Fear of the LORD series.
Impact Church
IF I OBEY(June 3)
If you obey God, because of your faith He will reward. The goal is to move towards intimacy with Him.
The Bible tells us the story of man's relationship with God. Fear is not mentioned as an aspect of our relationship with God until after the Fall. It is only after Adam and Eve eat from the forbidden tree that they are "afraid" hearing God walking in the garden. This tells us that God did not originally need to use fear to exert His will and rule. Adam and Eve had intimacy with God. That's what was lost in Eden, and that's what God is restoring. Now that fear is in the world, God is willing to use it to get us to a point of intimacy with him. Only when men began to subdue each other through fear does God begin to use this emotion as a way to relate to Him. And the purpose of it is that we achieve intimacy with Him.
God does not want us to constantly be afraid of him, but because there is so much fear of other things and because it is such a strong, controlling emotion, he uses fear as an entry point for many people. For instance, David Ritz has told me the story a few times of a friend of his who, upon being told by a friend that he was going to hell would be terrified by that very thought every time he was high on drugs. Freaking out, he would tell his friends that he was going to hell and had to do something about it. Later this guy came to faith in Christ and now knows God's love for him. And it seems that God uses fear most often for wayward Christians, people who know the LORD but are slipping up in their faith and getting caught up in the wrong things. God is not afraid to bring us back to Him by fear. A friend of mine had a spiritual rebirth after she had a near death experience in a car crash. Now she prays for her friends to know God, she tells them about His love, and wants to be a missionary to Jerusalem. Fear is not God's goal, but He is willing to use it. This is not to say that when we really know God we no longer fear Him, but when we know Jesus we know that as awesome as God is, His love has done away with the things that would make us afraid of Him. In fact, Christians, especially need to be taught the fear of the LORD. We can be close to God yet still be tempted by sin.
Before we move on I want to watch a scene [Scene 6 from Fellowship of the Ring] from one of my favorite movies: the Lord of the Rings, because this scene is perfect for illustrating my next point. In this scene, Gandalf uses fear for love. Gandalf loves Bilbo, you can see it in his eyes. You can tell in the way at the outset he does not scold Bilbo but tries to persuade him and wanting him to do choose to do the right thing on his own. The "cheap trick" is actually just that, a way to get Bilbo back to his senses and doing what is right. And by the way don't you love that Gandalf never once gives the ring a lustful glance? In the next scene he thinks about picking it up to move it but he thinks better of it ... He's like Jesus never sinning, he never gives in. I think that this is a good illustration of what it means to fear the Lord. Bilbo loves Gandalf and wants to maintain their relationship. Though he's occasionally brought to a point of fear, he knows that it's only for his good, and so he continues to listen to Gandalf's loving advice. I would recommend this scene to anyone going through an addiction. I would just watch it again and again to realize how to get free from the power of that addiction. Listen to God! Obey!
What does it mean to practice the "fear of the LORD"?
Many passages in scripture tell us bits about the "fear the LORD" but I often wonder what did it mean to the people to whom this passage was written?
Though the phrase is packed with meaning for us, the phrase "the fear of the LORD" was first taught to the Israelites leaving Egypt. I want you to imagine for the next few minutes that you've never heard this phrase "the fear of the LORD." I want you to imagine that you're in an ocean all alone, having no idea of where to go - and the fear of the LORD is your life boat. It keeps you from drowning, and it gets you to your reward - land. Maybe the analogy helps, maybe it doesn't, but the important thing is: imagine you have no idea what it means.
