On Being Scared

On Being Scared

Most, if not all people have been scared sometime in their life.  It may have been by something trivial such as a sudden loud thunderclap, something appearing suddenly, or as a child, an imaginary boogeyman lurking under a bed.

I can remember being scared by something more than a trivial scare when as a twenty something young man, I was engaged in skydiving (my crazy side) and my main parachute failed.  Out came the reserve chute and I safely floated to earth.  My fellow jumpers asked me how I was and I told them I was fine, but down deep inside, that really scared me a lot. 

Having MDS takes the scare level to new heights compared to my skydiving incident.  First of all, in skydiving, they prepare you for the worst; you are given training on how to handle malfunctions, are told you may experience them, and do their best to prepare you for that day.  In life, you know that someday your life will end, but generally we go around as if we will live forever.  Yes, we may prepare financially, get insurance, a will, even prepare for our funeral arrangements, but we live as if that day may never happen.  And when a life shortening ailment such as MDS appears, we get scared.

Secondly, when you go skydiving, you always wear a reserve parachute; I’ve even know some skydivers to wear two reserve parachutes.  With MDS, there is no “reserve”, nothing known that will guarantee a cure and few treatments that may lessen the symptoms.  And you get scared. 

Last, if you have a malfunction in skydiving, it usually takes only a few seconds, albeit very scary seconds, to resolve the issue.  MDS, from my extensive readings on it, can be a long progressive not pleasant decline down to the end.  And it scares you.  

Lu and I are not so scared that we cannot function; in fact we are both doing our respective jobs (Home Depot for me and pastoring a local church for Lu) as well as all of the other things that life demands.  But in those still quiet moments when all you have is your thoughts and no other distractions, we feel sometimes feel really scared.  As a Christian with a strong faith, I am not afraid of the death part of this malady.  I’m pretty sure I’ll be going to Heaven and that will be wonderful.  It’s the dying part of this process that gets me; not knowing when it will start or just how long and uncomfortable it will be is not easy to live with.  The other part is the fact that Lu and I really love each other and not having the other is sad.  Also, I’m Lu’s biggest cheerleader in her ministry and her rock to get her through the stresses of being a pastor.  It saddens me and scares me that I may not be around always for her.  I’m sure she feels the same.  So we both get scared.

In the midst of the beginnings of MDS and the fears we are facing, Lu, in one of her sermons, included some words from the Bible that gave me the peace I needed to help alleviate my fears.  She included Psalm 23 as an illustration and I don’t know if it was accidental or maybe the Holy Spirit led her to do so, but the words in this psalm sure gave me the peace needed to overcome some of my fears.  Most of you know Psalm 23; it’s the one that starts out “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…”.  It’s also the one that has the verse “Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I shall fear no evil    “; very relevant words for right now.  

So if you are in need of peace, go read Psalm 23; I’ve included a link to it in a new section called Inspirational Links that I’ll start populating with links to words and illustrations that I am finding helpful in my journey through life with MDS. 

Thank you for reading my blog and please feel free to pass this along to whoever you feel may need to read this.  Comments encouraged.

God’s peace