Fear of Responsibility
And the courage to overcome it
Life demands that we take responsibility, but we don’t always know how. Some of us, the privileged, were raised as agents of responsibility, were taught how to take care of ourselves positively and confidently. Some of us were drilled into being responsible so that we are afraid of doing the wrong thing and agonize over our agency. Some of us were negatively thrust into danger and forced to sink or swim, and with trauma we survive. And a lot of us were held back from responsibility, sheltered from it, had our hands held through it, so that we struggle to see ourselves as active agents of responsibility as adults. But all of us face responsibility in our lives: responsibility to do our laundry, go to work, care for our bodies, support a loved one, resist injustice, repent from sin, and so on. We are thrust into the world with agency and must take responsibility for our actions, our lives, and those we are responsible for. This is no minor reality that one can merely live with. This is shocking and overwhelming for some. As I write about in On Getting Out of Bed, we all are responsible for our witness to the world, for our choice to act in the midst of suffering, for example. That is, as my subtitle suggests, a burden and a gift. Our agency can weigh on us. Our responsibility to others and to God. And as a result, some people fold up. They abandon their responsibilities in despair and denial and fall into sloth and distractions and numbness. The hard thing to do, but the very thing required of us is to turn and face our agency despite our fear. To do it scared, if necessary. And be responsible. And I think this is only truly possible when you know the grace of God that undergirds all your works, when you act with courage toward the good as defined by God, and when you choose to take a step to the block not knowing the particular outcome but knowing that God goes with you.
The temptation to give into fear of responsibility can be overwhelming, particularly in an age that teaches that the world is a frightening place and we are weak, fragile creatures who need costly products and services (undreamt of by our ancestors) to survive. When the reality of our agency rears its head and we are faced with a responsibility and a choice to act, our anxiety can spike, we can feel too small, too insignificant, too ill-equipped for the challenge. I remember returning home from the hospital with my first child thinking, “Shouldn’t they require a license for this?” As the nurse helped buckle our daughter into the carseat, I thought, “Don’t let us go! I’m not prepared for this!” I felt similarly stepping in front of my first classroom. The responsibility of being a father, being a teacher (which obviously aren’t equal) felt outside my abilities. A potential response to moments like this is to freeze, to grow inhibited, to not try to become a father or even a husband (or wife/mother) because you fear that you won’t be responsible enough. This is the vice of despair: the abandonment of hope in your own God-given ability to have agency in this world.
Another possible response to the fear is anxiety: becoming so overwhelmed with the possibility of failure at your responsibility that you go over every scenario, trying to make sure that you are safe. This is also despair, but it’s almost the vice of presumption, because it assumes that you can figure out how to protect yourself in every scenario. In reality, our agency in the world requires risk. We act responsibly not knowing how any one scenario will turn out. We take a job, not knowing if it will be the right fit; we date someone, not knowing if they will be they will break our heart; we raise our kids as best we can, not knowing how we will make mistakes and they will get hurt. Responsibility requires risk.
How is such a risk manageable? How do we bear the burden of living with uncertainty and agency? As Christians, we begin by resting in the grace of God. In Ephesians 2:10 we are told that, “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” Which means that our agency isn’t our own. It belongs to God. It’s his workmanship! Not only that, we were created not to screw things up, but for good works! Isn’t that amazing? And in case you feel like you don’t know what those “good works” are, don’t worry, God does, because he “prepared” them “beforehand, that we should walk in them.” So our duty is to bring everything before God, to seek him first, to use prudence and wisdom and discernment to make the best decisions that we can, and to act responsibly, knowing that there is grace for our mistakes. A God who is provident over all things is guiding us. And when we make mistakes, as we will, he is there to forgive us.
Which means we must act on our responsibilities with courage. Courage does not mean that we do not have fear occasionally, but that we do not let fear drive the ship. Fear can be there. It is a feeling and feelings come and go. If you must be afraid and responsible, then be afraid. Don’t feed the fear by dwelling on it, but do the responsible thing and act! Courage means knowing what is good and enduring suffering for the sake of that good. Maybe the suffering you must endure is the suffering of anxiety or fear of making a mistake or looking foolish or being rejected. But courage asks you to endure those things for the sake of the good, which is the glorification of God, walking in the “good works” God has prepared beforehand.
And that means you must act, take a step to the block. Do the thing you need to do. Commit. Of course this is frightening and overwhelming at times. You don’t know the particular outcome that will occur. But you do know that God loves you and desires your good. Over time, the person who takes up their agency and accepts responsibility in their life to glorify God will face difficult decisions, will make mistakes, will be forced to repent and apologize, will be rejected, and will regret decisions. But they will also glorify God, be more confident, accomplish more goals, and struggle less with uncertainty.
All of life is difficult, but facing our responsibilities with God is what we are called to do. We can’t avoid responsibilities. We can’t be afraid forever. We can’t always deny our agency. We were made to be moral agents for God’s glory. And that requires us to get up and do things, hard things.
For more on courage and the virtues please pre-order my book, To Live Well: Practical Wisdom for Moving Through Chaotic Times.
On another note, I recently published an article on why we need the humanities today despite AI for the Keller Center for Cultural Apologetics.
This was very timely for me. Thank you
Thank you for this. I struggle because for me, the real fear of responsibility has always been at its core a fear of responsibility to make sure one is willing to be saved, so my anxiety is always underneath everything else I plea to be told that I will be saved even if I am an unwilling to do whatever is demanded. Every tiny responsibility carries within it this implicit total risk and total responsibility.