Exodus 6:2-3 shows us that though God had revealed himself to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, He first revealed himself by the name YHWH to Moses and the Israelites in Egypt. Even though God was not yet revealed as YHWH (which happens in Ex. 3:14 to Moses), in the Genesis narratives the name YHWH is used often. Reasoning that the whole Pentateuch (widely accepted as having one author) was probably written by that person to whom God was first revealed as YHWH (or someone after him), it seems that the most likely author of Genesis through Deuteronomy would be Moses. Knowing the context in which the phrase "fear of the LORD" is first revealed helps us to understand the meaning of the phrase. If I'm in the middle of a ship wreck and I am all alone, out on the ocean, and all I have is a life boat, I'm not going to know where to go with it to get to land. I need more than just the life-boat. I need to know where I am. Here [holding up the Bible] is our lifeboat. But to understand where we are going, we have to understand the context, we have to understand where the lifeboat is. Moses wrote to the Israelites most of whom, until then had not experienced God personally. They had the stories of their ancestors, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. But their cultural experience in the present told them of a different worldview. According to the Egyptians there were many gods, one of whom was the Pharoah. The people of the land, including Israel served and feared the King of Egypt, because their worldview told them that he was divine and because he had real political power. It is in this context that we learn what it means to "fear the LORD."
Now that the setting has been unpacked, we look at the story of Exodus which tells of how God goes up against the Pharoahs, these men who were believed to be gods. And this makes you wonder, why did God choose to go up against the Pharoahs? He could have just reclaimed Israel off on its own plot of land in a remote part of the world. But He chose to go after the Pharoahs, and to make a mockery of the self-proclaimed "gods." As a clever way of reversing the roles Pharoah has pompously constructed, God tells Moses in a missionary commission: "See, I make you as God to Pharoah"(Exodus 7:1). What Pharoah tried to do to everyone else, God does to Pharoah through the signs and wonders. And we see that by the end of the story, Pharoah is brought low, he is groveling. He repeatedly admits his sin, is made to look foolish as he chases after the Israelites and his entire army is crushed in the Red Sea. Why the ten plagues? Moses says to Pharoah God did it "so that you may know that the earth is the LORD's" [ Exodus 9:29]. God owns the whole earth, and He's not afraid to show a little pharoah who's boss, to tell him and the world "I am the real king." That land you call Egypt, that's mine. That whole in the ground you call the Nile, that's mine. That palace you're building at the expense of my people - he bricks and mud are mine. That land you stole to build your pyramid for a burial site - that's mine. Pharoah didn't want to let his identity go. He was afraid that if he obeyed God, he would lose his position and his title. He was afraid that people wouldn't think he was who we said he was anymore. This is often the same reason we compromise. We look at that chart and say: "If I obey, I lose my identity." We replace the "he will reward" part with our own fears of what will happen. So our first reason for the plagues is found in the encounter between God and Pharoah.
The second reason for the plagues is seen in what happens to the people of Israel. Before the plagues, Israel was already a nation, though the people did not serve the LORD. What the Pharoah said was done in Egypt. Everyone in Egypt in some way served the Pharoah, whether through allegiance or through some employment. The Pharoah was feared throughout the land. This is the context in which the term the "fear of the LORD" was introduced. People already knew what it was to fear and revere a king. To fear the king was to serve him and obey him. The king Xerxes in 311 instills an awe and fear similar to that the Pharoahs probably did. And for a citizen of Babylon, or for the citizen of Egypt, the king's face is on the currency, the city is designed with the focus being the king's palace, everything is effected by the king. But these men were claiming positions and titles that only belong to the LORD. I wanted to include all of that to show how this term "fear of the LORD" is introduced in scripture. The context is really important. As kings were causing men to fear them and obey them, God does two things: 1. God moves to cause even the highest, most powerful of men to become his subject. 2. God also makes for himself a people of His own, a nation who fears Him. I think we can see these purposes most clearly in Ex. 11:7, where He says to Pharoah that He's doing all these things "so that you may know that the LORD makes a distinction between the people of Israel and Egypt." He is making a people of his own, but he's doing it in such a way to make it clear to Pharoah that He is God! We see that after the Israelites have crossed through the waters, it says that then they "feared the LORD, and they believed in the LORD and in His servant Moses" (Exodus 14:31).
Why does God do what He does in Exodus?
1. to humiliate Pharoah - Pharoah says: your men can go, but leave your children here; you can all leave, just not your cattle.
2. to make for himself a people who fear Him
What does it mean to fear the LORD?
It seems to have something to do both with what you do, and what you don't do.
Job 1:8 says that Job was "a man who fears God and shuns evil."
