what you have to do tomorrow and that it really would be useful to go to sleep now: just think about all you have to do tomorrow. But before that, what about that thing somebody said today that really upset you? And remember hat time they really upset you thirty years ago? Then you notice your feet are cold which might be the first sign of diabetes or circulatory deficiency or isn’t it one of the symptoms of leprosy? At night with no distractions your brain is its own Google, with all the sensible search results excluded. When you’ve run through the entire  record of past hurts, enumerated the complete list of present stresses, and exhausted the range of incredible diagnoses— you’ve either fallen asleep ready to wake for morning Mass in two hours time or your mind is about to torment you with… metaphysics. If it was how many angels on the head of a pin that would be alright, because, you know the answer to that and watching the seraphs minueting on silver is like counting sheep; but it’s not the heavenly line dance tonight, instead you’re lying awake worrying that you are destined to spend eternity in hell. Or perhaps the person next to you, the person wearing your ring, the person breathing ever so quietly, is destined to an eternal life of endless, conscious torment. 

Some of us are more likely to have had that particular kind of insomnia than others, some of us have been told, quite openly and with some barely disguised relish by those who are supposed to have our spiritual care in their hands, that that is what awaits us when our time on earth is o’er— the flames of hell. Sometimes people say these things in church, and sometimes, some of us listen.  Over the centuries the recipients of hellfire and damnation discourses have changed. Currently it is LGBT people who are preacher’s pet, but at one time or another it has been everybody from naughty children to independent women, single mothers to adulterous wives and every time someone climbs into the pulpit to denounce people as irredeemable, it’s pretty much carved in stone that the targeted group  is  one that is vulnerable or powerless. That said, sometimes hellfire and damnation has been promised to Roman Catholics or non believers; who are, it’s true, unlikely to have been present in the protestant conventicle to hear the threats, but I’ve known more than one person with a  non-believing spouse who has spent night after night worrying themselves sick that their loved one has a one way ticket to the fiery furnace.

What an obscenity. What an abomination. What a foul, blasphemous thing to make a child of God think an eternity of excruciating suffering will be their fate. And what an abominable, obscene, blasphemous vision of God it pronounces.

Is that the sort of God you worship? Is that a God worthy of worship? One who wants you to live in constant fear, one who demands his son is tortured to death on the cross for  your sins but then burns you in Hell forever anyway? Maybe that’s what God is like, maybe that’s what the Bible says. I don’t believe either of those things to be true.

Here are some words from the first letter of St John:

God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them. Love has been perfected among us in this: that we may have boldness on the day of judgment, because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear; for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.

Whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.

The fear of hell is a strange way indeed to preach the love of God.

In the book of Proverbs you will find this written:

The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

What the Hebrew word translated there as ‘fear’ means is not cowering afraid hiding behind the sofa fear, it is not the sort of fear you will experience when you’re threatened by a maniac with a knife or a mob of thugs fired up on hate: ‘fear of the Lord’ means ‘awe’- an entirely appropriate response of reverence, respect and wonder in the presence of the Holy.

Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Jesus said. Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. And even the hairs of your head are all counted. So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.

Fear has its uses. Fear will stop you doing something: it will not stop you wanting to do something. Jesus knew this:

You have heard that it was said to those of ancient times, ‘You shall not murder’; and ‘whoever murders shall be liable to judgment.’ But I say to you that if you are angry with a brother or sister, you will be liable to judgment; and if you insult a brother or sister, you will be liable to the council; and if you say, ‘You fool,’ you will be liable to enter Himmon’s Vale of fire.

‘Himmon’s Vale of fire’ was a rubbish tip outside Jerusalem that was constantly burning. You’ve not heard of it before because it has traditionally and dubiously been translated from the Greek as ‘Hell.’

How can you stop yourself getting angry? You can’t. How do you stop adulterous thoughts coming into your mind? You can’t. Are we all then condemned to the everlasting bin fire?

As with all Bible teaching, all Bible quotes, all Bible passages, look at the context. It’s always vital. Jesus is not giving a how-to-avoid-hell tick list there. He’s encouraging his followers to go beyond what is required by the letter of the law. When St Paul wrote ‘those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God’ he was encouraging his readers to do the right thing, knowing that they will never be able to avoid doing the wrong thing. When St Paul wrote to the church in Rome, in that template beloved of all hellfire preachers, firing up his listeners about the loathsome habits of the pagans:

‘Look, they worship idols; their men lust after each other, their women too. They’re wicked, covetous, gossiping, slanderous, haughty, foolish’ 

he’s whipping up the crowd into a frenzy of self-righteous hate before abruptly stopping to say: ‘erm, look in this mirror: I’m talking about you here’. That passage used to judge so many, is Paul pretending to be a hate preacher so he can shock his listeners out of judging others. Really. Read past the clobber passage. And in this, he is but mirroring the words of Jesus.

Do not judge, so that you may not be judged.  For with the judgment you make you will be judged, and the measure you give will be the measure you get.

Fear will stop you doing something: it will not stop you wanting to do something. But Love is stronger than fear, conquers all fear, pushes fear away. God is love. Love cannot be a sin, because God is love.

However we have lived our lives, none of us will reach the end of our days sinless. We should try, of course, to follow Jesus to the best of our abilities: not because we are afraid, but because it is the right thing to do; because we love God, not because we are afraid of hell.

And to follow Jesus, the rules are simple. You don’t need a preacher to interpret them for you. Love God, love your neighbour. Do to others as you would have them do to you.

Nevertheless. We are not saved by what we do. We are not damned by what we do. Nobody at the final judgement, not one single person, catholic, protestant, orthodox, progressive, married, single, divorced, gay, straight, young, old, saint or sinner has any defence before the judge except ‘Jesus died for me’. It’s the best plea, the only plea.

God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

You are not saved by what you do. You are not damned by what you do. You are saved by the grace of God, and the saving death of the Son.

Do not be afraid.