This is the last of a short series this week on the Lordship of Jesus.

I began this series by suggesting how essential it is for followers of Jesus to be open to the Holy Spirit. Not to do so is to risk being led by forces other than God and, as Jurgen Moltmann says, seeing the church waste away. One of those forces is fear and so many of us – maybe even all of us – have been affected by fear in our lives. Fear often manifests in control and in this we see a force that works in direct opposition to the Holy Spirit, who seeks to set free. Fear motivates us – drives us, even – to attempt to control a situation. For example, the fear of appearing foolish will have us striving hard to ensure that all is perfect in our world, controlling every fine detail of our life and often the lives of those around us. At those times when the attempt fails – or is in danger of failing – anger will sometimes surface, be it directed towards another or turned inwards. A quick temper can often be a characteristic of a controlling person.

Plenty of churches have been affected by control over the centuries. You’ll know the scenario well: one person – often the leader – or maybe one family have a strong grip on all that happens within its life; some begin to react to that control and suddenly the church is split in two. An alternative is that no one reacts and the controlling person continues to dominate thus allowing no one to be released into their calling in God, leaving the church dependant on a handful of people. Neither scenario is good; both can lead to a wasting away of life and vitality.

But if individual churches can be affected by fear within the walls, we also see church affected by fear as it reacts to what is happening beyond its walls. The perceived relentless advance of secularism, or the apparent progress of radical Islam, or a million other seeming threats of a modern and post-modern world is causing many in church to fear for the future. The UK is loosing its Christian identity; moral standards are falling; discrimination and even persecution are at the door; the standards of other religions are replacing Christian standards. What is to be done in such circumstances but be fearful? And out of that fear comes the control – and so we hear calls for tighter moral laws; for tighter immigration rules; for legal action; for protecting privilege and status.

The antidote to fear, of course, is trust. And if the Spirit is saying ‘Jesus is Lord’ then our response to that must be to trust. Trusting can often be a difficult thing to do – and there is almost a constant struggle in our soul between fear and trust. But if Jesus is Lord then surely we will choose to trust.

Moltmann suggests that not only does the church need to be open the Spirit but also to the world and to the future. But in fear the church is not be open to the world. The world around us is getting worse and getting more aggressive towards us and so we shut the door on it. But God’s mission – and therefore the church’s mission – in this world has not changed and the call for us is to still reach out and proclaim the gospel. When fear is replaced by trust then we can then turn and face the world in a very different state of mind. Under the Lordship of Jesus we can respond to the world in the way that God does so – not with fear and hatred but with love and service.

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