Proverbs 8:13 "To fear the LORD is to hate evil; I hate pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech."
Deuteronomy 10:12-13 "And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the LORD's commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good?"
Deuteronomy 6:2 "so that you, your children and their children after them may fear the LORD your God as long as you live by keeping all his decrees and commands that I give you, and so that you may enjoy long life."
I can say, yeah I stopped looking at pornography, but is that what it means to fear God?
On the flip side, I can say, I volunteer at a soup kitchen three times a week, but is that all it means to fear God? Some people, even former U.S. presidents have done great deeds but cheated on their wives. We have to shun evil, AND do good. I am not there yet. It is He in me who's gonna do it.
We can know what is right, but not do it. I met a guy named Zach who had a deep faith and intimate walk with God. He shared his testimony with me, told me about his ministry to street kids and people with huge problems, and gave me a lot of wisdom. At the end of the night I asked him how old he was - he said 18. I said "Man, you're wise beyond your years." He said "no, man, the wisdom is in the doing. I need to do." He was so right. We can know what's right, but we know that we fear the LORD when we do what is right.
What does it take to learn the fear of the LORD?
1. God.
Now imagine you're Pharoah, and a man comes and tells you that God is going to judge your land with plagues if you do not let the Israelites go; You don't quite believe him, because you know he was off in the wilderness for a long time and something weird could have happened to him while he was out there. Besides, he's 80 years old, and not even the Israelites believe him. But right when he says it's going to happen and just he way he says it, the plagues come. Time passes, and one plague after another devours your land. The river your nation depends on for water is turned to blood, your land is swarmed with frogs, then locusts and other insects; your cattle die, even your magicians and sorcerers are subjected to boils on their bodies, then a storm like none the nation has ever seen comes: just as Moses says, ice starts falling and the thunder roars. Half of your nation's crops are destroyed, and there is a threat of further damage to the land if you do not repent. You'd think that by this time, Pharoah would have learned to fear the LORD. But that's not what happens. At the end of each plague, we're told that Pharoah's heart is hardened and he does not let the people go. What does it take for a person to learn the fear of the LORD? Looking at the story of the plagues that God brought on Egypt, we can see that it is more miraculous than any of these signs and wonders for a person's heart to be transformed. Moses discerned correctly after the plague of hail and thunder that they did "not yet fear the LORD God" (Exodus 9:30). Pharoah saw the most amazing signs and wonders that for any of us would instill fear, yet he and his servants hardened their hearts to God (Exodus 9:35). We see from this story that it is incredibly hard to learn the "fear of the LORD"; in fact some would say it takes divine providence. It takes a miracle, it takes God's power to help us to live for Him.
2. Hard work.
Obedience does come at a cost. It requires all of us, our whole hearts, everything.
Deuteronomy 10:12-13 "And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God require from you, but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all His ways and love Him, and to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul, and to keep the LORD's commandments and His statutes which I am commanding you today for your good?"
It does cost us something to serve God. It always costs us something. We can't go through our lives without expecting to give up everything for what we believe in. To serve God means to give him everything all the time. We are always His, entirely. Next week, though, we are going to look at the rewards. By now you might not believe the second part of section in the diagram, the part that says that He will reward. But we are going to talk about the benefits of the fear of the LORD, so come ready to hear about these, because they will truly make you passionate for more of God in your life.
HE WILL REWARD (June 10)
I believe that He wants me to speak on this for at least two reasons tonight.
1. When I read this verse, I said, Lord, I don't want to be lukewarm. I want to be on fire for You. It's time for us as a church to accelerate into God. Lord, pull us into you! Let's pursue God and His righteousness like we've never done before. Jesus said "seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things will be added unto you." We're going to talk today about the second part of last week's key sentence: "If I obey, because of my faith, he will reward." We're talking about the blessings of God. But before we get into that, I had to talk on this. We need to run, and accelerate in our faith and obedience.
