What we are going to talk about today is the structure of fear. Now some people say you should not live in fear.  This is a totally stupid statement.  Fear is an extremely constructive emotion.  In other words it is important to fear the consequences of jumping off a 20 story building.  It's important to fear that because if you do that you're going to kill yourself.  It's important to fear the consequences of leaping in front of a fast moving car.

So fear is a very logical and intelligent emotion.  the question is what is the structure of fear in your life.   Now we're going to talk about the concept of the larger reality.  Some people might talk about spiritual realities.  We don't like that term because it it has negative connotations with the new age movement and all sorts of other nonsense but let's let's phrase it like this there's the basic reality of life you wanna get enough food you wanna make enough money so on and so forth and these are you know legitimate priorities but then there's the larger structure of reality of the reality of God, the reality of Allah as Islam refers to God.  This is a structure of reality in which people have a purpose.  It also exists in Hinduism with the concept of Dharma, purpose and Karma of how you in your life do or do not move forward in terms of fulfilling your purpose.

Frederick the great once said that soldiers should fear their officers more than the enemy.   Stalin once said it is more dangerous to desert the Red Army than it is to serve in it.  Now when you look at the structure of fear you have to analyze two things.  One your fear of what stands in front of you ….social embarrassment, the loss of a relationship loss of a job political persecution possibly political persecution, torture and death depending on where you live.  These are concerns However you need to step back be awake be aware of the larger reality the larger reality is the terror that stands behind you yes because if you have committed your life to Allah and you are expected to carry out missions.  If you do not do that, you face the retribution from the most terrifying person who exists, the living God Allah.  That's an important point to keep in mind.

In making decisions you need to filter out a lot of confused ideas from American life in American life you have what you might call the trivialization of sin.  Sin is irresponsible sexual behavior sin is too much drinking and so on and so forth then these these uh are both sins there's there's no doubt about it that these are are are negative forms of activity.  But the larger issue is the decisions that you make in terms of policy decisions, in terms of say whether you do or do not stand up to the government that is ruling you.  You have to look at the Old Testament prophets.  We're not big fans of Christianity but there are lessons to be learned where a person raises their hand and agrees to serve God.  So it all sounds great except God stands up one day and says I want you to go to your king and tell him he needs to change his ways.  Now that could be pretty much of a suicide mission in the world that those people lived in that could be a death sentence that could be a trip to a torture chamber so it puts prophets in a very tough position.  They can play it quote safe in terms of the smaller view of reality and say that's that's a suicide mission no thank you.  But here's the problem.  If you have raised your hand and told a real person the living God that you're gonna go do something you are facing some real problems if you do not carry out your mission God can cause your life to go completely haywire God can inflict on you every nightmare that you feared as a result of carrying out your mission and by playing it safe and not carrying out your mission.  So that point needs to be understood.
In the Bible there is an instance where God commands a prophet to go to a king and tell him to change his ways and then God says if you go and tell him to change his ways and he does not change his ways his guilt will be on him and the bloodshed that he causes will be on him but if you don't go I will call you to be responsible for his sins.

So this is a very important point so in making decisions you need to be aware of the structure of fear and as we mentioned in another lecture you need to fine tune your decision making ability.  The truth is not just lying around.  Your life is like a radio receptor  It has to be lived in a certain way in order to pick up a clear signal in other words if you have a radio and you drop it in the bathtub and do all sorts of stupid things it's probably not going to work very well.   OK well same with your life.  If you lead a immoral life, your ability to perceive things will be dull now again we need to move beyond are what I call the trivialization of moral morality it isn't just lifestyle issues and immoral life may mean to become obsessed with your commercial job that you want to get ahead that's you want that corner office you want to buy that Mercedes whatever and you are obsessed with that that can be just as much of a poison in some ways even more of a poison than an addiction to destructive sexual behavior and addiction to destructive chemicals such as alcohol.  So you need to keep that in mind

So as you look forward you need to think about the power behind you as well as the threats in front of you.  It goes both ways that the threats in front of you may be horrendous but the power behind you is ultimately greater than those threats however you need to understand life you may be a martyr you may be a shaheed.  You may be your life may end up being sacrificed I would conclude by using the analogy of an army.  Suppose somebody was organizing an army and they said everybody who joins the army will be safe as can be nobody be will be wounded nobody will be killed.  Everybody will lead a life of ease and comfort and we'll have lots of money and lots of sex do you think that would be a credible proposition?  No it would not be so in life in the service of the almighty you are serving in an army.  That's the way to look at it and there is a promise in the Koran and in other great religions that what you do will be rewarded at the judgment day and before the judgment day the hand of the Almighty is at work every day he has a plan and what does or does not happen to you needs to be factored in … who do you wanna team up with the person running everything or well who would who would you team up with other than that and whatever happens insofar as maybe you become a martyr, it's not at all clear that you could avoid that by playing it safe.
In the end …if you do the best can….. you will be rewarded beyond anything you could ever imagine at the judgment day.  That's the larger reality.