This week we finished Deuteronomy and began Joshua. Here is the transition of leadership from Moses to Joshua and leaving the wilderness to entering the promised land of Canaan.
Moses’ life ends on Mount Nebo and God himself buries Moses somewhere in Moab on the wilderness side of the Jordan. Thus concludes the life of the greatest leader of the Old Testament. Imagine 40 long years of leadership under one Prophet of God. Imagine having one preacher for 40 years. That’s what happened in Centerville, TN with Paul Rogers. He served as minister there for 46 years before he died. Centerville is a town of about 4000 and the Centerville Church of Christ grew to over 800 members during Paul Rogers’ ministry. I spent a week there with him back in the summer of 1996. He was a father figure for practically the whole community. I remember him telling me that he dreaded local elections because invariably more than one member of the church there would run for the same office in town.
But I digress. Moses has done what no other leader in the Bible ever did accept Jesus. God used Moses to lead a nation out of idolatry and slavery and forge them into a people belonging to God. He delivered the law to them. He mediated the covenant of God to them. He set up the priesthood and the worship for them. He received and implemented the plans for the tabernacle for them. There was no one like Moses before or after until Jesus.
Interestingly, the name of the man to whom Moses passed the baton of leadership of God’s people to is, in Greek: Jesus. Joshua is the Hebrew form of the name Jesus. How fitting. Moses didn’t lead them into the promised land. He brought them through the wilderness, but not into the land of promise. It took Jesus to do that. Joshua. That is no coincidence.
Tonight I hope we will be able to discover the power of courage that God gives to those who come to him and follow Jesus. But this morning, I want us to consider one more lesson from God’s word here about the fear of the Lord. Last week I did a sort of overview of the fear of God in the books of Moses in the morning and the fear of God in the New Testament in the evening.
I’m sure all of you who were here last Sunday can remember the three points about fear that we covered. In fact, let me just call on one of you to stand where you are and remind the rest of us what those were. Ok? Let’s see… Who can I call on?
Perhaps it would be better not to make one person stand out. Maybe it would be better to call on three of you and let each one tell the rest of us one of the points on fear that we covered…
Does that make anyone nervous? To be honest I only remember them because I spent so much time finding and sorting them for my sermon last week. 1. Do not fear men. 2. God says, “I will put the fear of you on your enemies.” 3. You are to fear God alone, and keep his commandments.
Today, I’d like us to explore the meaning and application of fearing God more.
To help us understand this, we need to think of God in terms of our Father. I remember a time in my early youth when I thought my dad was the strongest man in the world. I figured he could beat up any of my friend’s dads with one hand tied behind his back. Dad was the smartest man in the world too. I wished he was president of the country, because if he was president, this country would do the right thing! Dad could straighten out all that mess up there in Washington DC. In my eyes, my dad could do no wrong.
But, I’ll tell you, I also had a trembling dread and fear of him too. If I disobeyed him or sassed my mother in his presence… umm umm, it could be bad. My dad was not to be messed with. I remember one time talking to my sister in the next room after dad had turned off the lights and told us to go to sleep and he and mom went to bed too. We kept whispering and giggling and dad turned on the lights and repeated that we were to be quiet and go to sleep, and then he turned them off again. Why we did it, I don’t know, but we kept communicating through the wall, tapping and whispering and laughing and then lightning struck. He came with a belt and when he was finished, we were quiet and went to sleep.
I loved my dad, but I had a healthy fear of him too.
I believe that the fear of God is best illustrated by just such a relationship. God is indeed the strongest, wisest, holy Father. He can beat up every other god. He can rule the world in righteousness. He can do no wrong. As great is his love, so great is his strength and righteousness. He disciplines us as a Father disciplines his children, says Hebrews 12:4-11. And Prov. 3: 12 For whom the LORD loves He reproves, Even as a father, the son in whom he delights.
So it says in Psalm 103:13 Just as a father has compassion on his children, So the LORD has compassion on those who fear Him.
Did you see Psalms 78? It was part of our reading for Wednesday. When I read it, it struck a cord as to the severity of God’s discipline.
34 When He killed them, then they sought Him, And returned and searched diligently for God;
35 And they remembered that God was their rock, And the Most High God their Redeemer.
36 But they deceived Him with their mouth, And lied to Him with their tongue.
37 For their heart was not steadfast toward Him, Nor were they faithful in His covenant.
38 But He, being compassionate, forgave their iniquity, and did not destroy them; And often He restrained His anger, And did not arouse all His wrath.
39 Thus He remembered that they were but flesh, A wind that passes and does not return.
40 How often they rebelled against Him in the wilderness, And grieved Him in the desert!
It reminds me of 1 Cor. 11: 28 But let a man examine himself, and so let him eat of the bread and drink of the cup.
29 For he who eats and drinks, eats and drinks judgment to himself, if he does not judge the body rightly.
30 For this reason many among you are weak and sick, and a number sleep.
31 But if we judged ourselves rightly, we should not be judged.
32 But when we are judged, we are disciplined by the Lord in order that we may not be condemned along with the world.
Deuteronomy 31:12 "Assemble the people, the men and the women and children and the alien who is in your town, in order that they may hear and learn and fear the LORD your God, and be careful to observe all the words of this law.
13 "And their children, who have not known, will hear and learn to fear the LORD your God, as long as you live on the land which you are about to cross the Jordan to possess."