2. The second reason I believe God gave me that verse this week is for the second part of it. It says "for you will enlarge my heart." What does that mean? Why do our hearts need to be enlarged? It's because God wants to communicate to us this week. Throughout scripture the heart is the place of communication. When God speaks to us, He speaks to our hearts, not our minds. He shows us through our minds (with things like visions and dreams, this is what I want your life to look like), but he speaks to us in our hearts. The mind comprehends, but the heart understands. John 12:40 says that the Israelites did not understand God's Word because of their hearts: "He has blinded their eyes and deadened their hearts, so they can neither see with their eyes nor understand with their hearts, and turn and I would heal them." When God calls us, the place where we hear His voice is in our hearts. Also, our words come from our hearts. Sometimes people say words like "How are you?" "I'm good.", words without much meaning, but true communication moves from heart to heart. Matthew 12:34 "Out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks." Or "For the mouth speaks out of that which fills the heart." 1 Samuel 16:7b says "man looks at the outward appearance, but God looks at the heart." David prayed "Let the words of my lips and the meditations of my heart be pleasing to you" - What's in our hearts is what we're saying to God. Of course God hears our words. David prayed let the words I speak to others be pleasing to you and the meditations of my heart, because he recognized that God is right on top of us. To listen to us He moves past our mouths and to our hearts to hear our inner thoughts. He knows what we say and think but to hear what's happening and what we are saying He searches our hearts. He is over ever one of us today doing that. Searching our hearts, examining them to see what is in them.
So today, we ask God to fill our hearts with His word. We're asking Him to enlarge our hearts to hear His voice. And this goes right with our diagram, which says as we grow in obedience, we become more grateful and grow in intimacy with Him.
Re-introduce diagram.
Obedience - rewards
Last week we said that the fear of the LORD was more than a one time event, but a posture before God. It's a way of describing our relationship with Him. The one who fears the LORD serves Him.
"Employee Benefits" of practicing the fear of the LORD:
When I started to look for examples of the benefits of the "fear of the LORD" in scripture, it was a lot easier than I had expected. We're going to go through these together, now. This is not a comprehensive list, but it at least gives us a taste of what is there.
His personal guidance, teaching:
Psalm 25:12 "Who then is the man who fears the LORD? He will instruct him then, in the way chosen for him."
His confidence:
Psalm 25:14 "The LORD confides in those who fear him, he makes his covenant known to them."
Fulfillment, contentment:
Psalm 34:9 "Fear the LORD, you his saints, for those who fear him lack nothing."
His love:
Psalm 103:13 "As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those who fear him."
You could say, "everyone is loved by God," but that's not exactly the way the Bible says it. God reserves certain blessings for those who fear Him.
Wisdom, understanding:
Psalm 111:10 "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom, all who follow his precepts have good understanding. To Him belongs eternal praise."
Blessedness:
Psalm 112:1 "Blessed is the one who fears the LORD, who finds great delight in his commands."
Protection:
Psalm 115:11 "You who fear him, trust in the LORD, he is their help and their shield."
A special place in God's heart:
Psalm 147:11 "The LORD delights in those who fear him, who put their hope in his unfailing love."
Giddiness, glee:
Psalm 2:11 "Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling."
At first when I read this, I thought to myself, this is the most blatant contradiction I've read in the Bible. I said "God if I weren't a Christian and I read this there's no way I'd continue to read the word."
What does it mean? Maybe it means we can get giddy like the girl who just won a beauty pageant, or someone who is being proposed to.
Good health, long life:
Proverbs 10:27 "The fear of the LORD adds length to life, but the years of the wicked are cut short."
Healthy, strong families:
Proverbs 14:26 "He who fears the LORD has a secure fortress, and for his children it will be a refuge."
Safety from injury, freedom from addictions:
Proverbs 14:27 "The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, turning a man from the snares of death."
A fountain of life could mean any of a number of things. People say things like "Hockey is life." But what happens when you're too old to play or when your vision goes and you can't even watch the game anymore? Or what happens when there is a strike? Wouldn't you rather have a fountain? A lake or even an ocean has limits. If you keep taking from it it will eventually run dry. But a fountain is continually replenished. It grows old with you. And with a fountain you never lack your source.
