"Do not worry over things that generate preoccupation and anxiety. One thing only is necessary: to lift up your spirit and love God."
-St Padre Pio
I am very discerning and cautious about speaking about my faith at work. If I do so, it is somewhat clandestine because of where I work--an environment that is relatively hostile to orthodox religious belief. That being said, if given an opening in the right time and place, I try not to pass on the opportunity to speak about faith in Jesus Christ.
That happened this morning. The building was quiet, and not many people were in yet. A co-worker came over to chat, and she seemed upset. She was shaken, saying that a girl had just been shot up the road where my co-worker commutes on in a road-rage incident--a completely senseless and tragic act of violence over a traffic merge. She was 18, had just graduated from the local high school, shot in the head, and died.
"This world is just crazy," she anxiously said. "I just don't understand it. I'm just so fearful."
I knew where she was coming from. She has three teenage and 20-something kids, and it is a crazy world we live in. I knew she was Catholic, but I didn't know to what extent she believed really.
"That's awful," I said, "honestly my faith is the only thing that keeps me from going off the rails into worry and anxiety these days."
"What do you mean?" she replied, a bit taken aback.
"Well, you're right about the world. But thankfully as a Christian we are not living for life in this world--we're preparing for the next."
She looked at me with a little bit of deer-in-headlights stare.
"I mean we need to do what we can--to do good, and all that. I struggle with anxiety myself, so part of trusting in God's plan and having faith in Him is survival for me, because I think if this world was all there was it would break me. But it's not...there's more to life than what's going on here."
"I don't know how you do that," she said incredulously, and with a slight tone of flabbergasted disbelief.
"Well," I went on, "it helps me to trust that when God sends good into our life and God sends hardships and tragedy, it is all because He loves us, when we trust in Him as a loving Father. When we try to align our will with His--wanting only what He wants, doing only what He wants us to do--there's a kind of "peace that surpasses understanding" that the Bible talks about, that helps me survive and gives me an assurance. So that's what I try to do. Not easy, but I have peace despite the craziness in this world."
I didn't have time to go into the effects of Original Sin and the Fall and free will (haha, felt I was saying too much already!). I think my words shook her a little, like she was expecting commiseration and a kind of hopelessness and didn't know what to make of it. I felt a little foolish, but I'm getting used to that. I'd rather look foolish and have somebody come to see another way of living in the upside-down world--the Way that Jesus lays out for us--if it helps them, then stay quietly in my place.
If we don't have the assurance of God's presence and provision, forgiveness and grace, that He has the wheel and only asks us to trust Him...well, I can understand the worry and apprehension. I have lived with it all my life, but the world is almost so off the rails that to continue to do so would result in my imminent mental demise.
So I have to turn it over.
I remember doing this when our second child was born. Everything felt like too much, too heavy. And so I took a drive while Deb slept in the hospital bed and stood outside a Wawa smoking a cigarette and thinking and fretting. And I just said, "I can't." Lord, I can't, it's too much. Please, I entrust her to you. I trust you, please do it and help me do it too." And that was that.
I knew some people say faith and religion is a crutch. Meh. For me, as I may have said before, it's about survival, with a happy and surprising byproduct being...peace. A peace that surpasses understanding, and is available to all.
Evangelization doesn't have to be a dirty word. It can express itself in listening or genuine concern for another persons and their situation or well being. It can be doing something for them out of love and putting your own needs aside. And it can offer a kind of peace that the world doesn't offer, because it comes from God alone. It is speaking the Truth in love. Don't forget the love part. And do so "with gentleness and respect" (1 Peter 3:15). They are free, like everyone, to make choices. You never know, though....you might give someone another way.