The scripture is extremely plain that we are to fear the Lord. Old and New Testaments alike teach us this message. What is sometimes lost in translation is how this works in our love relationship with the Lord.
Just as when we say “we are to love the Lord,” we must be careful to define it by the Bible, when we say the word “we are to fear the Lord,” we also need a biblical understanding. The word “love” today is thrown around a lot in distorted ways. Homosexuals usually define love as sexual attraction. This is the popular definition and the one most written and sung about today. But I would argue that sexual attraction has nothing to do with biblical Christian love of God or others. Lust is not love. Romance is not necessarily based on love, though it may have a foundation on love. Romance is an emotional expression can happen between people that do not love each other at all! Real, true love is of God. God is love. Biblically defined love is the most powerful thing in the world.
The word fear can be understood in many ways as well. For the sake of time I want to consider two kinds of fear.
1. There is the Satanic fear that makes us want to run and hide from God. This fear is what happened to Adam and Eve in the garden when they sinned. They disobeyed God and ate the forbidden fruit. God had said, “If you eat it, you will surely die!” They had not believed God’s word, but had listened to the liar. Now, after disobeying, the love they had for God is replaced by what I will call Satanic fear. They are separated from God by sin and they are afraid of God. When God comes they run and hide. Love and trust are shattered by sin. Satanic fear replaces them. This fear is not of God. It is not based on trust in God or submission to God or love for God at all! This fear is from the enemy of God and is based on unbelief and rebellion against God. This fear must be cast out. It enslaves and drives a person to deeper sin and greater darkness. It is a power of disobedience that controls the heart and mind the one under it’s influence. Israel was terrified of God, but what they needed was godly fear based on a relationship with God through faith, submission and love.
This is the fear that the love of God casts out. But for the one who hears God’s word and fears God in faith and love, that person’s worst nightmare is not God’s presence, but God’s absence.
2. There is the godly fear that works repentance, submission and obedience in our hearts and minds. This fear of the Lord finds its definition in the human response to the holiness of God. God reaches down to us as we are enslaved in sin and pours out his love to us in deliverance and redemption. For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish but have everlasting life.
This godly fear makes us run TO God, not away from him. We trust in God and fear him. We love God and fear him. We run to God and fear him. We cling to God in godly fear. We obey God in reverent fear. We serve God in holy fear. We hold fast to God in fear. As we grow closer and love him more, God becomes the one and only fear we have in our hearts. The more we experience and grow in the fear of the Lord, the more fearless we walk in this world. As Hebrews 13:6 says, So we may boldly say: "The LORD is my helper; I will not fear. What can man do to me?"
Sinful fear makes us run and hide from God, godly fear makes us run to God. The end of Revelation 6 describes those who live in sin and rejoice in the darkness when Jesus comes again. Listen to their words, 14 And the sky was split apart like a scroll when it is rolled up; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places.
15 And the kings of the earth and the great men and the commanders and the rich and the strong and every slave and free man, hid themselves in the caves and among the rocks of the mountains;
16 and they said^ to the mountains and to the rocks, "Fall on us and hide us from the presence of Him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb;
17 for the great day of their wrath has come; and who is able to stand?"
Then chapter 7 describes those who walk in the fear of the Lord during the same event: Listen to them: 9 After these things I looked, and behold, a great multitude which no one could number, of all nations, tribes, peoples, and tongues, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, with palm branches in their hands,
10 and crying out with a loud voice, saying, "Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!"
11 All the angels stood around the throne and the elders and the four living creatures, and fell on their faces before the throne and worshiped God,
12 saying: "Amen! Blessing and glory and wisdom, Thanksgiving and honor and power and might, Be to our God forever and ever. Amen."
13 Then one of the elders answered, saying to me, "Who are these arrayed in white robes, and where did they come from?"
14 And I said to him, "Sir, you know." So he said to me, "These are the ones who come out of the great tribulation, and washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.
15 "Therefore they are before the throne of God, and serve Him day and night in His temple. And He who sits on the throne will dwell among them.
16 "They shall neither hunger anymore nor thirst anymore; the sun shall not strike them, nor any heat;
17 "for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne will shepherd them and lead them to living fountains of waters. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."
The fear of the Lord gives us victory! It moves us to obedience and holiness. It fills us with strength to face whatever foe hell can bring against us. We stand in Christ with one fear and one fear alone.
When Jesus was faced with the cross, what did he dread the most. He called it the cup. It was handed to him by the Father and its contents were fearful to even Jesus. He pleaded in prayer with sweat and blood, “Father, all things are possible for you, Let this cup pass from me!”
What dread and trouble did Jesus, the Son of God recoil from? What was it that he begged his Father to take from him? It was separation from his Father. Separation caused by our sins. Jesus did not want to be torn from his Father’s presence, period! The one who knows the fear of the Lord has the same dread. We do not want to be separated from God! King David had seen what happened to Saul when God’s Spirit and presence left Saul. He became a mad man. After David sinned with Bathsheba, this memory must have filled his mind and he begged God, “Take not thy Holy Spirit from me!”
Eternity without God awaits those who do not walk in the fear of God today. Listen to
2 Thess. 1: 5 This is a plain indication of God’s righteous judgment so that you may be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering.
6 For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you,
7 and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire,
8 dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus.
9 And these will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power,
10 when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed-- for our testimony to you was believed.
