Perfect love drives out fear

I used to listen to a call-in “helpline” advice show on Christian radio when I was a teenager. I haven’t thought about this show in a long time. It was called Dawson McAllister Live. Perhaps it is still on the air. Frequently teens would call in who had been sexually abused or raped. He always started with the same statement: When Jesus was nailed to the cross he was naked — sexual abuse and sexual shaming was part of the torture of Roman crucifixion. There is every evidence in historical documents that the sexual degradation of crucifixion extended far beyond just a naked death. 

I have forgotten much of the advice from that show, but this point has stuck with me through the years. When I taught on the problem of evil in theology class I had several students come to my office struggling to understand the absence of God when they had been sexually molested as children. They had not been sexually harmed by Pastors or Priests, but the effect was the same. They had been made to feel abandoned by God. 

There was nothing even close to adequate to say except that God, in Christ, has been there too. 

Jesus died naked. Torture and abuse had rendered his body a monstrosity. Part of the insidious power of abuse and degradation is that it makes people feel ashamed and abandoned. Most of Jesus friends abandoned him. Part of the insidious power of abuse and degradation is its capacity to make the victim feel like God is on the abuser’s side. Jesus cried out from the cross—God? Why have you abandoned me? 

The cross was spectacle. 

Its purpose to drive fear into the hearts of anyone who would dare call into question those in power. There was no shade in the shadow of the cross and to stand beside someone on the cross was to be rendered visible and vulnerable yourself.

In the Gospel of John we learn that standing beside him on the cross were his Mother, his Aunt, Mary Magadalene, and the disciple that Jesus loved (usually believed to be John). What allowed them not to turn their faces away from Jesus? 

Love.

Crazy, crazy love. The crazy love of old women. The crazy love of Mary who had been forgiven much. The crazy love of John who basically can’t write a sentence in any of his epistles without veering back into writing about love, love, love. 

It was love that kept Jesus on the cross and it was strange love that kept his mother, aunt, and his two dearly beloved disciples adamantly standing at the foot of his cross. 

Or as John would later write: 

There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear.