Freedom From Fear Comes Through Love
This is a line from Psalm 3, Nan Merrill – Psalms for Praying. Fear is an ingredient that was liberally added to my understanding of God as I grew up. Fear is an ingredient that power mongers wield to control those who have “less than”, and fanatics hold it as their creed over those who see through different eyes. Religious abuse is based on fear.
Fear and freedom cannot co-habitate within me – they are absolute rivals for my heart and soul and the battle inside gets fierce when freedom is threatened. Yet fear is my response when threatened, or silenced, or when the bruise of the past is touched – instinctively I retreat to fear! Why? Why is my response not from freedom when I am threatened? I live so far away from those places of fear now. The wind of the Spirit has never spoken fear to me – only the tenderness of freedom and hope.
The practice of moving into freedom doesn’t come as quickly as I want it to. But “practice” is the only way I know that will move me from old responses to the true one of Trust in Love, in the Beloved, where the fear is silenced and Truth is spoken to my heart and soul.
Over the past few weeks I have seen the effects of legalistic/cult like behaviour in the circle of those I love, the circle I have had to walk away from, yet they cannot see it from within. As I hear of their pain my own fears rise for I know they have been unable to ever truly hear my own pain. These wounds of the soul are deeper than we realize and perhaps the ‘bruise’ left behind will always remain. Religious/spiritual abuse may also take a lifetime to heal.
As I retreated to my place of solitude and silence, even away from my beloved fiance, I sat with the fears and heard them for what they are – bruises of the past that cannot sit with the freedom my heart lives for now. Picking up my new book, Psalms for Praying, I found this Psalm 3 to speak to me, to let the wind of the Spirit bathe me again in freedom, hope and truth:
O Beloved, how numerous are my fears!
They rise up within me whispering
There is no help for you in Love.
Yet You, O my Beloved, radiate around me,
My glory,
Lifting my head high.
I cry aloud to You,
And You answer within my heart.
I lie down and sleep;
I wake again, for my Beloved
Holds me with strength and tenderness.
I shall withstand all my fears as they arise within me.
Rise up, Love!
Set me free, my Beloved!
For with You in my heart
My fears will be transformed into Love.
Freedom from fear comes through Love;
May the Beloved’s blessing reign within all hearts!
From Psalm 4 – Nan Merrill, Praying the Psalms
You know that the Beloved dwells with those
Who are filled with love;
And hears when our hearts cry out.
Though you may feel angry,
Do not give in to fear;
Commune with the Heart of your heart
As you rest,
And be in silence.
Make peace with your fears
And trust in Love.
I hold this in my heart and let it be infused into my being to help me build new responses, in freedom.