Were you ever afraid of the dark? I sure was when I was a kid. And I don’t mean I just didn’t like it! No, I dreaded the very idea of it. It wasn’t just the dark but was those things that go bump in the night. The monsters that hide in the closet and the terribly scary things that wait under the bed. Even though I slept in a room with my two brothers, I lived in fear every night. And if wasn’t for my trusted dog Specks, who slept at the end of my bed, it could have been a lot worse.
My problem was I did not get over this fear. I remember when I first went away to the Catholic seminary where I attended high school. Even though the place was pretty well lit at night, it was creepy to me. The dorm we slept in was one large room. Maybe thirty-foot-wide and fifty yards long. Three beds on each side of a main aisle, with a four-foot-tall closet beside each bed and dividing it from the next set of beds. Steam radiators ran along both outer walls with large factory like windows above them. Those radiators creaked and banged all night. With steam pipes running along a bare concrete ceiling. I tell you it was creepy.
But to tell you the truth, the dorm wasn’t to bad. If you could get used to sleeping with 30 or so adolescent boys every night, it was bearable. But it was the bathrooms that brought back my fear of scary things that walk in the night. They looked like any commercial bathroom you probably have ever seen. I believe there were at least 6 stalls on each wall. Lit with a blue fluorescent light, it was a room full of shadows and eerie sounds. And any time I went in there at night I was sure something or someone would pop out of one of those stalls and that would be it.
Well, I don’t know if I told someone about my fear or if it was so obvious that someone caught on. But one night I went into the bathroom with my normal trepidation and as I was entering a stall, the door of one behind me slammed open and out jumped a specter from hell! I know I screamed not because I remember it, but because the guys who had planned this scare fest never let me forget about it. The specter that scared me so bad was one of my freshmen classmates covered in a sheet with a flashlight below his face. He started laughing so hard it woke the dorm monitor (an upperclassman who was in charge of keeping underclassmen in line and above all quiet, no talking after lights out) and both of us earn two demerits for this late night high jinx. And I earned the reputation of a guy who was afraid of his own shadow. It took almost two years to live that down.
From then on, I needed to fake my bravery but my fear of the night and the unknown that travels in it lasted into my adult life. And as addictions took over my life sometimes it would be even scarier. There were nights I had drank myself into black-out and waking up in the dark, not knowing where I was, a terrible fear would run through me. In my mind I would be five years old again, too afraid to move knowing that if I did the thing that was waiting for me would awaken. Cold sweat would be running down my back. But the crazy thing was there was never anything there. If I could take that first step into the darkness, I knew it was all in my head.
I think the fear of the unknown has a hold on all of us in one way or another. My fear always centered around the night and darkness. But there are a hundred different ways that we can live in fear. And what I learned as I came to trust in Jesus and spent time everyday in his Word, that is exactly where Satan wants us to be. For me it was a few verses from the book of Proverbs that finally helped with my fear, “My son, do not lose sight of these- keep sound wisdom and discretion, and they will be life for your soul and adornment for your neck. Then you will walk on your way securely, and your foot will not stumble. If you lie down, you will not be afraid; when you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.” (Proverbs 3:21-23) But there are so many other promises within God’s Word, that whatever you fear, He knows it and you can find the courage to take your first step when and if you can trust.
I can’t say that I am completely cured of my night fears. Even now I will get that creepy feeling. But I know who it is waiting in the dark. With and through Jesus I have the answer, I simply say, “Get behind me Satan! You are a stumbling block to me; you do not have the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.” Taken from Matthew 16:23. And even if darkness is Satan’s realm, I now live in the light. Thank you, Jesus.
Blessings John
4/11/18
