John says it straight: God is love. And those who remain in love remain in God. There’s no fear in perfect love—love drives fear out.
Now, I think we get confused about that. We think if we just love hard enough, we’ll be safe. Safe from loss, safe from pain, safe from all the hard stuff. But that’s not what this means. Love doesn’t protect us from difficulty. Love actually makes us more vulnerable because we care about people and things.
What love does is give us the confidence that we’re not alone in it. That whatever comes, God is here. That our suffering isn’t bigger than God’s ability to be present in it.
Here’s what gets me: the scripture says if you can’t love a brother or sister who can see, you can’t love God who you can’t see. In other words, love has to be real. Tangible. Shown in how we treat each other. Not just nice thoughts. Actual showing up.
And when I think about loving people—really loving them—I think about all the ways it’s hard. All the ways it makes us different from each other, all the ways we hurt each other’s feelings, all the ways we misunderstand. But that’s the work. That’s what it means to be Christian.
We don’t get to love God from a safe distance while staying cold to people around us. We’ve got to actually care about them. Actually show up. Actually let love change the way we see each other.
That’s how fear loses its power over us. Not because we never feel afraid. But because we’re connected. We’re loved. We’re part of something bigger than our own terror.
A reflection by Rev. MaryGean Cope