God Fully-Clawed

"Fearing God? What are you talking about? God is love!" This is the rallying cry of the misinformed Christians of our day. Since "the fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom," it would follow that having no fear of God would leave a person with no wisdom.

But doesn't fearing God mean being afraid of Him? Certainly not! Moses addresses the Israelites, right after delivering the ten commandments, and says, "do not be afraid; for God has come in order to test you, and in order that the fear of Him may remain with you, so that you may not sin" (Ex. 20:20). Do not be afraid. Fear God. These two propositions do not contradict. To be afraid seems to give the connotation of being unaware of consequences or the future, but to fear something, in this case, means that you know well and good what the consequences are. God makes us fully aware what our consequences will be for our sin: death. This fear we are to have for God includes reverence, honor, and respect [Heb. "yir'ah" - awesome or terrifying thing (object causing fear), respect, reverence, piety]. Were it not for Christ, this consequence of eternal seperation from God would be a reality for us all.

All of this to say that modern pagans, and even many Christians, have spent their lives judiciously and fervently declawing God, and in turn His church. Shirking the sharps pains of persecution, ridding ourselves of church purity, emphasizing God's love much more than His other attributes, the list goes on and on. Christians have got to think iconoclastically! We must constantly be vigilant in destroying heretical (wrong-thinking) views of God, and in their place, inserting orthodox (right-thinking) views of God. The ever-present heresy of our day and age is that God is not to be feared. May we rid ourselves of this in order to see God in a more orthodox way, one that honors His omnipotence and wrath toward sin.

Remember, Aslan is not a tame Lion.

Ok, we should fear God, but isn't He "safe?" Don't we know everything there is to know about Him? Don't we have Him in our back pocket? I can say it no better than Mr. Beaver, so I'll let him make response:

"Safe?" said Mr. Beaver. "Don't you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.

Thank you, Mr. Beaver. Love, in and of itself...is an oxymoron. True love does not exist without fear and trembling and honor, all of which are immortal things. Let's get back to a more robust and honorable view of our King. God is love, certainly, but He also commands fear and trembling from all creation (Phil. 2:12, Heb. 12:21).