Overcoming fear

As we conclude this series on Do Not Fear (instead, trust and obey), I had a crazy idea about fears/phobias.  Here is a list of some fears/phobias; can you identify them?  You might even identify with some of them yourself:

• Ablutophobia
• Acrophobia
• Arachibutyrophobia
• Bromidrophobia
• Coulrophobia
• Glossophobia
• Hexakosioihexkontahexaphobia
• Lilapsophobia
• Nomophobia
• Zuigerphobia

And this is just a small sampling of the things we fear.  Psychologists use a method called desentization to help some people overcome some fears.  The process is to expose yourself to increasing amounts of whatever it is that you fear.  I have never been through any of this, but I imagine it is a terrifying experience, but one that helps some people.  I have never been comfortable with heights.  As a teen, I didn’t want to get on the roof to clean out the gutters (and truth be told I wasn’t extremely excited to be at the top of the ladder either).  I avoided walking out to the edge of cliffs or up the windows of tall buildings (over three stories).  Then I worked at Centrifuge where I had to come face to face with this fear.  Outside of the campus of North Greenville College (now University of North Greenville) was a rock face called Glassy Mountain. One of our staff members had equipment for rappelling so up the mountain some of us went.  I watched, stood back from the edge, even belayed others from down below.  But my going over the rock face and rappelling the 70-80 feet was a non-starter.  Kent explained to me why I could trust the rope, the Swiss seat (harness you wear) and all the knots the rope was tied to atop the cliff. 

Finally, on the third or fourth time up, Kent had convinced me that I could trust all the preparation, all the equipment, and those holding both ends of the rope.  He even tied the ropes at the top to two trees and a car bumper to give me more reasons to trust.  So on came the Swiss seat, the rope placed through the figure eight device and then those dreaded instructions, “Just walk backwards a step at a time until you get to the edge, then keep walking until you are parallel to the ground (otherwise you face plant against the cliff face), we’ve got you!”  And so back I walked, even getting parallel to the ground (but I didn’t look down), and then I slowly let the rope slide through my hands as I walked down the side of the cliff for about 25 feet.  Then the cliff face inverts in and you are simply hanging on the rope until you allow it to slide through your hands descending to the ground.  I took a few minutes to spin around and look out over the valley (the same one you could see from the safety of the top), but hanging there in the air, there just seemed to be something different about the view and how I felt about myself (and heights).

My fear had stopped me so many times from experiencing the thrill and freedom I had just had.  What changed?  The constant voice of Kent encouraging me, talking to me about trust, and seeing the process of my friends trusting, too, helped me to not extinguish my fear, but to move forward in spite of my fear. The same is true in the things God calls us to do, specifically about being His ambassador (2 Corinthians 5).  We can provide help in sharing your testimony and in sharing the gospel.  We can model these for you by taking you with us as we share.  These are to build your confidence in knowing what to say.  Trusting the Holy Spirit to guide you and empower you comes as you take the next steps to be obedient in sharing as God’s ambassador.  When you do, I would really enjoy hearing about your opportunities and experiences.

Pressing On…

Ron Tipton, Senior Pastor