Be Not Afraid

Celebrating Christmas in an age of anxiety

It is not groundbreaking to say we live in an age of anxiety and fear. W.H. Auden’s 1947 Pulitzer Prize-winning poem “The Age of Anxiety” popularized the phrase. In that long poem, three men and a woman meet in a bar by chance, share drinks, and grapple with isolation, spiritual emptiness, and the loss of tradition, faith, and community. These four fictional characters can name the loss, but they are less successful in figuring out how to recover or rebuild what modernism has destroyed.

The Annunciation to the Virgin / Painting by Adriaen van de Velde

I thought about Auden’s poem this week when I heard a sermon on angels and their role in the Christmas story.

Angels, as you probably know, are all over the Christmas story.

The angel Gabriel appears in person to Zechariah in the temple (Luke 1:11-20). Gabriel announces that Zechariah’s elderly wife Elizabeth will bear a son, John the Baptist, who will prepare the way for the Lord. Zechariah doubts, and Gabriel strikes him mute until the prophecy is fulfilled. Gabriel then appears to Mary (Luke 1:26-38) to call her “highly favored” and tell her that she will conceive Jesus.

Unnamed angels also make appearances. One comes to Joseph in a dream (Matt. 1:20-24), telling him not to fear taking Mary as his wife. Angels appear to the shepherds (Luke 2: 8-14) to announce the birth of Jesus and to sing God’s praises.

But what arrested my attention this Christmas — which finds us in a state of political division, violence, economic uncertainty, and cultural disruption — is how the angels repeatedly began their messages with some version of “fear not.”

That greeting should not surprise us. For one thing, angels are awesome creatures. Scripture describes angels as mighty warriors, with supernatural powers. Fear is a reasonable response, and “fear not” is a practical greeting.

I think there might also have been another reason, and it is that reason that I have been thinking about all day. Is it possible these angels were teaching their hearers that fear is incompatible with the good news of Jesus? That they won’t be able to truly and fully receive the Good News if their hearts are full of fear?

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This idea might be a stretch if I were proof texting it from just a few passages in the Christmas story. But consider the whole counsel of Scripture. “Fear not,” or some version of that command, appears more than 100 times throughout the Bible. Surely God expects us to take seriously a command he repeated so often. Elsewhere, scripture tells us that “perfect love casts out all fear.” Few distinctions in scripture are so clear: One sure sign of love is the absence of fear. The presence of fear is also a sure sign that love is absent.

So are we Christians, we followers of Jesus, taking this admonition to “fear not” seriously?

If you look at the way we show up in public spaces, it’s hard to answer “yes” to that question. At this week’s AmFest event in Phoenix, Ben Shapiro said fear has become far too important as a driving force in the conservative movement. He said pundits feared losing their audience, and therefore their financial support. He called for “truth over cowardice” in the conservative movement.

Shapiro is not a Christian. He is an Orthodox Jew. That means we share a common religious heritage, and — given his background — his worldview (and his speech) were likely informed by such scriptures as these:

• “Fear not, for I am with you.” – Isaiah 41:10
• “Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid…for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go.” – Joshua 1:9
• “When I am afraid, I put my trust in you…. I will not fear.” – Psalm 56:3-4

Christians can rely on all these promises, plus the fulfilment of these promises in Jesus. Therefore, I would also add these words of Jesus, from the Gospel of John:

• “Peace I leave with you… Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” – John 14:27

In short, there is much to tempt us to fear in this Christmas season, in the Year of our Lord 2025. The “age of anxiety” Auden identified nearly a century ago is still with us, and that anxiety has, if anything, deepened. We all feel it. To deny it would be to bear false witness.

But we humans, in this time and place between Eden and All Things New, have never lacked reasons to fear. And yet…as the shepherds of Bethlehem discovered…what sometimes shows up as a cause for fear can end up being a messenger of good news. The point of the Christmas story is that fear is not our fate.

That’s one of the reasons I welcome the Christmas season each year. It’s my annual reminder to “fear not.” It is a reminder to me that I was once one of those people who feared, and that Jesus offered me a better way.

Merry Christmas.