Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 37:2 (Spring 2023)
Article: For Whom Will The Church Be Safe? A Sermon Preached On July 3, 2022
Author: Ruth Barron

PP 37:2 (Spring 2023) p. 18

For Whom Will The Church Be Safe?
A Sermon Preached On July 3, 2022

Ruth Barron

Ruth Barron is a #metoo/#churchtoo activist who has worked in full-time ministry since 2000 and as a missionary in Kenya since 2007. With degrees in English and psychology (BA from Milligan University) and Christian doctrine (MAR from Emmanuel Christian Seminary), her focus is on the intersection of trauma, theology, literature, and church polity. She has developed curricula for Maasai and Turkana churches and writes essays, poems, and stories.

The Lord is my light and my salvation—
whom shall I fear?

The Lord is the stronghold of my life—
of whom shall I be afraid?

2 When the wicked advance against me
to devour me,
it is my enemies and my foes
who will stumble and fall.

3 Though an army besiege me,
my heart will not fear;
though war break out against me,
even then I will be confident.

4 One thing I ask from the Lord,
this only do I seek:
that I may dwell in the house of the Lord
all the days of my life,
to gaze on the beauty of the Lord
and to seek him in his temple.

5 For in the day of trouble
he will keep me safe in his dwelling;
he will hide me in the shelter of his sacred tent
and set me high upon a rock.

Psalm 27:1–5 (NIV)

Fight Or Flight

Years ago, I sat in church in Nairobi, Kenya, listening to the pastor talk about our need to do more for Christ. I had given up my home in my own country. I had learned a new language. I had worked to serve God in every way from my teens to that very day, yet I was still drowning in a sense of disappointing God. In fact, I had recently prayed and confessed to God that I was not serving as a missionary because I loved God. I admitted that I was serving God because I was afraid of hell.

Oh, I don’t mean that I didn’t have any other reasons for serving as a missionary. When I was a college student, freshmen were required to write a research paper on a career we were considering. I wrote my paper on missions because missions was the career which best fit my fascination with understanding cultures and languages and my heart for ministering to people.

What I mean is that, as people, we all have complex motivations for everything we do, and of all my motivations, fear was still my strongest motivation as a missionary. When I prayed and confessed that I feared God more than I loved God, I remembered that the greatest commandment was to love God with all my heart and all my mind and all my strength and all my s...