Wealth, honor, life:
Proverbs 22:4 "Humility and the fear of the LORD bring wealth, honor and life."
Salvation, knowledge:
Isaiah 33:6 "And He shall be the stability of your times, A wealth of salvation, wisdom, and knowledge; The fear of the LORD is his treasure."
The LORD's presence:
This passage is talking about a community that's being transformed.
Malachi 3:16 "Then those who feared the LORD talked with each other, and the LORD listened and heard. A scroll of rememberance was written in his presence concerning those who feared the LORD and honored his name."
The verse emphasizes two things: their fear of the LORD and His presence with them.
How many times have you been in a battle with a temptation and known that you'd be ok because you have God with you?!
Knowledge:
Proverbs 1:7 says "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; Fools despise wisdom and instruction."
Living in a culture that highly prizes knowledge, a world where degrees and education are so highly valued, we need to be able to see what the Bible says about knowledge. Proverbs talks more than any other book I know about knowledge and understanding, and it says consistently that to attain knowledge, we need to know God.
Positive attractive powers / Corrected, healthy relationship with opposite sex/spouse:
Proverbs 31:30 "Charm is deceptive and beauty is fleeting, but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised."
Proverbs tells us that the fear of the LORD is even the way for a woman to find a good husband. The fear of the LORD remedies unhealthy relationships between the sexes.
Health, long life, happy marriages, healthy families, safety, freedom from addictions, protection, wealth, honor, life, joy peace, blessedness, wisdom, salvation, knowledge, fulfillment, the LORD's compassion, the LORD's personal instruction, the LORD's confidence, being the LORD's delight, positive attractive powers, the LORD's presence, healthy relationships. Every aspect of our mental, emotional, spiritual, and physical lives are covered.
When you put it all together, who wouldn't want the fear of the LORD?!
Love God.
One guy in the Bible who gets it best, in my opinion, is Agur: "Surely I am more stupid than any man, and I do not have the understanding of a man [a word referring to Adam or the race of man]. Neither have I learned wisdom, nor do I have the knowledge of the Holy One." Proverbs 30. The man is desperate for knowledge, desperate for wisdom, desperate to know God. In verses 8 and 9 he says "Two things I asked of Thee, Do not refuse me before I die: keep deception and lies far from me, Give me neither poverty nor riches; Feed me with the food that is my portion, lest I be full and deny thee and say, 'Who is the LORD?' Or lest I be in want and steal, and profane the name of my God." He's not seeking the reward apart from God. He knows that God will reward. He only wants to be in relationship with God. It's when God sees our faith combined with obedience that He rewards.
And in verse 12 he says "there is a kind [of man] who is pure in his own eyes, Yet is not washed from his filthiness."
If you think you have it all together, and that you're generally a good person, do not read the Bible. The Bible is good for encouragement and yes it tells us about God's love, but is not kind to the person who is not willing to recognize his faults. It will tell you like it is. It will not lie, it will expose your innermost thoughts and show you that you too are "not washed from your filthiness."
Proverbs 8:18-21 "Riches and honor are with me, Enduring wealth and righteousness. My fruit is better than gold, even pure gold, and my yield is better than choicest silver. I walk in the way of righteousness, in the midst of the paths of justice, to endow those who love me with wealth, That I may fill their treasuries." What is wealth? In this life, what is wealth?
Is wealth the silver and the gold? No, it is the potential to create it. God is the giver of all these things. If you have Him, then you have them. Having a God-filled life is better than anything the world can offer.
To protect your wealth, you have to protect the source. When conservationists go to protect a river, they go up to where the water starts. They don't go down to the harbor where the river goes into the ocean and try to clean out all the pollution there. If it's clean and rich at the top, it'll be clean and rich at the bottom. As long as the system is healthy at the source, the river does its job. They stop deforestation and pesticides in the mountains where the rivers begin. They do whatever it takes to prevent the water that's hitting the mountains from being sent elsewhere. To have a healthy, steady flow of the Spirit in our lives, we have to protect and nourish our relationship with the source, we have to deepen our walk with Jesus.
