Fear and friendship

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Exodus 25-27 and Psalm 26

TO CHEW ON: "Who is the man who fears the Lord? Him will he instruct in the way he should choose.... The friendship of the Lord is for those who fear him, and he will teach him in the way he chooses." PSALM 25:12,14 ESV


It's interesting that this psalm promises God's guidance and friendship to those who fear Him.

The word fear (yare') here doesn't only mean to be afraid in its usual English sense. It also means to "Stand in awe of, be awed, reverence, honour and respect." The Amplified translation includes those shades of meaning: "Who is the man who reverently fears and worships the Lord? ....The secret [of the sweet satisfying companionship] of the Lord have they who fear (revere and worship) Him and He will show them His covenant and reveal to them its [deep inner] meaning."

The words worship and revere imply that our relationship with God is not one of equals. It is similar in some ways to the relationship of subjects to a monarch. Even a king's son or daughter must treat him with special deference observing protocol, at least in public.

When we fear God we become good candidates for His instruction and guidance. It means we will pay attention to what pleases Him. We will accept His correction and discipline. We will obey Him when He tells us what to do and how to do it.

The wonderful thing is God is not some cold distant sovereign ordering us around, but a God who, in response to our fear (respect, reverence, worship), extends (amazing thought) "sweet, satisfying companionship" i.e. "friendship."

PRAYER: Dear God, when I think about You and all Your power, authority, wisdom, creativity, and compassion, the only appropriate response is fear.  I am amazed and incredibly grateful that in response to my fear, You offer friendship. Amen.

PSALM TO PRAY: Psalm 25 

MORE: "The Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom"

"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom" (Prov. 1:7). Happy the soul that has been awed by a view of God's majesty, that has had a vision of God's awful greatness, His ineffable holiness, His perfect righteousness, His irresistible power, His sovereign grace. Does someone say, "But it is only the unsaved, those outside of Christ, who need to fear God"? Then the sufficient answer is that the saved, those who are in Christ, are admonished to work out their own salvation with "fear and trembling" - by A. W. Pink. Read all of "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom."

*********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scriptures marked ESV are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®) copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. ESV® Text Edition: 2011. The ESV® text has been reproduced in cooperation with and by permission of Good News Publishers. Unauthorized reproduction of this publication is prohibited. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked AMPLIFIED are taken from the Amplified® Bible, Copyright © 1954, 1958, 1962, 1964, 1965, 1987 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission." (www.Lockman.org)

A remedy for spiritual complacency

Image: Pixabay

TODAY’S SPECIAL: Isaiah 64:1-12

TO CHEW ON: “And there is no one who calls on Your name
Who stirs himself up to take hold of You;
For You have hidden Your face from us
And have consumed us because of our iniquities” - Isaiah 64:7


Isaiah’s concept of God was rooted in the fearful, awe-inspiring moments when God gave him a glimpse of Himself and eternal things. The account of this is in Isaiah 6, where he saw God on His throne. The train of His robe filled the temple. Angels, their faces veiled from God’s holy presence with wings, shouted across to each other “Holy, holy holy is the LORD God of hosts / The whole earth is full of His glory!” Then an earthquake shook the place and it filled with smoke.

Isaiah became exquisitely aware of his own pollution. He felt dirty, sinful, alarmed at his unworthiness, conscious of his foul mouth. Read the account in Isaiah 6:1-8.

In our reading this same Isaiah (now years later) rues the complacency of his fellow citizens: “… there is no one who calls on Your name, / Who stirs himself up to take hold of You.” God feels absent and the people live as if God can’t see them and may as well not exist.

But Isaiah knows better. Just because God doesn’t show Himself at their bidding doesn’t change anything about Him. And so his prayer is full of apologies and repentance on behalf of himself and the people: “But we are all like an unclean thing … We are the clay and You our potter … Do not be furious, O Lord, / Nor remember iniquity forever” - Isaiah 64:6,8,9.

This reminds me of something I read recently. David Kitz, in his book Psalms Alive tells (in the chapter on Psalm 32:6-7) the story of how he and his brother avoided a stalking cougar on their Saskatchewan farm because of the barking of their dog. He makes this application:

“In a peculiar way, an unexpected encounter with the living God can be a lot like an encounter with a cougar. Suddenly, we realize our every move has been studied and watched; we are not alone. And that other being out there, watching us, is much bigger and more powerful than we are. Are you really prepared to meet Him around the next curve in the road, or just over the next hill?” - Psalms Alive p. 72.

