Fear Not, Love All, Don’t Give Objects Power

Hatred
End product of fear
Seeds scattered on the winds
Seeking soil readied by the rhetoric
Of discord, no one truly safe
From its sprouting–

for all of us stew over something unfair–

For in our brokenness we will fear what we do not understand

or what threatens

or offends

nor are we beyond 
Becoming a conduit of proliferation of fear

Because we want others to see the danger

or offense, or injustice, or to fear what we fear 

and nurture that fear until it morphs into either quivering in a corner

sure THEY are out to get US or into a RAGE that topples anything or anyone

even remotely identified as THEY.

Fear the Bible says is the opposite of Love
While also saying the fear of God is the
Beginning of wisdom and that God casts
Out all fear of anything that is not love

For God is Love.

So if I fear God
Will that fear not bring forth
A harvest of hatred for all misplaced fear
That points fingers, throws sticks and stones,
Or bullets or angry words or destroys property,
Or drives a vehicle into human beings intent
On the destruction of others created in God’s image
Or gives the idols carved by human hands POWER
To turn people’s fears into actions

that should
Make all of us like the five year old child
Watching the violence on the news, recoil and scream
‘Make them stop! Where are their Mommy’s? Where are their Daddy’s’
Where indeed?

Seeds of fear scattered on the winds
Find places to root and grow
When I fail to fear God
Who says Love others, even those who
Have let fear grow into
Hatred.