Puritanism: the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy.

I get mad at the TV lately.

As a kid, it always amazed me that people would get angry about what was depicted on television, or on the internet... hearing people with that attitude, I always thought, who cares if Babylon thinks that fornication and drugs and violence are acceptable? "The world" will always be hostile to the gospel--God has been telling us this for thousands of years. Why should we expect any different? Why rage and fume at it?

The answer, I find, is fear. I never hated those temptations before, because they seemed foolish to me, obvious. When I was a kid, most of what God said to do was obviously the smart thing to do anyway, whether it was God saying so or not. Don't do drugs, don't have sex until you're married, be good to people. And I got to feel a little smug, too--nobody else was reading the books I was reading, having the experiences I was having (as far as I knew). My spiritual life was an exciting secret, like being a superhero. Even the mission was not that hard of a decision: I loved teaching, and it sounded like an adventure.

In those days, the difference between my life and the advertised "good life" was inconsequential. Most people agree that they'd be better off without the addictions and poor decisions and fumbling adolescent sexual embarrassments that they accrued in their teenage years. Living the gospel always seemed "smart".

But now, living the gospel means making choices that the rest of the world would consider extremely foolish; and I'm reminded of it every time I turn on the television. To choose just one person to be with for the rest of your life--and worse, to choose that person without living together first--nothing about that decision sounds smart, unless the gospel is true. To make, really any promise at age 23 that will define your life for the remainder (and beyond)--that's optimistic to the point of insanity, unless the gospel is true. Especially if you intend to keep that promise.

The world says that kids my age are supposed to be living for themselves, making money for themselves, figuring themselves out while backpacking in Europe or something. They're not supposed to be halfway through undergrad, married, living at home and uninsured. For the first time, the life I chose doesn't sound like such a smug, pat proposition. If the gospel isn't true, I'm missing out. It's scary.

But I got this answer this morning, and it seemed worth sharing.

In Numbers 14, twelve Israelite spies have just delivered their report after infiltrating the promised land. They say Canaan is beautiful and fruitful, but that a race of indomitable giants--the Anakim--occupy it. Ten of the spies say that invading the land would be foolhardy--"We be not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we... we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight" (Numbers 13:31-32). They call it a land "that eateth up the inhabitants thereof." The other two spies, Joshua and Caleb, see things more clearly--knowing all that God has done to deliver Israel to this point, they testify that God will still deliver them, and keep His promise.

But Israel weeps, saying, "Would God that we had died in Egypt, or in the wilderness!" Having endured so much in their journey, they seem to believe that it has all been for nothing. And if Moses had been merely a charismatic desert sheikh--seeing the situation from a worldly point of view--it would be true. They took the Holy Land with a tiny force, upheld by miracle after miracle throughout the conquest. It was an impossible task, with their strength.

Israel attempts to select a leader to bring them back to Egypt (to what end? To hold out their necks again to Pharaoh's yoke?) and Moses, Joshua, and Caleb fall on their faces and tear their clothes in mourning for the shortsightedness of their people.

It's hard to see myself in the scriptures, because my heart is more often with the wayward children of Israel than with their prophets. I am ashamed to say how often I look back with longing on Sodom and Gomorrha, or the "flesh pots of Egypt." I know God lives, of course; just as surely as if I had walked through the Red Sea with them. But it is so easy to forget, to lose heart; to see only a land "waiting to devour you", not one flowing with milk and honey.

It is encouraging to note that Israel did not go back to Egypt. They feel certain that the Canaanites will destroy them; but, like me, their fear of the Canaanites is overpowered by their fear of God, and He carries them, kicking and screaming and backsliding, into the promised land. But the tragedy is that they had to endure all their trials with such despair. Their distrust of God led them to seek security in idolatry and foreign exploitation--but also, paradoxically, to hate and fear their neighbors, whom God had commanded them to love as themselves.

When faced with that kind of fear, it is surprisingly easy to become paranoid--to see even mild criticism or contradiction as a threat, even when that criticism is only implied--or even unintentional. In that mindset, even a TV show that depicts immorality as wise, sane, and enjoyable gets interpreted as a personal attack on my tenuous spiritual life. And maybe it is, in fact; but it never bothered me before.

It's one of our culture's favorite platitudes that fear breeds intolerance; I don't think I'm saying anything new here. What is surreal is to experience it for myself.