As I sat down to write this week’s message on “Fear of Intimacy.” I thought to myself, “I don’t want to do this. I hate that topic!” Perhaps I have a problem.
The concept of men fearing intimacy is a bit of a cliche. We expect it in men. I think that’s because when we guys hear the word, the picture that comes to mind is quite frightening for us. Intimacy conjures up images of us crying, going antiquing, listening to our partner’s endlessly detailed stories and having to dutifully nod at the end of each sentence with an “I know” or “Yes, how interesting.” In other words, even if you don’t believe in a literal Hell, intimacy becomes a fairly close recreation for us.
Men have a problem with intimacy in our relationships. When we’re angry, we tend to retreat, sometimes not even letting know we are angry. We do this with our wives, our children and our friends. We don’t communicate honestly. Even though last week, I talked about us all having special gifts, the one gift no one has is that of being a mind reader. We expect people to guess how we are feeling. That lack of honest communication prevents us from having close relationships.
Although this intimacy phobia is often portrayed as limited to the male of the species, some behaviors stereotypically associated with females also demonstrates this fear. For instance, guys, have you ever asked a woman “What’s wrong?” and they say, “Nothing.” You know there’s something wrong. She knows there’s something wrong, but the problem isn’t being communicated. Think of all the hours men would get back if every women we to whom we asked “What’s wrong?” answered us on the first try. We may not realize it, but that is symptomatic of fear of intimacy.
Another example of which we are all guilty, have you ever wanted someone to do something for you, but rather than just ask him directly, you drop hints. That lack of honesty in communication may also be a sign that you are avoiding intimacy in that relationship.
In our journey to become the people God created us to be, this fear of intimacy is yet another roadblock. Regardless of our gender, we are all guilty of creating barriers to closeness in our relationships. These barriers are not limited to our romantic relationships, we routinely erect them in families, friendships, even in churches. We even set up barriers to block our intimacy with God. In fact, the Bible claims that is at the heart of all our dysfunctional human relationships - a fear of intimacy with God.
We are all familiar with the story of Adam, Eve and the forbidden fruit. After Eve takes the fruit and gives it to Adam they suddenly feel shame. They sense they are quite literally exposed and aware of their nakedness. In response, they sew together clothing of fig leaves.
When you think about it, the human race has been sewing together fig leaves ever since. This stems from our fear of nakedness and exposure to one another. It erupts up all the time in our subconscious. Have you ever had a dream where show up in a public place naked, missing an article of clothing or dressed inappropriately? We fear others discovering our faults, our fears and seeing us for who we truly are. In short we fear closeness with others and we fashion little coverups for ourselves to hide our true selves. These coverups range from attempts to create a good impression to seriously dysfunctional behavior.
All of us try to create a good impression when we meet new people. I remember my friend Steve coming to a party a few years ago and being introduced to an attractive young woman. They struck up a conversation, flirted a little bit and covered a little bit of their life stories. Steve mentioned he was an artist and when this woman head that, she promptly asked to see his work. Immediately, Steve ran out to his car and brought in his portfolio, which he laid out on a coffee table to show her. A while later, I asked him how it was going.
“I don’t know. It seems strange,” he said. “I feel like I’m on Wild Kingdom. Marlin Perkins should be narrating this scene saying, ‘and then the male of the species presents works he has created and lays them in front of the female. If she accepts them, they will mate.’”
If we want to knock down the roadblock of fear of intimacy, the first way to do that is through authenticity. Maybe you don’t have a portfolio of artwork that you use to impress people, but for you it’s a portfolio of money, your grades, of your kid’s accomplishments, or even your own spiritual status. There’s nothing wrong with creating a good impression, but often we take it too far. For many of us, how we look to other people becomes so important that we no longer act authentically. In this age of social media, online profiles and personal branding, that it is all too easy to fall into that trap.
Why do we do that? Why do we go such elaborate lengths to fashion modern fig leaves for ourselves? I believe it is not so much that we want others to be impressed with us, as it is we want to prevent them from seeing our flaws. We fear them getting close to us. We fear being truly known by them. So we invest inordinate amounts of time and energy putting an image of ourselves out there. Although we think those images of ourselves are helping us in life, they really just get in our way. Ironically, most people see right through our facades and are put off by them. So we push people farther away. The images we project needlessly complicate our relationships with our friends and family. They lead to misunderstandings.
God doesn’t want us to have relationships where we are always worried about the impression we are making on others. Following Jesus, and the right relationship that provides for us, knocks down that roadblock of the fear of intimacy. No matter what we do, we cannot create a good impression of ourselves before God. Our faith is in God’s grace, not our own abilities. When we have a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ, we know we are loved and valued by God.
We don’t have to pretend in front of people anymore. We don’t have to always be scurrying around to cover up our faults in front of people and trying to create the right impression. We can simply be who we are, warts and all, broken and yet forgiven, imperfect, yet being perfected.
That may seem hopelessly idealistic to you, so God has provided a test lab for you to experience these types of authentic relationships. The church is a prototype of that authenticity. This is a place where you don’t have to pretend and you can take a rest from always having to make good impression. When we put those things aside, we find ourselves more willing to communicate honestly with one another. In this space, God works a transformation. Before you know it, there is a closeness among us and perhaps even an intimacy that was not possible before.
I have rarely met anyone who doesn’t want to have a good marriage, be close to their kids, or have close friends. God doesn’t want us to have half relationships, half friendships or half marriages. Yet we often settle for that. We find God at the depths of human experience, not in its superficialities. In order to have deep experiences, we must move past our fear getting close to one another. That roadblock can only come down when we are re-created in Christ and realize that we don’t have to hide from people.
Most importantly, we don’t have to hide from God. Sure we all fall short of what God wants for us. Like Adam, we all carry around the shame of that failure. The good news is that because of Jesus, we don’t have to carry around that shame any longer. God is a loving and forgiving God who gives us new chances at life. We can stop sewing fig leaves and let people get to know us, while we truly get to know them, and truly know and are known by God.
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