The only thing we have to fear…

Do you see God as soft and fluffy, or burly and scary?

Do you lean toward God being your nice friend or harsh judge?

The first 9 chapters of the Book of Proverbs sets up the offer of Divine Wisdom to us, leading us away from destruction and into life. Solomon sandwiches these 9 chapters with the idea of “fear”:

Proverbs 1:7
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge;
fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Proverbs 9:10
The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom,
and the knowledge of the Holy One is insight.

I’m sure many of us have perpetually heard that this word “fear” doesn’t mean to be afraid but to be in absolute AWE. Whereas I think this is mostly accurate, I think we have a difficult relationship with this idea of “being afraid of God.” Let me explain:

1) Many of us have a really unhealthy fear of God, being afraid of his judgement and wrath when we disobey him. We see him as being infinitely above us (which of course he is), waiting to discipline us (even harshly) when we disappoint him. We see him as a cruel judge.

2) We also may venture the other way, not seeing God as “wholly other” and infinitely pure as we sit Him next to us as our “co-pilot” and see his commands as soft advice. We “declaw the lion of Judah” (Dorothy Sayers).

We likely don’t cleanly fit into either camp, but we certainly lean one way or the other. But the proper “fear of the Lord” is to realize (as much as we humans can) that God has every ability and right to judge us with the ultimate judgement, but that he already poured out this full just judgement onto his own son. So to be afraid of God is to NOT believe the Gospel; to believe that Jesus hasn’t paid enough of the price and/or that God will require double payment for our sins, Jesus’ plus ours. Similarly, God is not our buddy buddy (though he absolutely is our tender Father and close brother). He is the God of all creation and infinitely above and beyond us, justly demanding our allegiance and worship while voluntarily sacrificially serving us to the point of death. “Fear of the Lord” just isn’t as clean as we want to make it because God is somehow perfectly both: just and love; grace and law; above and among.

Ben Seneker reminded us this past week that the proper Fear of the Lord doesn’t push us away afraid but rather draws us near in awe and worship and then sending us outward in love.

Living Wisdom

Every moment of every day we look for, find and answer this question: “What do I do with my resources?”

  • What do I do with my time today?
  • How do I spend or save my money?
  • How do I use my talents?
  • How do I utilize my stuff?

To be honest, we almost always answer this with sheer instinct, or with what we are “supposed to do.”

  • We hit the snooze button because we determined that the best use of the next 7 minutes, which we will never get back, is to get a tad more sleep.
  • A cup of coffee for $2.50 is better than saving that money or giving it to the guy on the corner.
  • Using 24 specific words to comfort a co-worker is better than using 46 words online to prove that somebody is wrong.Wisdom, as we will see in the Book of Proverbs, is the real-life working out of Truth. The real question is…which Truth? When our “truth” is that I need to build and keep my value, then it will be worked out in a “me first” avenue. When Truth is that Jesus has wooed me and given me infinite love and value, then it will be worked out in a “God first” and “others first” avenue.

In life we constantly ask “what should I do” in an infinite number of situations (parenting, job, pain, success, church etc). The first question should actually be “what do I believe?” because  it’s out of our belief that we will make decisions.

In the midst of that, there are still countless situations, circumstances and questions that simply don’t have simple and clear answers. It is in these real-life scenarios where we have freedom and are empowered with the very Spirit of God inside of us to speak, guide and even carry us moment by moment. So the real question under “what should I do” is “what do I believe?”, and the real question under that is “can I trust God?” Can I trust that God is for me and has the power to make all things work for the good of those who know him and are called by him? The answer to that is simply found here:

Romans 8-32
He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things?