This fall, our sermon series is called "Fear Not." We will look at some of the most common fears we all share, and I do not mean ghosts, spiders, or clowns (even if they are kind of scary). We will ask questions like: What is fear? Why do we fear the unknown and the stranger when God calls us to hope and hospitality? Why is commitment to God and to the church, even the smallest of ones, causing us so much anxiety when God has already committed to us? Why is it that being proudly a follower of Jesus, or the simple task of inviting a friend to church, causes us to be afraid? It is the brevity of our time on earth that makes our time so valuable, given to us by God; yet why are we afraid of giving even an hour or two, at minimum, back to the one who gives it? We are always afraid that there will never be enough, but why do we fear this self-fulfilling prophecy when God promises to provide and has given us literally everything to begin with? Why are we afraid to fail, rather than trusting that God will help us learn from our mistakes and try again? While this list may seem fairly exhaustive, it barely scratches the surface of the things we fear. Perhaps FDR was right when he said, "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."