Читать книгу The Divine Conspiracy Continued: Fulfilling God’s Kingdom on Earth - Dallas Willard, Dallas Willard - Страница 14

Even though I walk through the darkest valley,

I fear no evil; for you are with me;

your rod and your staff—they comfort me.

Such goodness, provision, protection, soul care, restoration, righteousness, and flourishing that life with the Shepherd provides allows us to face shadowy dangers and uncertainties that threaten life. We can live without fear. Living without fear is, in fact, the same existential reality as living a life without want.

Can we envision being freed to the point where not a single thing on earth, above the earth, or below the earth could cause dread to creep into our hearts? Can we begin to imagine what living a life free from the plagues of worry, anxiety, and dread would demonstrate to a world whose societal engines are stoked day and night by media franchises devoted to peddling fear and anxiety?

Why does fear play such an oversized role in our lives and our culture? What exactly are we afraid of? Well, the list is long. We are afraid we will not be happy, that we will not flourish unless we take the proper offensive and defensive positions necessary to protect ourselves and provide for every possible existential need, both real and perceived. Our search for safety and contentment is endless and inexhaustible precisely because of the intrinsic futility of relying on human abilities to provide resolution to our problems. Thus, if telling the truth on a mortgage application or quarterly report, forgiving a family member or neighbor an offense, or giving time or money to an organization from our stockpile of resources is perceived to put us or our pursuit of our individual version of the American dream in jeopardy, our moral compass is adjusted to justify our own sense of self-fulfillment, pleasure, or even security. The result is one more brick of our lives laid on a foundation of shifting sand.

It only becomes a matter of when, not if, such a life and such a civilization will implode. The mental and emotional energy required for rushing about in the vain attempt to control the uncontrollable in order to preserve what tiny sense of security we can is an exhausting and deadening errand. The effort reveals a total lack of understanding of our Shepherd, his nature, the structure of the universe God created, and the ethos of his kingdom. Without such a vision generation after generation continues the desperate search for that elusive guarantee of holistic flourishing. And our social and political ineffectiveness continues to fuel the rage and shame of unrealized desire, which continues to fill our hospitals, prisons, and morgues with stories of cataclysmic sorrow and tragic despair. One sociologist has suggested that adults today represent the most numb, obese, addicted, medicated, and indebted generation in American history.¹

The human problem has no human solution, because it is humans that are the source of the problem. We need a Shepherd.