(Note: this article originally appeared in Spiritual Life, vol. 38 no. 1 [spring 1992], pp. 45-49.)
Fear is the great obstacle we face on the road to faith. It provokes doubt and breaks our confidence. At times it seems to tell us that God is nothing more than an image we invent to help us cope with the difficulties of life - and we may well believe this when we are afraid. At other times, its message is that even if God does exist, God cannot really affect our lives, cannot or will not help us in any meaningful way. Fear, especially when chronic, can undermine our faith and rob us of the vitality we need to live productively. Yet, paradoxically, fear can also become the door to a deep, abiding faith - if we know how to respond to it in a way that preserves our own presence of mind, and with it our sense of God's presence.
Fear is the sign of an uncertain situation. It is hard to live with insecurity, and so we struggle for certainty in ways that usually only increase our fear. We may turn for reassurance to people who understand our situation little better than we do, even if they appear to be experts. We may turn for company and support to friends who cannot be with us all the time, who have problems of their own, and who cannot provide the solutions we seek. Even the closest members of our family never understand completely what it is that we experience, and though they may genuinely wish to help us, they may simply lack the power or the resources to provide an answer that will reassure us in our anxiety.
If we find no relief from fear by turning to other people, we may seek it by turning inward to our own thoughts. We try to find certainty in uncertain situations perhaps by imagining the worst possible outcomes we might face; we hope that by preparing ourselves for these outcomes we will protect ourselves from fear. Instead, we end up frightening ourselves even more. By letting our imaginations run wild we easily fall into obsessive worrying. What we imagine scares us, but we cannot let it go because our need for certainty requires a specific image on which to focus. Worry is actually an attempt to escape from fear, but only draws us deeper into it. By worrying we strive, in our thoughts, for a sense of control over an unmanageable situation. But instead we find only a self-perpetuating cycle of worry and fear: what we imagine when we worry only frightens us, and becomes a cause of further worry.
Where then shall we turn? If we look for another human voice to reassure us, we may find one, but no human words can stop the fear for very long. Unless we are totally self-deceived, we soon discover that another person's understanding and insight, like our own, is limited. If we turn for certainty to our own inner voice, we find a buzz of thoughts churning in our minds, groping for knowledge where we have no knowledge, in a wishful attempt at control that merely increases our anxiety. The only alternative left, then, is to listen for God's voice.
But what is this voice of God, and where can we discover it? It is that "still, small voice" (1 Kings 19:12), discernible only in moments of inner solitude and quiet. Such silence requires that our own inner voice be completely still, that the inner monologue that calculates, imagines and worries be quieted. We cannot, however, simply tell ourselves not to worry, and worrying about worrying will certainly do no good. We need a deeper understanding of ourselves.
Many today speak of the importance of "being present to our own experience." To become silent and receptive to the divine voice we need to maintain a presence with ourselves, and within ourselves. This means staying with our present situation, in this case staying with the fear. When we worry, we try to escape fear by fleeing into a false sense of certainty, which is actually an abandonment of ourselves at the critical moment. Maintaining a self-presence means remaining aware of the raw experience, the fear, and not allowing our minds to race in a frantic search for escape. In this regard, maintaining an attitude of watchful, meditative observation is helpful. Observing ourselves as if from a distance, seeing without reacting, can help us remain present with ourselves even when we are conscious of our fear.
Remaining still within ourselves, we may discover the quiet moment that lies within the heart of fear. The great paradox of fear is that it often contains such moments. To find them, though, we must do a most difficult thing, which is to drop the demand for certainty. This is one of the hardest challenges we face, but it is possible, provided we are honest enough to see that a sure knowledge of the outcome is beyond our grasp. Living without certainty means being open to the unexpected - even the unexpected good. Fearful situations change us, and they can change us for the better if we meet them on the ground of truth, maintaining our presence even when the situation seems hopeless.
We may have to live in darkness for a while. Our lack of knowledge about the future, about the way our problems will resolve, makes the way obscure and difficult. But we can learn to live through the "dark night" if we cease our frantic efforts to escape. We will then find ourselves alone, with no external source of support to which we can confidently turn. All we have is the silence - but this silence is God's dwelling place.
