Be afraid, be very afraid! Tremble in your boots! Jeremiah 33:9 Ezekiel 26:16, Jeremiah 5:22
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.Job 28:28
The fear of the Lord is to hate evil and hunger for righteousness.
God shows his “secrets” to those who fear him.Psalm 25:14
When I fear the Lord, I do not need to fear anyone or anything else. Psalm 27:1
The angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear him. Psalm 34:7
The fear of the Lord is a choice which we must be taught and I must work to maintain even when I am rejoicing in his love. Proverbs 2:5
The fear of the Lord leads to long, healthy life. Proverbs10:27
The fear of the Lord continually fills my spirit so that I am not enticed by the snares of death. Proverbs 14:27
So that I do not fall into the trap of envying sinners, I need to fear the Lord all the day long. Proverbs 23:17
Whatever the fear of the Lord means, Jesus was given quick understanding of it by the Holy Spirit, along with wisdom, understanding, ability to counsel, might, and knowledge. Isaiah 11:2,3
Fear of the Lord is a heart affair, and God gives us a heart that delights in fearing him. It does not come from following rules and regulations. Isaiah29:13, 63:17
If we want help in fearing God and only God then ponder his works in nature and understand that our blessings of food and safety do not come from our own might but by his spirit. Jeremiah5:22-24
To understand the fear of the Lord we need to take our “fear” of authority and of our fathers and see that the Lord deserves it even more. (Of course, we practice bad attitudes towards authority and parents and so can not understand this crucial spirit attitude.) Malachi 1:6
You say that you believe in God? Do you tremble? Well, the devils believe in God and they tremble. James 2:19 ( The greek word is phrisso to shudder, to be struck with extreme fear, to be horrified.
We like to say that fear of God means to have deep respect. Fine, if we mean to lose control of our muscles and fall flat on our faces, as did the apostle John in Revelation 1:17 or Ezekiel in Ezekiel 1:28 or Daniel in Daniel 8:18 and again in 10:9-19 or Peter, James and John in Matthew 17:6
In each case step one is for me to fear and step two is for him to touch me and lift me up and say, “fear not” (Which God has to repeat over a hundred times throughout the Bible)
Fear of God helps me sort out my priorities so that I do not sin. Exodus 20:20
I believe that this is one of those Dynamic Balances that require me to keep my eyes on the Lord in order to maintain my equilibrium. If I get so comfortable in him being the God of love and mercy that I am tempted to sin— then I need to have a fresh dose of fear. If I am so full of awe that I can not come boldly to his throne and call him ABBA then I need his grace to “fear not.”
The fear of the Lord must be taught to our children. Psalm 34:11
My grandson James had the problem of having no fear. There are grey hairs on my daughter to prove it. He had to be taught to fear; cars, strangers, electric plugs,strange dogs etc. Then he had to learn to walk in the boundaries his parents set so that he did not have to fear. Then he had to learn to seize life with bold gusto while still fearing what would happen if he wanders out of his parents guidelines.
We all need to learn these basic steps and then ask the Lord to fill us with his enthusiasm and boldness. Acts 4:31 being filled with the Holy Ghost,they spake the word of God with boldness.
I think that you can see from these few Bible quotes, how vital the fear of the Lord is. Then it must be balanced with the comfort of the Holy Comforter. Acts 9: 31 and by the hundreds of times God says “fear not”. It is a matter of sequence. First I must see my sin and its’ consequences, my weakness and vulnerability and tremble in the Lords’ presence. THEN I need to fear not. I will talk on that in the next blog.
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