Should We Fear God?

Tombstone said:

"Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." -- Psalm 111:10

Click to expand...

• fear: a feeling of profound respect for someone or something; "the fear of God"; "the Chinese reverence for the dead"; "the French treat food with ...
• a reverent mental attitude
• regard with feelings of respect and reverence; consider hallowed or exalted or be in awe of; "Fear God as your father"; "We venerate genius"
• an act showing respect (especially a bow or curtsy)
  wordnetweb.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Foreigner said:

As long as YOU can provide "perfect love" then no, you have nothing to fear.

But since none of us is perfect...

Click to expand...

Foreigner said:

"thats not hard to do if you are truly a christian." - Snip

-- So, just to reiterate...you love everyone every day every time the exact way that Jesus loves you, without fault....because that's not hard to do if you are truly a Christian.
Uh huh.

NOPE, MY VIEW ON THIS IS STATED IN PREVIOUS POST

"The LORD confides in those who fear him; he makes his covenant known to them." - Psalm 25:14


"These are the commands, decrees and laws the LORD your God directed me to teach you to observe in the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess, 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." - Deut. 6:1-2



"God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints" - Psalm 89:7

-- Now, correct me if I am wrong, but does God not love his "assembly of saints?' Yet it says "God is greatly to be feared" among them.

But hey, what do I know, It's only Scripture....

Click to expand...

Robinson Crusoe said:

Should we fear God? Nowadays, this seems out of fashion. However, our ancestors, in The West, were very afraid of God. Were they unenlightened idiots; superstitious morons; victims of a church-state conspiracy, to control the masses with fear; was this just something Authoritarian men taught women and children, in order to make them slaves to The Patriarchy? These are just some of the questions, Baby Boomers and their offspring are faced with.

The Bible, often seems to be full of contradictions. The Skeptics Annotated Bible, for example, is dedicated to "exposing" those contradictions. Although, as a Christian, I've found its' objections: silly. However, they can be challenging and many people take it very seriously. In particular, I've noticed, young men do. So, what does The Bible have to say about it; bottom line it for me?!

Ecclesiastes 12:13-14 "Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this [is] the whole [duty] of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether [it be] good, or whether [it be] evil."


But my own little Bible study is kind of wimpy...
Skeptics annotated Bible has dedicated an entire page to the question, "Should We Fear God?" It concludes that The Bible is confused on the question; it has two opinions on the issue and hence, is an absurd book. They break it down into two sides, on The Yes we should Fear God side, they site the following verses


[font="Helvetica][size="2"]Leviticus 25:17Thou shalt fear thy God: for I am the LORD your God.

Deuteronomy 4:10That they may learn to fear me all the days that they shall live upon the earth, and that they may teach their children

Deuteronomy 6:2That thou mightest fear the LORD thy God, to keep all his statutes and his commandments.

Deuteronomy 6:13, 10:20Thou shalt fear the LORD thy God.


Deuteronomy 6:24And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God.

Deuteronomy 10:12And now, Israel, what doth the LORD thy God require of thee, but to fear the LORD thy God.

Deuteronomy 14:23...that thou mayest learn to fear the LORD thy God always.

Deuteronomy 28:68...that thou mayest fear this glorious and fearful name, THE LORD THY GOD.

Deuteronomy 31:12Gather the people together, men and women, and children, and thy stranger that is within thy gates, that they may hear, and that they may learn, and fear the LORD your God.

Deuteronomy 31:13And that their children, which have not known any thing, may hear, and learn to fear the LORD your God.

Joshua 4:24That all the people of the earth might know the hand of the LORD, that it is mighty: that ye might fear the LORD your God for ever.

Joshua 24:14Fear the Lord ... and put away the gods which your fathers served.

1 Samuel 12:14If ye will fear the LORD, and serve him, and obey his voice, and not rebel against the commandment of the LORD, then shall both ye and also the king that reigneth over you continue following the LORD your God:

1 Samuel 12:24Fear the Lord.

2 Kings 17:39But the LORD your God ye shall fear; and he shall deliver you out of the hand of all your enemies.

1 Chronicles 16:25The Lord ... is to be feared above all gods.

Nehemiah 5:9Also I said, It is not good that ye do: ought ye not to walk in the fear of our God because of the reproach of the heathen our enemies?

Job 28:28The fear of the LORD, that is wisdom.

Psalm 19:9The fear of the LORD is clean, enduring for ever.

Psalm 25:14The secret of the LORD is with them that fear him.

Psalm 33:8Let all the earth fear the LORD.

Psalm 33:18The eye of the LORD is upon them that fear him.

Psalm 34:9O fear the LORD, ye his saints: for there is no want to them that fear him.

Psalm 96:4For the LORD is great, and greatly to be praised: he is to be feared above all gods.

Psalm 103:11Great is his mercy toward them that fear him.

Psalm 103:13The LORD pitieth them that fear him.

Psalm 103:17But the mercy of the LORD is from everlasting to everlasting upon them that fear him.

Psalm 111:10The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.

Psalm 112:1Blessed is the man that feareth the LORD.

Psalm 115:13He will bless them that fear the LORD.

Psalm 128:1Blessed is every one that feareth the LORD.

Psalm 47:11The LORD taketh pleasure in them that fear him.

Proverbs 1:7The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge.

Proverbs 14:2He that walketh in his uprightness feareth the LORD.

