Pathways Press.com

Written by Brian Morykon, a contemporary writer.

The faith tradition I grew up in warned us about “slippery slopes.” There were different kinds: the worldly slopes of sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll, and the spiritual slopes of bad doctrines and weird practices… Whether warned about them or not, many Christians have a built-in slippery-slope detector. That’s normal and useful. Some hillsides are genuinely dangerous. But the same fear that keeps you from stepping off a cliff can also keep you from stepping up to an overlook. Wisdom is learning to discern when a fear is keeping you alive and when it is keeping you from being alive… You might feel resistance being around people not like you. You might feel it reading a spiritual classic, whose author speaks from another time and a different way of being. You might feel it when you hear the quiet, insistent invitation of the Master to serve someone in a way you know will be the death and the life of you, and you just don’t want to do it. This resistance is usually fear—fear dressed in a robe of reason. May I suggest asking the Holy Spirit to help unrobe this fear and discern the root of resistance that keeps you from fullness of life in Christ?  The Spirit might uncover… A fear of uncertainty.  A fear of losing identity. A fear of losing connections. A fear of being hurt or hurting others. A fear of being heretical or unfaithful.  A fear of offending God and thus being abandoned in some way by God. A fear of getting to heaven and being met by Christ’s disappointed face.  All these fears and more may keep us “safe” right where we are, but they also keep us from abundant life.

The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full. [John 10:10]