Fear and Trembling

"Unite my heart to fear your Name."

"The Fear of the Lord is clean."


These verses come from the ancient psalms yet remain highly relevant for the people of God today. I think that the problems within the modern Church are so plentiful because people who claim the name of the Lord do not fear Him. These problems consist of divisions, immorality, weakness of worship, weakness of interest, and an overall weakness of heart when it comes to the important business of God. I could write a whole post specifically listing the fine points of weakness in the Church, but that is not the heart of dilemma, nor is it the direct matter of my attention here. The heart of the dilemma is a general boredom when approaching the matters of God. To fear the Lord is to be lost in wonder when considering the greatness of who He is. When we do this, our consideration of our worth is reduced and we grow increasingly aware of the insignificant interests to which we hold. In fact the whole human race, because of it's brokenness, is without significance. It is like a clock that keeps on ticking but keeps the wrong time. The dance that we dance--the endless motions of drudgery day in and day out that cloud our ability to prioritize the fear an due wonder before God. We must come back to the fact that we are granted one day of breath in eternity-a people fashioned in the image of the living God. We are a people who possess the fear of Isaac. When we approach God and when we seek Him we are to do so considering all of this and what it is exactly we are coming to:

"For you have not come to a mountain that can be touched and to a blazing fire, and to darkness and gloom and whirlwind, and to the blast of a trumpet and the sound of words which sound was such that those who heard begged that no further word be spoken to them. For they could not bear the command, 'If even a beast touches the mountain it will be stoned.' And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, 'I am full of fear and trembling.' But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to myriads of angels in festal gathering, to the church of the firstborn ones, those who are enrolled in heaven, and to God, the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood, which speaks better than the blood of Abel."

If we fear God then our worship will be arighted. Our actions will be seasoned with salt, our prayers will be full of understanding, our approach to the Scriptures will be humble and we will have brilliant fellowship that is pleasing to God. We fear God because we have His promises and because the One who calls us is the great I AM. Thus because God will begin His judgement with His house, we are to be holy and blameless without spot or wrinkle while traversing upon the days that God has appointed for us. If we fear God, we will recognize that this is no small thing and beg for the grace of God to aid us. We fear God because we are chosen not to be like the wicked of the world who are chaff prepared for the day of fire. God has extended His hand to us in Jesus and has saved us from our sin and damnation. The Holy One who did not know sin because it was not in His nature became sin for us that we may be displayed as the righteousness of God through eternity. We are chosen for adoption according to the pleasure of God. This monumental, ageless act of love shown by the Lamb who was slain before the foundation of the world should cause us to tremble, understanding the price of our consecration and being wary lest a root of bitterness against God cause us to fail obtaining Christ's grace.
To fear God is to elect wisdom and begin it's healing procedure.

May God take away the shame of a lazy ungrateful people! May God strike us with the rod from His mouth that we may fear Him! May God take away the love of the world in His Church! May God pour forth His knowledge of Himself that we may tremble because we have begun to consider the identiy of who we are because God has revealed His identity to us!

"May the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be pleasing to you, O Lord."