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Home Group – Does God Really Want Us To Fear Him?

by | Mon, Aug 25 2014

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Does God Really Want Us To Fear Him?

The word “fear” is common in the Old Covenant, and to many it sounds like we should cringe in dread of God’s presence.

Of course, we also find “fear” in the New Covenant too. The Gentiles who believed in God were called God-fearers, and the early church was said to be built up in the “fear of the Lord” (Acts 9:31). Why is there so much fear in the Bible?

The key to solving this mystery is to know more about the Hebrew word that we translate as “fear.” Like many words in Hebrew, it has a much broader range of meaning than we have in English. To us, “fear” is the opposite of trust, and its synonyms are fright, dread and terror. But the Hebrew equivalent, yirah (YEER-ah) encompasses a wide range of meanings from negative (dread, terror) to positive (worship, reverence) and from mild (respect) to strong (awe).

You may be surprised – every time you read “revere” or “reverence” in English it comes from the Hebrew word yirah. In Leviticus 19:3, we are told to “fear/respect/revere” our mother and father using this same word and in this instance yirah refers to showing them respect or reverence, not being afraid of them.

An even stronger word for “fear,” is pahad, which is often translated “dread” that can also describe jaw-dropping awe. In fact pahad means to tremble, revere, be in awe…imagine — “fear” describing spine-tingling amazement at what God has done to bless His people as is the case in Jeremiah 33:9, ‘Then the name of this city will bring me joy, praise and glory before all the nations of the earth that hear about all the good I am doing for them; they will be OVERCOME WITH FEAR AND TREMBLING at all the good and peace I am securing for it.’

Have you ever experienced what it’s like to be ‘overcome with fear and trembling’?

How Should We “Fear the Lord”?

Often Christians interpret “the Fear of the LORD” as the fear of the punishment that God could give us for our deeds. Certainly, we will all stand before God’s judgment seat when we die. But if you know that Christ has paid for your sins, you should not have this kind of fear anymore. This is what John preaches against when he says, ‘There is no fear in love. On the contrary, love that has achieved its goal gets rid of fear, because fear has to do with punishment; the person who keeps fearing has not been brought to maturity in regard to love.’ 1 John 4:18

The rabbis often spoke of the “fear of the Lord” — Yirat Adonai— but they always thought of it in terms of the most positive sense of the word yirah. They defined it as awe and reverence for God that motivates us to do His will.

They pointed out that fearing God’s punishment is actually an inferior understanding, because at its core it is self-centered. It doesn’t even focus on God but rather looks at God only through the lens of our own interests, by asking what will happen to us because of God’s knowledge of our deeds.

If you have yirat Adonai – awe and reverence for God – it fills you with a better kind of fear. An example of this kind of ‘fear’ might be that you work in a mega-corporation and one day you’re promoted to work directly under the CEO. Wouldn’t you tremble and be incredibly nervous as you report for your first assignment? When you have great respect for someone, you feel terrible knowing you’ve disappointed them and when you love another person deeply, you earnestly want their approval. How much more should this be true of how we feel and relate to God!

Understanding Yirat Adonai through a Hebrew lens shows why the “fear of the Lord” is so highly praised in the Bible:

Proverbs 9:10 says, ‘The fear of ADONAI is the beginning of wisdom, and knowledge of Holy One is understanding.’

 

Proverbs 14:26-27 says, ‘In the fear of ADONAI is powerful security; for His children there will be a place of refuge. The fear of ADONAI is a fountain of life enabling one to avoid deadly traps.’

The “fear of the Lord” in these passages is an awe-filled love of God that allows us to grow in intimate knowledge of Him. It teaches us how to live, and reassures us of God’s power and guidance. It gives us a reverence of His will that keeps us from getting caught in sins that will destroy our relationships and lives.

A Sense of God’s Presence

One aspect of Yirat Adonai is the idea that we should be constantly aware of the presence of God. You see a reminder of this in many synagogues. Over the ornate cabinets (ark) that hold the Torah scrolls is the phrase Know Before Whom You Stand. This means to realize that an infinitely powerful God is always close at hand. Wow!

We all love to have those emotional experiences where we ‘feel the presence of God’, but the reality is that most of the time we don’t ‘feel’ anything. Does that mean that the presence of God is not longer with us? Of course not, our God has promised to never leave us or forsake us. Psalm 139 ask the question, “Where can I go to escape your Spirit? Where can I flee from Your PRESENCE?” The entire psalm then gives itself to explain that there is nowhere in all of God’s creation that we can flee or hide from His presence. He is always with us…our ‘feelings’ have absolutely nothing to do with it. If that’s the case, shouldn’t we live in a state of reverential awe and respect toward Him in all that we do? Shouldn’t that affect the decisions we make regarding where we go, what we do and who we do it with?

The phrase ‘Know Before Whom You Stand’ takes on a whole new significance when you realise that every second of ever day we are standing before the God of the Universe!

Jewish thinkers point out that study of the Scriptures must always be done with Yirat Adonai. Academic education in Biblical studies tends to be entirely intellectual, and Christians often find it dry. What they are looking for is God’s voice speaking through the Scriptures, and to find it they need Yirat Adonai. There is an enormous difference between study of the Bible that is done out of Yirat Adonai, reverence for God, and a purely intellectual approach.

A classic rabbinic saying is that a scholar who does not have Yirat Adonai “is like a man who owns a treasure chest and has the inner keys but not the outer keys.” 2Rich wealth is right in His hands, but he can’t get at it. To study the Bible without reverence is a dry enterprise that will never unlock its true meaning.

Our Moral Foundation

Another thing that Yirat Adonai gives us is an inner moral foundation. When you know that God knows your thoughts, you are compelled to act not just for what other people think, but for what God thinks. This was what Paul meant in Colossians 3:22 when he said, ‘Slaves, obey your human masters in everything, not serving only when they are watching you, to win their favor, but single-heartedly, fearing the Lord.’ Reverence of God gives us an inward sincerity because we don’t do things just for appearances, but to please God who knows our heart and sees all we do even when others don’t.

A humorous story illustrates

A great rabbi once caught a ride on a horse-drawn wagon, and as the wagon passed a field full of ripe produce, the driver stopped and said, “I’m going to get us some vegetables from that field. Call out if you see anyone coming.” As the driver was picking vegetables, the rabbi cried out, “We’re seen! We’re seen!” The frightened man ran back to the wagon, and looked and saw no one nearby. He said, “Why did you call out like that when there was nobody watching?” The rabbi pointed toward heaven and said, “God is watching! God is always watching.” 3

An awareness of God’s presence will motivate us to obey Him. You may still think of this as a fear of punishment, but it doesn’t have to be that way. Indeed, the “fear of the Lord” should really be a sense of Christ’s majesty that gives you an earnest longing to please Him. When you know He is always with you, it causes you to try to live as the disciple He wants you to be.

Shalom

Based on writings of Lois Tverberg

1 From “Fear of YHWH and Hebrew Spirituality” a lecture by Dwight Pryor, October 2003. See the Center for Judaic-Christian Studies (www.jcstudies.com) for more.

2 From the Talmud, Tractate Shabbat 31b. See the article “Fear of God” at jewishencyclopedia.com.

3 As quoted by Joseph Telushkin in The Book of Jewish Values, p 10. Copyright 2000. (This is an outstanding book on practical ethics and how we should live – highly recommended.)