This is our final stop on our journey with 4th century mystic Evagrius Ponticus. On our travels, we have encountered Evagrius’ bestiary of demons – demons of desire: gluttony, lust, and avarice; demons of resistance: sadness, anger, and acedia; and demons of reason: vainglory and vanity. We also added shame to Evagrius’ list. I hope that this helped name the demons that speak to you, the demons that drive you. I hope that it allowed you to “catch yourself in the act” of reacting to those voices and, in the process, to find out a little of who you are. This week, we will talk about the source of the demons’ power: fear.
Behind each of these demons is a particular fear. Gluttony speaks to our fear of pain. Vanity speaks to our fear of worthlessness. Sadness speaks to our fear of meaninglessness. When we listen to the demons, the fear grows. At some point, we can no longer distinguish the fear from who we are. But if we stop and listen closely, we can hear ourselves apart from the fear. We can recover the image of God that we were made to be.
Join us at 11am this Sunday at the Kessler. We’ll talk about fear and its antidote and what it might look like on the other side.
Grace and Peace,
Scott