In the previous post we looked at what the fear of the Lord means. So how then does it contrast with the fear of man? And what is the fear of man anyway?In a nutshell, who you fear essentially translates to who you worship. The fear of man is therefore the worship of people -- caring above all else about pleasing them and them having a good opinion of you. Because pleasing people is your primary concern (because you want them to praise you and think well of you; we're not talking about selfless love here), your life, actions, words, everything are all dictated by other people -- that is, people whose opinion you care about.
John 12:42-43 talks about this when it says, 'But because of the Pharisees they would not confess their faith for fear they would be put out of the synagogue; for they loved praise from men more than praise from God' (NIV).
The reason we fear other people is because we believe they will give us what we need. As with all of worship, we worship a particular thing because we are hoping it will bless us -- so when we worship the way people view us, it is because we think they can give us the fulfilment and provision we are looking for.
Contrast this with the fear of the Lord, which is of course the worship of God -- where pleasing Him is your priority and the goal of your life, and where you care about His view (and His view alone) of you. Also, by fearing God we are saying that we are looking to Him to give us that fulfilment, satisfaction, blessing, and provision that we need.
But how is this practically seen in our lives? Well, a great example of fearing man vs. fearing God would be you lying to someone. Imagine the scene: a work colleague who doesn't know you're a Christian asks you what you did on Saturday. Now you were at an all-day prayer meeting, but you know that telling him this would make you look weird in his eyes. What do you do?
You have option A: fear God, which would be telling your colleague the truth, therefore obeying God by being honest and not caring about this man's opinion of you. Or you have option B: fear man, which would be lying about what you did by saying something like, "Oh nothing really", therefore disobeying God and instead placing this man's opinion of you higher than God's.
Do you see how this works out in the day-to-day decision of our lives? Fearing man means you are more concerned with what people think; fearing God means you are more concered with what He thinks. But someone might argue, well what does it really matter whether we fear man or fear God? What good does fearing God over man really do for us?
In summary, it is this: when you fear God you fear nothing else; you are free! Free from the control that other people have over you, free to walk in humble obedience to God (which has its own benefits and blessings), free from the impossibility of caring about pleasing every single person. And it is only once we are freed from needing people to make us feel good and right about ourselves, that we are able to truly love and serve them as Christ commanded. 1 Peter 2:17 teaches us to 'Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God.' See how Peter connects honouring and loving people with fearing God.
For more on this topic of fear of God vs. fear of man, and how to overcome the need to please people by learning the fear of the Lord, I'd highly recommend reading the very helpful book 'When People Are Big And God Is Small' by Edward T. Welch. Overall, I hope these couple of posts on the fear of the Lord have really helped you to see the importance of fearing God alone, and I hope you are motivated to live a life that cares solely about pleasing God and His opinion of you.
7 comments:
I think we get into a lot of trouble when fear is our motivation instead of love. It is our love that compels us to worship. We shouldn't worship because of fear of displeasing God if we don't worship. This implies that we think we can earn his favour. Nothing we do can make God love us any more and nothing we do can make God love us any less.
Because of what Jesus did on the cross, we can approach God boldly and in full confidence, without fear, as friends, not as slaves. He wants us to be motivated by our love for him.
Jenny - I appreciate your concern, but what we are talking about here is not being afraid of God or motivated by fear, but fearing the Lord which basically just means worshipping Him and living our lives humbly before Him (which of course is motivated by love for Him). The Bible is full of instructions and examples of fearing God; here are a few:
-Acts 9:31: 'So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.'
-Revelation 19:5: 'And from the throne came a voice saying, “Praise our God, all you his servants, you who fear Him, small and great.”'
-Matthew 10:28: 'And do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather fear Him who can destroy both soul and body in hell.'
-Luke 1:50: '"And His mercy is for those who fear Him from generation to generation."'
Basically, we are going to fear/worship someone or something. In this post we have been contrasting the fear of God with the fear of man, encouraging us to fear the Lord and not the opinions of people. Of course, as mentioned, we fear God out of love and gratitude for what He has done for us. Fearing God and walking in God's grace are not antithetical -- they go hand-in-hand and help us to know and to follow Christ better.
I hope that explanation helps. We are going to be moving on now from the fear of the Lord -- we just wanted to define it briefly here. If you're still confused by it or unsure what we're talking about, please listen to the audio messages that we recommended by C.J. Mahaney and Mark Driscoll, or have a read of the book 'When People Are Big and God Is Small' by Edward T. Welch.
Also, we completely agree that we can NEVER earn God's love, and we never obey God in order to win His favour. Fearing God is definitely not this -- it is worshipping God because of who He is and what He has done for us, knowing that despite the fact we are completely sinful and He is holy, He has loved us and has made a way for us to come to fear/worship Him freely, without any shame or guilt or condemnation. This is the awesome gospel, and it causes us to fear/worship God.
Good stuff, Emily. You might appreciate the new book by Greg Beale entitled "We Become What We Worship," which has a very similar point to what you are saying. The Welch book is fantastic, I agree.
Found this blog searching under the fear of man in google. Love your post on this topic. This is a very important topic in the church. Fear of man is leading to some of the core heresies in the church today, particularly the emergent church.
Emiley, I am so excited that at your age God has opened your eyes to the Fear of the Lord. It is an awesome and seldom understood truth that is essential if we are to really know God. God has His hand upon you and I am sure that the blessings that go along with the Fear of the Lord will fill your life. The Fear of the Lord actually lets us see things as God sees them. Its amazing!
As you grow and study if you are anything like me you will tend to forget things God has taught you or at least let them drift to the back of your mind. Never let go of the Truth of the Fear of the Lord.
God Bless you as you grow in Christ.
Mike
Nice post. I lead a small church youth group and have leveraged some of this into my "Fear God, Not man" lesson.
Thank You.
-Ken
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