Something broke my heart the other day.

My son Judah is 17 months old. His personality is growing by the day, and we are finding he is a very happy, smiley, and generally good natured little dude. He runs around the house as much as his little legs will let him run and he plays with the dog, throws balls, and bounces on the couch.

He also loves to watch movies. He loves watching Brave and Bolt. He has watched each of those movies at least 100 times, and surprisingly, these movies hold his attention more than almost anything else.

The part that breaks my heart is what happens every time my wife or I forget to skip the previews on Bolt.

There is a preview for the new Monsters University movie coming out on there. In the preview, the scene is in what seems to be a little boys room at night. The camera zooms in on a closet door that creaks open and something swoops out over towards a bed with what looks like a little boy. The monster stands up and reveals dark red, pretty scary looking eyes, but we soon see that the monster is Scully and Mike is in the bed, and Scully has glued his eye shut, and Scully starts laughing. It is actually pretty funny.

Judah is terrified of this.

Happy-go-lucky Judah, who is always smiling and laughing with that cute baby belly laugh, is afraid of Monsters in his closet. At 17 months!

He is so terrified that he screams at the top of his lungs and cries his eyes out at even the slightest glance of that closet door at the beginning of the preview. Its no fun if we forget to skip the previews.

It takes a while to console him if he sees that closet door. We have to hold him tight and rock him back and forth and repeatedly whisper “It’s ok buddy, Dada and Mama are here” in his ear. He eventually calms down and we tell him we love him and he is ready to watch Bolt.

Judah’s sheer terror of this scene breaks my heart. It ticks me off a little bit actually. It ticks me off because, the fallen world we live in that is teeming with fear and sin, is what my sweet, innocent Judah was born into.

It makes me want to rescue him from it. It makes me want to do whatever it takes to save Judah from ever having to be afraid.

I bring all this up because it’s a perfect picture of how I think God feels about us. I think he feels ticked off that his people that he loves are born into a world apart from him.

The awesome part about God is, he did exactly what it took to save us, his children.

He sent us Jesus.

Jesus is the opposite of fear. Jesus is love. Jesus does not force us to face our fears, nor does he ridicule us because our fears are unfounded. Instead, he is simply with us. He sits by us. He comforts us. He provides for us. He loves us.

Does God take away fear? No. Otherwise he wouldn’t tell us repeatedly in the Bible not to fear, he’d just take the fear away.

No, God does not take fear away. Otherwise I wouldn’t fear people will not like me. I wouldn’t fear failure. I wouldn’t fear isolation and rejection. I wouldn’t fear the future and I wouldn’t fear for my security.

What God does instead is not unlike what Kelsey and I do with Judah. He holds us close. He loves us. He speaks gently to us for a while, letting us know everything is going to be okay. He comforts us.

It is in our times of greatest fear that the true measure of our faith is tested.

And the best part is, that faith can be placed in a Jesus who tells us he will never leave us or forsake us, that he is always with us. That faith can be placed in a Jesus who sends us truth, encouragement, provision and protection. That faith can be placed in a Jesus who is holding us, rocking with us, reminding us we don’t need to fear.