If, by maintaining our presence and stilling our useless mental activity through watchful contemplation, we can find a quiet place within ourselves, then we can establish a communion with God even during our anxious moments. The stillness and calmness we can find in a fearful time, when we would really expect ourselves to be agitated, are not signs of mere emptiness. They are active; they speak to us. The contrast between this stillness and our previously agitated mental state itself speaks to us of a higher presence that can even grow into a source of assurance. If we listen, we may begin to sense something: "Fear not, for I am with you" (Isaiah 41:10); "The battle is not yours but God's" (2 Chronicles 20:15); "The Lord will fight for you; you need only be still" (Exodus 14:14). We may not hear actual words, but we may find an insight, a new way of looking at the situation that had not previously occurred to us. Or we may find nothing more specific than the sense of a presence of love, of acceptance even during a time of great difficulty.
Such moments are moments of grace. There is no method by which we can be certain of capturing them. No one can tell us precisely how to bring them about; here, too, certainty fails. Nevertheless, we can prepare ourselves for these moments. We do so by meeting our difficulties with truth and love. We meet problems just as they present themselves to us. We keep watch over the mental activity through which we usually try to escape. We maintain our presence in the situation by remaining aware and resolving not to deceive ourselves. We find a calm, observing presence within ourselves that "sees us through it." By maintaining this sense of presence we show love to ourselves and toward others who may also be affected by the difficulty of the situation. If we have this love, then we have the strength to carry the cross.
The inner stillness that meets fear with love is more than just our presence with and to ourselves; it is God's presence with us. In this presence we can converse with God, the inner monologue of our frantic thoughts giving way to a healing dialogue with a transcendent source of wisdom and peace. We can speak to God, express our deepest concerns, and then spend most of our time listening.
We cannot listen, however, if we still try to control the situation or calculate the outcome. We can listen only in a state of perfect, childlike trust in the center of calm beneath the storm, as Elijah listened to the "still, small voice." We may then find the assurance of a deeper presence, a friend who remains with us when it seems we have left all of our other friends behind.
Perhaps we need moments of fear and doubt in order to find this inner presence. Without such moments we would never question ourselves, we would never pause to reflect, we would never really become aware. It is therefore perhaps no accident that the first verse of Psalm 91 can be translated in two ways, each of them faithful to the original Hebrew: "He who dwells in the secret place of the Most High, shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty" (NKJV), or "The Most High dwells in darkness; the Almighty abides in shadow." The paradox of fear is that these two radically different translations of the same verse fit together perfectly. The "secret place of the Most High," God's dwelling place, is the dark, quiet place in our own consciousness where we drop our concern for certainty and confront ourselves in perfect solitude. In this dark, quiet place we accept our lack of knowledge about the course our lives will take, and trust the stillness that comes to us in spite of it. As dark as this place may seem, once we know that God abides here with us, we will be in no hurry to leave.
God will not abandon us, if we do not abandon ourselves. Even in the dark and fearful experience of guilt, when we seem to turn actively against ourselves, God remains with us. Guilt cannot simply be psychologized away as the product of neurosis. Sometimes our sense of guilt may be exaggerated, but sometimes there is a genuine recognition that we have violated authentic standards of integrity. In these cases, too, we need to maintain our presence in the situation. By not running away, we may be able to learn something that will help us to set the situation right, or to do what we can to alleviate the harmful consequences of our actions. No sin is unforgivable, as long as we are sincerely searching for the truth. We can easily take ourselves out of God's presence if we demand of ourselves a perfection that no human being can ever hope to have. But if we can return to the stillness with compassion for our own limitations, we find that God is still there and has always been there.
If we can maintain our solitary friendship with God we may become blessed to find even the most difficult situations resolving in unexpected ways. No one can give us this as a guarantee, and we cannot make it the object of a willful quest. It is ultimately a matter of grace. Nevertheless, we can know that whatever the outcome of the situation we can emerge from it stronger, more loving and more whole, as long as we maintain that presence with ourselves and with God. It is in this sense that "for those who love God," "all things work together for good" (Romans 8:28): this, not the promise of a forever peaceful existence, is the basis of our trust and our hope. It is our lifeline of strength in time of fear.