Fear Stops Here
We all know that the Covid-19 virus spreads from person to person. We also all know that each of us therefore has the ability to slow and stop its spread.
What if we could do the same thing with fear? What if we could also stop fear from spreading through our communities?
I believe that the Church in America has a priceless opportunity to step up and say
FEAR STOPS HERE.
How Firebreaks Work
In wildland firefighting, a firebreak is a deforested band of dirt plowed through the forest that keeps a wildfire from spreading further.
The concept is simple: remove the fuel, stop the fire.
The same principle applies with fear.
How Fear Spreads
Fear spreads from person to person, but unlike a viral infection, you don’t even have to be physically proximate with someone else to catch or spread fear—it can happen through our communication networks.
Ever felt fear after reading a headline or receiving an email?
Exactly.
Fear is contagious.
But peace is also contagious.
Becoming a “Fearbreak”
After the Resurrection, Jesus proclaimed “peace” over his disciples.
Followers of Jesus have nothing to fear—has he not told us?
“In this world you will have trouble, but have no fear: I have overcome the world.”
Therefore each of us has the opportunity to stop the wildfire of fear from spreading beyond us.
Each of us has the opportunity to become a “fearbreak.”
Each of us can say, in the name of Jesus:
FEAR STOPS HERE.
The most important gift we can share with an anxious world is the peace that the Lord has given us.
You Can Make a Difference
Like a virus, fear needs a host.
Like a fire, fear needs a source of fuel.
When we declare FEAR STOPS HERE, we bring God’s peace to our circumstances and communities and fear’s spread is stopped.
We Can Flatten the Curve of Fear in Our Communities
The Covid-19 virus is here among us, and there is nothing we can do about that fact: we can’t change our current circumstances.
What we can change, however, is the future.
How we react to fear today will affect what our communities are like in the future.
During the Spanish Flu Pandemic in 1918, different cities had different responses to the influenza virus’s spread. By late September of that year, e.g., the virus was already making its way through the citizens of Philadelphia. Nevertheless, the city’s public health director refused to cancel a big Liberty parade that had been scheduled for September 28 in support of the American war effort for World War I. Over 200,000 people attended the parade.
Three days later, every hospital bed in the city was filled, and 2,600 people died before the week was out.
In St. Louis, the city health director—a man named Dr. Max Starkloff—forced social distancing and quarantine measures as soon as the first cases of influenza appeared in the city. As a result St. Louis was able to “flatten the curve,” and compared with Philadelphia, had thousands of fewer deaths during the fall of 1918.
What if we made the decision to flatten the curve of fear in our communities?
What if the rate of fear in Dallas became noticeably lower than in other cities because of our commitment to spread peace instead of fear?
“FEAR STOPS HERE.”
How do we do this? How can we become people of peace? How can we beat back fear?
The foundation of peace is a decision to trust God with tomorrow and to focus on what each of us can control today.
The FEAR STOPS HERE Daily* Checklist
When fear begins to rise within you, ask yourself the following three questions:
Can I make it through today?
Have I taken the OBVIOUS next step that’s right in front of me today?
Is there an opportunity that’s opened up through my circumstances that will allow me to love God or my neighbor today?
If the answer to any of those questions is YES, then it’s time to kick fear to the curb until tomorrow.
Fear comes from worrying about a tomorrow that is inherently outside of our control.
Courage is the confidence that comes when we choose to focus only on today and trust God with tomorrow.
(Matthew 6:34.)
*Use every morning, and any other time you feel fear or dread.
Join the FEAR STOPS HERE Campaign
Make the decision that fear stops with you.
Be the non-anxious presence in all of your networks.
Create a handmade sign and post it in your window, or draw on your sidewalk, or write in big letters on your fence: FEAR STOPS HERE.
Drop the #fearstopshere hashtag in your social media posts.
Use Fear Stops Here as your new email signature.
Stop FEAR and Spread PEACE.
Let me know how it goes!
Found in East Dallas, Sunday, March 29, 2020.
My quarantine sermon for 3/29/2020 was entitled “Fear Stops Here.”
Sermon begins at the 22:00 min mark.