Fear The Lord?

Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. Phillipians 2:12

For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart: And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake. Hebrews 12:20&21

And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell. Matthew 10:28 (spoken to the disciples as He was sending them out)

Those are some heavy verses if you ask me! What is it with fearing God that Is so crucial? Hopefully we can adequately analyze this from these 3 verses.
I love it when scripture is used to interpret other scripture! Those above verses in conjunction with each other answer a lot of questions. God never ceases to amaze. I believe this “fear” topic is confusing to a lot of believers in light of the teaching of God’s wonderful grace, bestowed upon us through our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. How in the world can both love and fear be helpful in a believers life? A pastor by the name of John Bevere once said “If we are taught fear, fear, fear all the time we become legalistic (in the classical sense), if we are taught grace,grace,grace all the time, we tend to become lawless.” I don’t think I could agree with him more. Because of our fallen state we need to have both. When we have given into the enemy and sinned, we didn’t stop feeling our affections towards the Lord did we? And we didn’t think God stopped loving us did we? No, we were still aware of His great love! So what does this mean? It means we need another motivation, and that motivation is the “fear of the Lord”.

Let’s talk about the above verses. We see Paul telling the church to “work out your own salvation with FEAR AND TREMBLING” , and then the verse below that says “And so if as much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart: And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly FEAR AND QUAKE.” And then you have Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, telling His disciples to fear God “who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell”. This is very sobering! See I have heard people say, “you are not supposed to be afraid of God”, and do not get me wrong, this is so true! But I feel it is not explained harmoniously with what WE ARE supposed to be afraid of, I feel it waters other scripture down if not adequately explained what is meant by that phrase. We are not supposed to go around always wondering if God is going to strike us dead . But we are, however, supposed to have a fear that is on the inside, looking out at sin and says, “I am absolutely terrified at how the Lord feels about that, and how He says He will deal with that if I do that and/or continue in it, and I am deeply afraid to ever even go there”. Just as Moses was “on the inside looking out” at the beast that touched the mountain and the beast was stoned for it, so we should “WORK OUT OUR SALVATION WITH FEAR AND QUAKING”. God is so wonderful in giving us a mental picture of what this phrase “fear and trembling” means.

So how do fear and love work? I like to think of it like this, God knowing how hard His wrath would be on the son’s of disobedience, sent His only Son, on a mission full of love, to save us from that wrath. In other words, fear draws us to love. What was the message again? You have a way of escape (love) from the wrath of God (fear), AND HIS WONDERFUL, PRECIOUS, MAGNIFICENT, HOLY, INCOMPRABLE NAME IS JESUS! And in other, other, Words, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes (puts their active faith) in Him shall not perish (fear) but have eternal life" (love)John 3:16. The fear of the true wrath of God propels us to the loving arms of Jesus. We love Him, because He first loved us (1 John 4:19), why? Because He showed His love for us in redeeming us from the wrath of God.

I hope brothers and sister that this was helpful. When God took me through this season of fear it was a hard pill to swallow. Used to, despite my love for Him, I would abuse His grace because of a misunderstanding of this topic. Please be careful with how you live your lives! God loves you so much, He has warned of His impending wrath upon disobedience. And not only warned, but provided a way of escape! Abide in HIM! Praise Jesus, we love Him, we love Him, we love Him!

Pastor Bevere told a story about a friend he had (or maybe even still has) that was an evangelist in another country. This man started out with pure motives, loving the Lord, but eventually fell into adultery and helping himself to some of God’s money. This man was put into prison in this country for this reason and pastor Bevere went to see him. “What happened to you brother?” Pastor Bevere asked, “When did you lose your love for the Lord?”. This humbled, repentant individual looked at him and said, “Lose my love? I never lost my love for Him, I lost my fear of Him.” Pastor Bevere said the Holy Spirit jumped all over that comment and revealed this truth to him in that moment. God used John Bevere to point this out to me, I hope I have successfully passed it on to you my brothers and sisters! With love, your fellow laborer, Chris Goff
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom: a GOOD UNDERSTANDING have all they that do his commandments: his praise endureth for ever. Psalm 111:10