Dear fear,

Dear fear,

You don’t even get a capital letter because you are not a name worth giving that much recognition to.

I have figured out your game.

As a kid, I thought you came in the form of something hiding under my bed. As a teenager, I thought you were nothing more than a phobia. I thought you were a roller-coaster or speaking in front of a large crowd. But now I know what you seem to really be.

You are the reoccurrence of something that has deeply wounded us. You are the loss we faced that left us shattered. You are the breakup that left us wondering if there was anyone else out there. You are the rejection that we came to know at too early of an age. You are the phone call in the middle of the night. You are the knock on the door. You are the diagnosis.

I have come to realize that you, fear, fight your best battles in form of reminders. It is that scene that I know is coming in This Is Us that will finally reveal what happened to Jack. I do not fear that scene, I fear what that scene will remind me of. It is the nights in Atlanta walking to my car. I do not fear the night. I become fearful when I start to think back to that night three summers ago when I was robbed at gun point.

If I have figured out the game, I can start playing.

Fear, if you are reminder or if you are just a reoccurrence of what has already happened then the only thing you hold over us is the ability to make us remember pain. I’ll give it to you, you are good at making us remember. However, if remembering pain is your ace then you will not win this round.

Remembering pain – I am capable to bear that when I have the right vision. When I look into those moments with an earthly perspective, all I see is what those moments made of me. All I see is a narrative that felt like the circumstance would be become my identity.

But when I look into the rooms that held tears, desperate prayers, and even slight unbelief, through the lens of eternity, I am daring enough to look beyond what is seen. Pain will break us into a million pieces, but His grace picks them all back up. When I look to the unseen, I see a God who breathes on every last dead and broken piece and raises them back to life – it’s His amazing grace.

Fear, you think that making us remember or reminding us of past pain is how you will defeat us but that is not the case with this Jesus of mine. When I remember His greatest pain, when I remember the moment that left Him at His weakest, I do not see His defeat…

I see yours.

You see, if I we never again remembered the blood sweat brow and nail pierced hands. If we never again remembered the parched lips met with the taste of vinegar. If we never again remembered the look of death on our Savior’s face. If we never again remembered the dark of that night. Then we would lose, because to remember that day is to remember the great price that Jesus was willing to pay for His Father to get His children back. To forget that day is to rob ourselves of the chance to remember the day that followed three days later. To forget that day is miss the greatest expression of love this world will ever know. To forget that day is to not walk through this life confident that not even the power of death would hold Him down.

So please by all means, if you want us to remember pain then we will, but just know this time we are going to do it through the right lens and that means we are going to use your own game against you to win.

Past pain is no longer something we must fear to face again. Fear, next time you knock on my door to deliver a memory, I’ll take it. But then I will remind you that even pain is a place that Jesus draws near too. I’ll visit the past pain any time because it is there that I will be reminded of how Jesus didn’t let me stay there. I’ll remember His past faithfulness any time that you would like.

You want us to remember? Not a problem.

But just so we are clear, this means you lose.

Sincerely,

The winner of this game