Nothing to Fear

This opinion column by Terry Dickson was published in the life section under the title, “Righteous ‘fear’ has its place.” I found most of it unremarkable except for a few choice selections.

The slide in religious affiliation [in New England] may be because of a lack of fear.

Perhaps this is correct. Maybe more people are increasingly realizing they have nothing to fear from non-existent deities and their imaginary torture chambers.

I like what the Rev. Tommy Nelson, senior pastor at Denton Bible Church in Denton, Texas, sometimes says. He'll be reading along in the Bible and do a little interpretation. “In the original Greek,” he'll say, “the word fear means fear. Be afraid.”

I suppose he didn't get the memo from liberal theologians and apologists that Christianity is supposed to be a religion of love and peace, and he actually read Jesus' intolerant and exclusivist message in the bible!

“I'm prophesying we'll become more religious with this economic downturn,” [Rev. Jay Hanson] said. FDR famously said during the Great Depression, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

How utterly ironic! Dickson laments modern society's lack of fear of God throughout the entire column and then at the end suggests with this quotation that we have nothing to fear and should not be afraid of anything except irrational fear! Be not afraid, indeed!