The upshot of all of this is that I, now armed with greater understanding, determined to be an instrument of fearlessness in the lives of others. Now, I realized that the only fear worthwhile was the fear of anything that might weaken or remove my relationship with God. This brings me back to my earliest statement about fear being such a motivator. Jesus warned us not to fear those who could merely harm the body, but those who could kill the soul. When I see men of faith purposely using fear about our future or livelihood to move and manipulate people, alarm bells go off in my heart.
Fear generates an independent life for any perceived threat.
My teenage years coincided with the McCarthy era when we thought communists were coming out of water pipes and lived in our attics. I recall a famous tent evangelist who promised to reveal to us the biggest communist in America, but we had to have tickets for that night, though they were free. He asked that we be discreet in sharing the tickets. Good ploy there. I wished that someone merely preaching the gospel would be so successful.