I don’t know about you, but I can become as spiritually complacent as Isaiah’s countrymen. As a result I fail to see and acknowledge God in my day-to-day. I want to resist that. You too?  Let’s “stir ourselves up to take hold of” Him. One way to do this is to become aware of what He is really like.

PRAYER: Dear Father, please forgive my frequent indifference and blasé attitude toward You. Please give me a glimpse of who You really are so that my relationship with You is rooted in fact, not some fantasy concocted by myself or those around me as to what You are like. Amen.
 

MORE: Francis Chan - Francis' Personal Testimony - Newday 2017


I recently watched a video in which Francis Chan tells some of his life story to a group of high school students in England. In it, he describes how Isaiah 6 impacted him: “Here’s what changed my life; when I understood reverence for God.”



*********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Sometimes God's ways get everyone talking

Zacharias and Elizabeth praying - Artist unknown

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Luke 1:57-80

TO CHEW ON: "Then fear came on all who dwelt around them; and all these things were discussed throughout all the hill country of Judea." Luke 1:65

Little Annabel Bean started having stomach troubles when she was just four. Her parents' quest for a diagnosis finally led to "pseudo obstruction motility disorder," an incurable condition where the stomach muscles don't work properly.

One afternoon when she was nine, weary of the house and bed, she—a tomboy like her older sister whenever she had the energy—joined her sister on the high branch of an old tree. The branch started to creak and then move and the girls scrambled for the safest way down. In that scramble, Anna fell headfirst into a grotto-like hole in the tree's trunk near where they had been sitting.

It turned out the hole wasn't the entrance to a shallow wooden cave but the mouth of the trunk that was hollow to the ground. Anna fell 30 feet that day. She should have been killed.

But instead, she had a heavenly vision. "I sat in Jesus' lap," she told her parents later. When rescuers finally lowered a rope sling to rescue her, she told how an angel provided light so she could find and grab onto it. And that day was the beginning of her healing. Her story caused quite a buzz.*

Another story that got everyone talking was the birth of John the Baptist. His birth to elderly parents, his father Zacharias's inability to speak throughout Elizabeth's entire pregnancy, then his parents' choice of name for him—John instead of Zacharias II, defying all convention—provoked "fear" (phobos - dread, fear, reverence) in all who lived nearby.

Though we may never have experienced God working in our lives in such dramatic ways as did John the Baptist's parents or Anna Bean, He is at work in our lives too. Let's stay alert to His activity. When we do sense His presence in things like little "coincidences" to the miracles we may experience, hear, or read about, let's not rationalize away His working: Anna was just lucky to fall the right way. Her vision was the product of an overactive imagination. The fact she never needed another pain pill after this was just coincidence….

No.

Rather, let's view God activity in our lives and the lives of those around us with the fear, dread, and reverence of Zacharias and Elizabeth's Judean neighbours. Let's let such examples strengthen our faith and reassure us that God is alive and active in our world.

PRAYER: Dear God, thank You that in my time, though filled with technological savvy where the tendency is to look for a natural explanation for everything, there are evidences that You still break through in miracles. Help me to believe, "The Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save; neither His ear heavy that it cannot hear" (Isaiah 59:1). Amen.

MORE: Nativity of St. John the Baptist

Today the church celebrates the Feast of the Nativity of John the Baptist. The day's liturgy begins with this collect:

Almighty God, by whose providence your servant John the Baptist was wonderfully born, and sent to prepare the way of your Son our Savior by preaching repentance: Make us so to follow his teaching and holy life, that we may truly repent according to his preaching; and, following his example, constantly speak the truth, boldly rebuke vice, and patiently suffer for the truth's sake; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

* Annabel's mother has told her story in the book Miracles from Heaven. A movie based on the story (Miracles From Heaven) was released in March, 2016.

 *********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

The foundation of wisdom

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Psalm 111:1-10


TO CHEW ON: "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom;

A good understanding have all those who do His commandments. His praise endures forever." Psalm 111:10

When people ask, what would you like to be remembered for after you die, as in what would you like written on your tombstone, my mind always gravitates toward wisdom. I would love to be remembered as someone who was wise. In Psalm 111:10, the writer reveals the foundation of true wisdom. It is the fear of the Lord.

What is this fear? Tim Challies in The Discipline of Spiritual Discernment describes it:

"Wisdom is the application of the fear of God to life; it is living in such a way that we esteem God above all else. A man who is wise is first a man who fears God. This is not a terrified, horrified fear, as in the fear of a child for a monster or an abusive father, but a fear based on a realistic understanding of the infinite gap between God and man in holiness and knowledge" - page 55.