Proverbs 22:4By humility and the fear of the LORD are riches, and honour, and life.

Proverbs 24:21My son, fear thou the LORD.

Ecclesiates 5:7For in the multitude of dreams and many words there are also divers vanities: but fear thou God.

Ecclesiastes 12:13Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man.


Isaiah 8:13Sanctify the LORD of hosts himself; and let him be your fear, and let him be your dread.

Hosea 3:5Fear the Lord and his goodness in the latter days.

Malachi 2:4-5...that my covenant might be with Levi, saith the LORD of hosts. My covenant was with him of life and peace; and I gave them to him for the fear wherewith he feared me, and was afraid before my name.

Jeremaih 5:22Fear ye not me? saith the LORD: will ye not tremble at my presence?

Matthew 10:28, Luke 12:5Fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

Luke 1:50And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.

Romans 3:10-18As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: ... There is no fear of God before their eyes.

2 Corinthians 7:1Having therefore these promises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God.

Ephesians 5:21Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

Colossians 3:22Servants, obey in all thingsyour masters according to the flesh; not with eyeservice, as menpleasers; but in singleness of heart, fearing God.

Hebrews 10:31It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

1 Peter 2:17Honour all men. Love the brotherhood. Fear God.

Revelation 14:7Saying with a loud voice, Fear God, and give glory to him; for the hour of his judgment is come.

Revelation 15:4Who shall not fear thee, O Lord?[/size][/font]




Wow, reading all of those pretty much blows me over. I don't have any questions left; I'm just scared of God and I know He will REWARD MY FEAR! Which is a huge bonus, but I'd still be scared of Him, even if He didn't, because He's big and huge and terrible and stuff like that. Oh yeah, and He's going to JUDGE everything I do! Yikes!!! Of course, some people are just too cool to be scared of that (roflol). Anyway... Here's the other side of the argument from Skeptics Annotated Bible. On the No side, they say, The Bible says, No, we should not fear God (and then they have a good laugh).


[font="Helvetica][size="2"]2 Timothy 1:7For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.

1 John 4:8God is Love.

1 John 4:18There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.[/size][/font]

Wow, 3 verses on the no side, and 57 on the yes side. Well, it seems that there is an overwhelming number of verses commanding and/or encouraging fear of God and there is a few that might raise a few eyebrows, but they don't raise mine. My instincts just don't flare up when I read that, because I already know, from Secular Psychology, that Love does not = the absence of Fear, in fact, real love requires fear! But of course, I am not surprised by their incompetence, because, as The Bible says and lots of Bible Belters used to as well, The Fear of God is The Beginning of Wisdom (stupid!). Of course, Skeptics Annotated has produced a riddle for its readers. My link

Riddles are humbling; we don't immediately know the answer; we have to work at it and people do come across riddles they "never" solve. That creates mystery and mystery is frightening.

The first thing to remember about a riddle (other than that you will need encouragement), is that they are meant to trick you, generally by misleading you. i.e., a face that never weeps, leads you to think of a human face, but it is referring to a clock's face. (simple, if you know it!)

Alright, so!, how are they misleading us here? Well, best way to begin is to break it down: Take 1 John 4:17-18. Would you be bold in The Day of Judgement, if you didn't know how to please God? You shouldn't! If you don't know what the rules are, you should be scared. God has given us the rules and He has proven His uprightness. So, if we have obeyed the rules, then we shouldn't fear his judgement. Of course, this begs the obvious! Why obey those rules in the first place? Well, if you aren't afraid of fire, then you are crazy! But, it's like the power of the state to throw me in jail. I fear that power, but I have nothing to fear from a judge, because I haven't done anything wrong. Of course, our judges nowadays can be crooked. So, we should fear that, but we don't have to fear that from God. The passage goes on to say, "...because fear involves torment." Oh! Well that makes sense. If you go before an upright judge, you know you are guilty of a terrible crime, which will get you a terrible punishment and you have no way of appeasing the judge, then your fear of him would torment you. So, we still fear God, but we aren't tormented by it and we are even bold, but don't get uppity. You better remember who you are dealing with and mind your place.

What about 2 Timothy 1:7? Well, there isn't any riddle there. Skeptics Annotated Bible is up to their old tricks again; just read the verse in context. It is a letter from Paul to Timothy and Paul is telling Timothy, basically, don't be cowardly in your preaching; be bold, because God loves us and that should give us hope. Even Secular Psychology knows (or at least before it became inconvenient for Feminism, it used to) that if a child knows their mother is there to take care of them, they develop a sense of hopefulness, which will be ingrained in their character. If they do not know that, they will develop a sense of hopelessness and it will be ingrained in their character. What Christians should know, but Secular Psychology doesn't, is that you can overcome that through Christ.

Well, that's the writing on the wall for Skeptics Annotated: "... Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting." Daniel 5:27


http://skepticsannot...ra/feargod.html

Click to expand...

Robinson Crusoe said:

Should we fear God? Nowadays, this seems out of fashion. However, our ancestors, in The West, were very afraid of God. Were they unenlightened idiots; superstitious morons; victims of a church-state conspiracy, to control the masses with fear; was this just something Authoritarian men taught women and children, in order to make them slaves to The Patriarchy? These are just some of the questions, Baby Boomers and their offspring are faced with.

Click to expand...

Duckybill said:

Fearing God is a NT command also.

1 Peter 2:17 (NKJV)
[sup]17 [/sup]Fear God.

Click to expand...