From Fear to Love: Listening Across the Divide
- Tim Ahlman
- Sep 1
- 4 min read
Fear is a crippling emotion. Fear leads to an amygdala hijack. Fight—flee—freeze. Fear keeps us from listening.
This is my first blog after sabbatical. Sabbatical gave me a lot of time to reflect, change my perspective, find hope, and become reacquainted with how deeply loved I am by God through faith in His Son.
And so are you. You’re deeply loved by God.
God’s love eradicates fear—at least it should. Our pesky sinful flesh keeps getting in the way. Ugh.
This is the power of daily dying to self, being daily drowned in the waters of my baptism so Christ may come alive in me. I no longer live—Christ lives in me. Since Christ lives in me, love lives in me. Deep love in my heart creating and sustaining faith. The Spirit of the risen Jesus makes me God’s temple—makes us His temple, Christ’s body.
Since I’ve returned and recorded a few podcasts, I’ve wondered why some of us don’t talk in Christian love to other sides of us. My friend, Pastor Bryan Wolfmueller, calls the two sides Barrier Breakers (aka “missionals”) and Distinction Keepers (aka “confessionals”).
While I would rather this divide not exist, I must address what is. Some of us have a behavioral tendency to lean theologically in one of these two directions. Some may lean further than others.
I guess I’ve earned—some may say “well earned”—the reputation as a “Barrier Breaker.” I would hope this is primarily due to our leadership formation tests we’ve been open-handedly running over the past few years. I do not believe this reputation is earned due to our Lutheran beliefs and practices. I guess you could say “Barrier Breakers” may have a slightly higher tolerance for corporate risk than “Distinction Keepers.” Maybe.
Here is where Bryan and I agree—we need one another. We need to listen twice as much as we speak. We need to put the best construction on the driving motivations of the other. We are all a part of the body of Christ. This listening must begin between different leaders in the LCMS. I am praying this listening leads to love—the love of God by faith in His Son.
I am encouraged. I believe there are more of us striving to listen and love one another across whatever behavioral and strategic divides that may exist (pastoral education and formation, prior approval lists, etc.). I am praying this continues.
Toward this end, I would love to have you join me at the Formal Dissent Gathering at Faith Lutheran Church in Las Vegas on January 6-7, 2026. The prayerful hope is to gather a wide range of LCMS perspectives from LCMS leaders (hopefully 200 attendees) on the topic of Pastoral Education and Formation in the hopes of listening respectfully to diverse opinions and uniting to meet the current and future pastoral needs of every LCMS congregation. We will listen to short Ted-talk-like presentations from LCMS leaders on all sides of the pastoral formation debate, with ample time for table and large group conversation. This gathering will be followed up by a written formal dissent document, summarizing the various arguments, presented to the CTCR for a formal response.
What are we afraid of? I pray it’s not one another—baptized LCMS leaders with diverse perspectives. The perfect love of God casts out fear. I pray you’ll meditate on St. John’s words below, allowing the Holy Spirit to eradicate fear with the deep love of God that is ours through faith in His Son.
“In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.
By this we know that we abide in him and he in us, because he has given us of his Spirit. And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent his Son to be the Savior of the world. Whoever confesses that Jesus is the Son of God, God abides in him, and he in God. So we have come to know and to believe the love that God has for us. God is love, and whoever abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him.
By this is love perfected with us, so that we may have confidence for the day of judgment, because as he is so also are we in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love. We love because he first loved us. If anyone says, “I love God,” and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him: whoever loves God must also love his brother” (1 John 4:10-21, ESV).