The Isaiah Gifts: Fear of the Lord

 God loves us. And He wants us to love Him. I said that yesterday and I'm repeating it today, because I am about to write about the seventh gift of the Holy Spirit, and it is one that gets a lot of preachers flak, especially when they don't sugar coat it to suit the palates of easy going Christians. The gift is Fear of the Lord. And it is a gift we really need in our lives because without it, we can end up losing the treasure that we've been looking at over the past week.

I recently watched a wonderful program on the cosmos (see introductory clip below; locate the others on http://www.youtube.com/) and couldn’t help but be awed at the realization that if the universe was so great, how much greater our God. And, despite our own insignificance—if we look at ourselves in relation to the canvas of the universe, we’re just a minute speck—we seem to think ourselves as masters of this universe. We’re not. God is. And it helps to have a healthy fear of Him, because as Scripture says, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom” (Psalms 111:10).




There are many Christian leaders these days who tell us that we don’t have to be afraid of God because His love is great, and so is His mercy. This is true, but it isn’t the complete truth. Yes, God's love is great. It is immense. So is God's mercy. It is vast. It is ongoing. It is limitless. Yet, it isn’t “infinite” as we commonly understand the word to be. God’s mercy, when not applied for reasons of sovereign grace, is dependent on the nature and sincerity of our repentance. True repentance involves turning our backs totally and completely on sin, giving up every thing that keeps us away from possessing the treasure that is the kingdom of heaven. And helping us ensure that we do not return to our old ways, like "a dog returning to its vomit" or a "pig returning to wallow in the mud" is the gift we are looking at today; a fear of what might happen if we do.

If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sins is left, but only a fearful expectation of judgment and of raging fire that will consume the enemies of God. Anyone who rejected the law of Moses died without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. How much more severely do you think a man deserves to be punished who has trampled the Son of God under foot, who has treated as an unholy thing the blood of the covenant that sanctified him, and who has insulted the Spirit of grace? For we know him who said, “It is mine to avenge; I will repay,” and again, “The Lord will judge his people.” It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. (Hebrews 10:26-31)

There is going to be a day of judgment and not everybody is going to heaven. There is a place called hell, too, and no matter how vociferously we may protest the reality of hell, if we believe that the Bible is the Word of God, then we have to believe it its existence because the person who speaks about hell most of the time in the New Testament is the Word—Jesus—Himself! He is quite descriptive about it too, but we don't need to get into that here. It is enough if we understand what hell really is.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches us that “hell is eternal separation from God, in whom alone man can possess the life and happiness for which he was created and for which he longs” (CCC 1035). Without God we lose out on life and happiness. Without God, we lose out on the treasure we have found, because He is the treasure in the field. We lose Him when we reject God for the things of the world, not realizing that to be without Him for all eternity is something to be really afraid about! I mean, just think about it: we can't stand being depressed for one day, imagine not having any happiness, joy, peace, love, or hope for all eternity! That's what happens when we are separated from God. Fear of the Lord—perhaps more easily understood as Fear of Losing the Lord—is, therefore, a wise thing indeed.

I had begun this study with a few questions. I don't want to leave them unanswered, even though you have probably figured them out for yourself by now. The kingdom of heaven is God, Himself. Jesus. And although some of us, like the farmer in the field, find the kingdom by "accident", the knowledge of the kingdom is given only to the others who seek it. And we'd be well advised to do so.

May the Spirit be with you.