The phrase "the fear of the Lord" (or "the fear of God") occurs often in the Bible. As we track some occurrences, we see that this fear impacts many areas of life.

1. To fear God is a requirement for God's people - Deuteronomy 2:25; Joshua 4:24.

2. The fear of God involves doing away with anything that would vie with Him for first place in our hearts - Joshua 24:14.

3. God alone is to be feared in this way - Isaiah 8:13.

4. God is worthy of our fear because only He has power over life and death - Matthew 10:28.

5. God is worthy of our fear because only He can see through our actions and judge us righteously - 1 Peter 1:17; Revelation 14:7.

6. The fear of God motivates us to do away with evil - Proverbs 3:7; 14:16.

7. Fear of God influences our respect for life. When Abraham came to Gerar, he was afraid that King Abimelech, who didn't fear God, would have no qualms about killing him in order to get attractive Sarah for the royal harem - Genesis 20:11.


8. The fear of God can operate on the national level. Moses and Joshua predicted that the Canaanites would be filled with the fear of God as they heard about and saw the miracles God did for Israel - Deuteronomy 2:25; Joshua 4:24.

9. Lack of the fear of God leads to backsliding - Jeremiah 2:19.

And so I ask, is my hope to be remembered as wise, realistic because it is foundationed on the fear of God? Wisdom built on any other thing will not last.

PRAYER: Dear God, please expand my vision of Your holiness and knowledge. May the awe and respect in which I hold You impact all I do. Amen.

MORE: Fear of the Lord--the foundation of wisdom

"The fear of the Lord - Reverence for God; respect for his law, his will, his government, himself; the fear of offending him, which will lead us to do right. This fear is not that of a slave; it is not mere dread; it is not terror. It is consistent with love, and springs from it. It is consistent with calmness of mind, and promotes it. It does not produce terror, but rather delivers from it, and preserves the mind from alarms.

The word here rendered "fear" is a noun of the same origin as the word rendered "reverend" in Psalm 111:9 ("reverence" - Amplified). The suggestion to the mind of the psalmist that the "name of the Lord" was "reverend," or was to be venerated, introduced this thought that such reverence is the very foundation of wisdom" - Barnes Notes on the Bible.

**********
Unless otherwise noted all Scripture quotations are taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

God's awesome, terrifying side

TODAY'S SPECIAL: Psalm 97:1-12

TO CHEW ON: "His lightnings light the world;
The earth sees and trembles.
The mountains melt like wax at the presence of the Lord
At the presence of the Lord of the whole earth." Psalm 97:4-5.

Bible writers depict God as showing Himself in different ways. Sometimes He revealed Himself as a person. For example, the LORD, appeared to Abraham as three men (or one of the three) in Genesis 18. The Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar saw "four men … loose and the form of the fourth is like the Son of God" (Daniel 3:25) when he looked into the fiery furnace into which he had just tossed Shadrach, Meshech and Abednego.

At other times God showed himself in a more awe-inspiring, even terrifying way. The Israelites saw this terrifying aspect of God on Mount Sinai:

"Now Mount Sinai was completely in smoke because the Lord descended upon it in fire. Its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace and the whole mountain quaked greatly" - Exodus 19:18.

"Now all the people witnessed the thundering, the lightning flashes, the sound of the trumpet, and the mountain smoking' and when the people saw it, they trembled and stood afar off" - Exodus 20:18.

My Bible's notes on Psalm 97:4-5 suggest that the images in this psalm are taken from that incident.

The writer of the NT book of Hebrews reflects on the reaction of the Israelites to seeing God this way: "… so terrifying was the sight that Moses said, 'I am exceeding afraid and trembling'" - Hebrews 12:21. Then Hebrews goes on to explain how we who live after Jesus come, not to that terrifying mountain but to Jesus the "Mediator of the new covenant" - Hebrews 12:24.

We know that we can now come to God without fear. But perhaps we now often come too casually with the attitude that He is our buddy and altogether like us. Perhaps a more realistic stance would be to remind ourselves, when we come running to God, or sitting, or kneeling in His presence that He is also the God of Mount Sinai's  smoke, earthquake, lightning flashes and trumpet blasts.

PRAYER: Dear God, my mind can never grasp the whole of You. Help me to approach You realistically, with the abandon of a child combined with the fear and respect of a creature approaching its creator. Amen.

***********

The Holy Bible, New King James Version Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. - Used with permission.