Fear and Love

[The Lord] fulfills the desires of those who fear him; he hears their cry and saves them. The Lord watches over all who love him. Psalm 145:19-20.

C’mon, C’mon, C’mon. Go away, Go away, Go away. Most of us have watched children react when they see a clown, or some other potentially scary object by covering their eyes, but peering through their fingers. They really want to look, but they have a reserve about it.

Scripture tells us that we should fear God, but also love him. What characteristic causes these reactions? God is holy and we are not. As James Montgomery Boice writes, “Holiness intrigues us, as the unknown always does. We are drawn to it. But at the same time we are in danger of being undone, and fear being undone by the confrontation.” Yet if our love for God does not contain this fear, we haven’t really seen God as he is.

In my estimation, too many people don’t experience the “fear of God.” Some refer to him as “the man upstairs” or the “Big Daddy.” This kind of familiarity does not show that the person has really experienced the presence of the Holy One. Franz Delitzsch, a German Lutheran theologian of the 19th Century wrote, “Fear and love belong inseparable together. For fear without love is an unfree, servile disposition, and love without fear, bold-faced familiarity; the one dishonors the all-gracious One, and the other the all-exalted One.”