The Fear Of The Lord
There is a tendency in the body of Christ to treat God solely as a friend, or someone who answers our prayers for what we need. There is a real need for the restoration of the fear of the LORD. Why the fear of the LORD. The fear of the LORD gives us a healthy attitude and mindset for how we approach God. What exactly does it mean to fear the LORD?
To fear the LORD, is to recognize who God really is, not who we make him out to be, by creating and fashioning him according to our own understanding. We need to realize just who it is that we are dealing with. God is the creator of all things. God is without blemish, faultless and pure; he is light and in him is no darkness; he is awesome in power and holiness; he is all together otherly – he is not like us; he is dreadful ie. awesome, worthy to be reverenced and given honor; he’s full of glory and majesty. Even though we are created in his image, we are not like God in essence. There is no one more powerful than God! He is all powerful, all seeing, all knowing and all present everywhere. Who is like God? It will take trillions of lifetimes to just scratch the surface of knowing who God really is.
He deserves our reverence, respect, honor, worship, love, obedience and devotion. To fear the Lord, is to know that he could have chosen to destroy us for our sin and rebellion, but he chose instead to punish his Son through mocking, scorning, beating, scourging and finally death by crucifixion. We should also recognize that God will judge those who will not bend the knee and heart to him in repentance in order to receive him. He will come to judge them, pouring out his full wrath upon them for their stubbornness, arrogance and pride. This is not something much mentioned about, but God is holy and he can not allow what is unholy to remain in his presence. Those who are rebellious and bent on having their own way will not remain in the presence of God. He resists the proud.
To fear the Lord, is to put our full faith and trust in him, because he is worthy of our love and affection. The fear of the Lord helps us to have the proper mindset in our approach to God. When we fear the Lord, we show him, the body of Christ and the world that we’ve fixed it in our hearts, that we will reverence God in our lives, and that we don’t take him lightly. He is our friend, but he is much much more than that.
Scripture references: Psalm 66:3,5; Deuteronomy 10:21; Psalm 99:3; Isaiah 64:3; Psalm 102:15; 2 Chronicles 20:29; 1 Samuel 12:l14; Proverbs 9:10; Psalm 19:9; Psalm 33:8; Psalm 135:20; Psalm 22:23; Jeremiah 5:24; Deuteronomy 10:12; James 4:6; Isaiah 6:3; Ezekiel 39:7; 1 Peter 1:15; Leviticus 20:26; 1 John 1:5
