The Fear of God

Ok, so this post isn't going to be about what the title might lead you to think it's going to be about. The fear of God used to be what kept us from misbehaving because he can see everything and would punish us 'be it ever so severely' for our disobedience. Then the phrase got a make-over and came to mean having an awe-filled respect for God in all his power, majesty and holiness. The phrase perhaps means a combination of the two, but certainly leaning towards the 'respect' meaning than craven fear. But that's not how I want to use the concept of the fear of God.


I recently read, and have no reason to doubt, that the most often repeated command in the Bible is to 'fear not.' Whether it is framed as, 'don't fear, be of good courage, be courageous, don't be afraid,' or any other wording, the command to Fear Not is throughout scripture from Genesis to Revelation. There are obviously many things that we can be afraid of, and the stories of the people we meet in the Bible give us examples. But it seems to me that as I pondered this idea recently that the thing we fear the most is actually God himself.


The fear of the Lord is a good and healthy attitude for human beings, yet it can too often lead to a withdrawing from the freedom that God has provided through Jesus Christ. Let me explain. God is big. God is beyond our comprehension or understanding. God reveals himself to us through the Bible, but even the scriptures cannot contain the immensity or totality of who God is. He is a God who defies definition and containment not because of any sense of randomness or inconsistency in his character, but because he is too big for definition.


This doesn't sit well with us. We, rightly, study the Bible to learn about God, write theologies and doctrine and creeds to frame what has been learned. And thank God for those things. But we then expect God to fit into the framework we have devised, because in that there is security and comfort. The problem comes when we discover that God doesn't fit. He won't be contained by our attempts to define him. In The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, C S Lewis reminds us that 'he isn't tame, but he is good.' Perfect love casts out fear and releases us into being and enjoying and living because perfect love is to know and experience and interact with a God who is wild and creative and surprising. There is, at some level, a fear of a God like this because I can't control him and bend him to my will.


Theology, creeds and doctrine can teach us much about God, but they all fall short. Any attempt to put him into a framework that makes safe, logical sense for us distorts the majestic and uncontainable God of the Bible. The Bible teaches us to hold many things in tension, truths that defy reconciliation: justice and grace, election and freedom, transcendence and immanence, three-in-one, and so many more. These tensions help us to understand that God is beyond our comprehension - and wonderfully so! This a God I can trust my life to; a God who is worthy of worship; a God to serve and love and discover. The God of the Bible is no man-made deity to be controlled and manipulated and defined, but he is the Creator God, the self-existent sovereign who reveals himself to his creation, loves his creation, suffered and died for his creation, and works to redeem his creation.


We need not fear our God, for he is a righteous, covenant keeping God. He will do what he says he will do, he is for his people and his creation and will lovingly keep us and care for us. Life can be messy and unexpected and too often doesn't fit into a neat pattern that explains why. Thankfully my God isn't a neat, easily-explained God, he is sovereignly and gloriously beyond my expectations and conception. And though I might fear the freedom that comes from faith in such a God, I can enjoy the liberation and unanticipated possibility of knowing and being known by my heavenly Father. He isn't tame, he cannot be contained or easily defined, but he is safe, and he is good.