Love And Hate

I’ll tell you how. We justify it with fear. Fear is nearly always what produces hate. Americans were scared to death in those days after 9/11. We felt violated and our deepest instinct was to do anything that was necessary to restore a sense of security again. We felt angry at the senseless loss of life. We felt powerless and just wanted to climb back on top again, to regain some control. And as natural as these feelings are, and quite apart from whatever measures our government took and did not take, this quick path back to control and power is not where we find God on an individual basis. This is because the drive toward control and power comes from fear, and there is no fear in love, and God is love, therefore there is no fear in God.

There’s a passage I often share at funerals. It is from the book of Lamentations, written by the prophet Jeremiah.

Lamentations 3:19-31 (MSG)

19 I'll never forget the trouble, the utter lostness, the taste of ashes, the poison I've swallowed.

20 I remember it all—oh, how well I remember— the feeling of hitting the bottom.

21 But there's one other thing I remember, and remembering, I keep a grip on hope:

22 GOD's loyal love couldn't have run out, his merciful love couldn't have dried up.

23 They're created new every morning. How great your faithfulness!

24 I'm sticking with GOD (I say it over and over). He's all I've got left.

25 GOD proves to be good to the man who passionately waits, to the woman who diligently seeks.

26 It's a good thing to quietly hope, quietly hope for help from GOD.

27 It's a good thing when you're young to stick it out through the hard times.

28 When life is heavy and hard to take, go off by yourself. Enter the silence.

29 Bow in prayer. Don't ask questions: Wait for hope to appear.

30 Don't run from trouble. Take it full-face. The "worst" is never the worst.

31 Why? Because the Master won't ever walk out and fail to return.

What are we told is the spiritual response to suffering? How are we told that we will find God in it? We’re told to wait, to seek, to quietly hope, to stick it out, to go off by ourselves and enter into silence, to bow in prayer, to not ask questions, to not run from trouble, from the darkness that is swallowing up our hearts and filling up our minds with fear, but instead to “take it full-face.” To not try to just “get on with life,” which is why Bush’s advice post-9/11 to get back to the malls and start spending money again was terrible advice. This crushing blow should have been a time for reflection, for quiet prayer, for entering the silence, for receiving grace and humility. It was not a time to again pick ourselves up by our own bootstraps, but rather a time when we should have been encouraged to not run from our fear, to take it full-face, and to trust that the worst – no matter how bad it looks – is never the worst, because God surely will not fail to return.

Ironically, the T-shirts after 9/11 that proudly proclaimed “These colors don’t run” were actually expressing the particular way in which we as Americans DO run. We run from silence, from humility, from quietness, from reflection, straight to the place of power. When we are afraid, we jump into our tanks and planes and warships and we pick up guns and grenades. We did it in Vietnam and Korea because we were afraid of Communists. We did it in Iraq in the early 90’s because we were afraid of losing control of our oil. We are doing it now because we are afraid of religious extremists. This is what we do. That pastor in Gainesville is afraid, and because of his fear, he is hateful. That church in Westboro, Kansas hates almost everybody. They view God as hateful, and they are living under massive weights of fear.