Today, Chris, is not a good day. Immediately after I leave you I am off to the dentist.
Now my dentist is very nice but I would rather walk blindfolded the wrong way down the M1 than have to visit him. I am scared of the dentist. So scared that I seldom go, which everyone tells me is the greatest folly imaginable because it just makes the eventual encounter worse.
This is true. Recently I found myself suffering from horrible toothache, which resulted in a trip to the emergency dentist who, having prescribed antibiotics for an infection then proposed the immediate extraction of the offending molar.
Eyes wide with horror, I said no, went back to the car and sat there for five minutes, frantically weighing the thought of pain now against the certainty of pain later, before going back in and getting the job done. Well, almost. Only half the tooth came out which is why I’m going back today.
The thing is, when we are afraid, whether it’s dentists or heights or spiders, we are afraid, even when to someone else it seems foolish and trivial. It sometimes feels like there is nothing as rational as an irrational fear.
It’s reassuring then, that one of the most often-repeated phrases in the Bible is ‘do not be afraid’ and it’s amazing how many things we are told not to be afraid of. Do not be afraid of being lost, of oppressive authorities, of being among strangers, of anger, of panic, of losing everything, of childbirth, of breaking social conventions, of shame, of the unknown.
The thing is, none of these are trivial or irrational – there’s nothing here about spiders. These are real problems, real fears and in some cases real, life-threatening terrors.
But what Christians believe is that God is to be trusted to look after these things, these big fears, the things that really keep us awake at night.
And I reckon that’s amazingly reassuring, even if it does hand us back responsibility for dealing with the things we really ought to deal with ourselves. And while I can’t speak for fear of spiders, if God can take care of the big stuff, then surely, I guess, I can manage the dentist.
I certainly hope so. Wish me luck.
The dentist could not fix my tooth. In the end, six months later, the rest was extracted at King’s College Dental Hospital. They were very nice about it. And they gave me a sedative.