CHERYL A. KIRK-DUGGAN
Rev. Dr. Cheryl A. Kirk-Duggan is a Professor of Religion at Shaw University Divinity School, Raleigh, NC, and an Ordained Elder in the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church.
Known for her 6 P’s as: professor, preacher, priest, prophet, poet, and performer, Kirk-Duggan is author of over 20 books, including Violence and Theology, her edited The Sky is Crying: Racism, Classism, and Natural Disaster, both Abingdon, 2006; and Wake Up: Hip Hop, Christianity, & the Black Church.
Dr. Kirk-Duggan’s current research includes: theology; justice; violence and religion; music; ethics; humor; the Bible and culture; Womanist and feminist studies; faith, spirituality, and health; women’s religious and leadership experience; pedagogy; rage, grief, and transformation; gender theory; sexuality, and popular media as a praxeology for constructive and narrative theology. Currently, she is working on a systematic theology, a commentary on Joshua and Judges, and a volume of poetry.
from btpbase.com
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
As Ecclesiastes people, we realize that there is a time and a place for everything under the sun. We recognize that life has its own vitality and that the days of our lives are filled with possibilities in what often feels like uncertainty. In the Wisdom literature of the Hebrew Bible, the writers make it clear that God is behind life and thus life is in order, even if it seems to be chaotic. Many times in dealing with fear we forget to praise. We forget these are moments to draw closer to God. Sometimes we are so trapped by what we “used to do” and what “could have” or “should have” been that we cannot exist in the exquisite “moment of now.” Sometimes today is the tomorrow that we dreaded yesterday. When we exist in the now, in the present, we have the possibility of living life at a more consciousness level. Such a level of consciousness reminds us that as we praise, we have opportunities to embrace FAITH, as Fervent Anticipatory Incarnated Total Healing.
The Undivided Soul
Archived Quotes
Faith: Wading Through Troubled Waters
God’s faithfulness emerges:
in all creation,
in all the days of our lives,
in the hopes and possibilities,
in love and peace and community.
God’s faithfulness emerges:
in the very possibilities
Of birth and death,
in relationships cast in truth and health,
in the connectedness of life.
God’s faithfulness emerges:
In the daily rising and setting of the sun,
In the laughter of children and old folk,
with every new discovery,
with every new dream.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
To be free, liberated, or saved infers a grace-filled mode of being and existence in the world. Such salvation understands eschatology, an awareness and consciousness of being free now, which stands in tension with what is yet to come. To experience salvation is to know fear, without being a victim of fear. To be free of fear is not to be reckless, but sure in the love of God. To be free of fear is to accept the challenge of life as a ministry one is called to fulfill.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
Seeing life as a ministry is the freedom assented to by those slave bards who sang, “And before I’ll be a slave. I’ll be buried in my grave, And go home to my Lord and be free.” To be free is to be open to possibilities, change, and responsibility for ourselves, our communities, and our ecology. True freedom is the ability to share a sense of liberation with others. True freedom can only be realized when one experiences a sense of salvation in the spiritual, physical, mental, emotional, communal, and economic facets of daily life. A faithful life of freedom does not negate the reality of fear, but does provide the tools and means for transcending the fear and making a difference.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
To move on is not to run away. We cannot move from what we have not fully experienced. To face fear is to know fear on a visceral, physical, mental, emotional level. The way individuals experience fear involves their history, culture, personal habits, level of maturity, and level of consciousness. Critical to attaining intimacy with fear and then moving on is one’s ability to stand amid both discomfort and the safety net of family, community, and self. Woven by grace, such a safety zone embodies spiritual gifts, particularly love and prophetic witness. Although prophets are usually not welcomed at home, we need those voices of wisdom and warning to face fear and to move on. Facing reality and discomfort takes courage, but such is not impossible and not always painful. In moments of awakening from the malaise of dreadful fear, one has a better sense of who she or he is, and is able to find purpose in life. To move on after facing the fear is to live. Ultimately, health and wholeness require being in the storm on the ship until the troubled waters and the rough rains are quiet. Healthy movement and change are major components for attaining and living liberative salvation.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
FEAR as Facing Every Activity Regally
Such a transformed way of viewing fear is to experience the conversion of a troubling energy to a healthy passion. By facing every activity with a regal or noble spirit we commit ourselves, particularly in a religious sense, to putting our best foot forward in a majestic, admirable manner. Such movement illumines the light within us. In some instances the most noble action is a quiet, silent, and grace-filled waiting. In other circumstances the noblest action is prayerful, discerning, and faith-based steps. Whatever action we choose, we do so in concert with God’s amazing grace. Such GRACE is Godly Renewal: Activated, Certainly, and Eternally. Such ongoing divine activity on behalf of humanity will sustain us and keep us when we are open to the presence of such power in our lives.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
Fear as passion: a desire, an enthusiasm, or an excitement or craving for something else, can drive one to self-destruction. Fear is a dangerous thing when it goes unchecked … Fear that has been shaped positively by faith into passion engenders hope. Fear that becomes hope sparks optimistic confidence and allows one to expect miracles … When fear is transformed into hope, we grow and have the discipline necessary to help affect change. As redirected emotional energy, transformed FEAR becomes Frequent Exceptional Awesome Reverence.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
When FEAR becomes Fatal Exaggerated Angst Realized the depths of despair my be so great that one becomes ill, depressed, spiritually paralyzed. In such moments God often comes as a still, quiet voice. Then one has to take a leap of faith to begin to trust the possibility that One greater can empower, can restore one to balance, to sanity. The experience of FEAR, of Feelings Electrically Accelerated Received, is the experience of intense energy, the energy that we name fear, but over which we can exert control. We can live a life where we are not stymied by the particular configuration of energy we fear.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
Fear of the Lord is a synonym for respecting, for being faithful to God. Living out this faithful respect is a commitment first to listening to God, to obeying Go’s commandments, and then living out and teaching those commandments to one’s children and community. These commandments call for allegiance,
devotion, and love for God- a love that then transposes to one’s offspring and simultaneously calls to one’s ancestors, who were also faithful. To fear God is to love and respect God. Love and respect are the cornerstones for all relationships. Immersed in the love of self, and therefore of God and one’s neighbor, is antithetical to being trapped by fear.
FEAR is False Evidence Anticipating Reality.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
Theologically, significant issues are justice, truth, mutuality, consistency, and power. Life makes sense and the order of the universe is meaningful because order, goodness and meaning is foundational to the world and one can rely on the credibility of one’s own experience. This type of order reflects the mind and will of God. Life, entrusted as gift to humanity, is an opportunity for humanity to be responsible. Such a gift of life and the world are to be shared, celebrated, enjoyed – a reality where God is constantly present to support, nurture, and facilitate humanity toward experiencing a holistic life.
The Undivided Soul
Faith: Facing Fear, Moving On
Faith meets fear in moments of weariness,
As I hold fast to Grace,
Knowing that God unconditionally
Cares for me.
Faith meets fear
When my tears flood
the rivers of my being;
When I’m spiritually bankrupt,
Yet, I stand on God’s promises.
Faith meets fear
When all hope seems lost,
Then God sends the joy
And the faith of a small child,
To delight my soul.
Then faith meets fear,
As I remember Jesus’ words to us:
“Come to Me with the innocence of a child;
I will calm your fear,
I will give you rest.”
The Undivided Soul