Monday, December 4, 2021
FEAR OF GOD. WHAT IS THE FEAR OF GOD?
“The fear of the Lord is to hate evil.” (Proverbs 8:13)
YOU NEED TO FEAR GOD. WHO IS AFRAID OF HELL IS AFRAID OF THE DEVIL.
“...If you play around, God will punish you, he sees everything,” the mother said to her naughty children, pointing to the icon in the corner of the hut. When mom left, the kids quickly found a way out of the situation. They closed the curtain that hung in front of the icon...
“...If it were not for the torment of hell, would I have adhered to God’s commandments? If a person simply died for his sins, then I would go on a spree with all my might. Fear of terrible eternal torment keeps me from sins...” And this has already been said by one emotional Protestant pastor.
Religion is built entirely on fear. Religion represents God as harsh, cruel, punishing, sending people to eternal terrible torment. Religion scares people with God, uses God to scare people. Why does she need this? The reason is clear. A religion that does not teach that God is harsh and punishing will lose power over people.
As you know, to substantiate its false teachings, religion has made insertions into the Holy Scriptures. (There are several articles about this. For example, the article “THE TEACHING OF CHRIST IS THE STANDARD OF TRUTH.”
One of the far-fetched teachings adjusted to religious dogmas is the doctrine, or interpretation of the concept of “Fear of God”. In this regard, religion also intervened in the text of Holy Scripture. As a result of religious interference in the Holy Scriptures, in the Bible published by religion, the term “Fear of God” is used exclusively in the sense of punishment, punishment, intimidation, horror. In addition, religion even literally inserted the word “fear” where this word was not originally in the text of the Bible. For example, let’s read in the church Bible the text from the Epistle of Jude: “... Save others with fear, tearing them out of the fire, but reprove others with fear, abhorring even clothing that is defiled by the flesh.” (23rd text). In this short text, the word “fear” appears twice. So in the Synodal Translation of the Bible. But let’s look at the same text in the Modern Russian translation: “...Save some by snatching them from the fire; to others be merciful, but beware of them, hating even their clothing, which is unclean from the depraved flesh.” As you can see, the word “fear” does not exist at all!
Having made its insertions into Scripture, religion has confused its meaning, so it is impossible for a simple person to understand anything. But that was the purpose of religion. This is how she tied people to her. Now, having incomprehensible Scripture, and illogical, vague church theories, a person is forced to turn to the same religion for clarification. “...It is impossible to understand the Gospel without the books and works of the church fathers,” a professor of one of the state religions said on television. The professor is wrong. It is religion that has made the Gospel incomprehensible. And initially the Gospel was understandable and accessible to anyone, even the most illiterate person. And today the Gospel is understandable to those who look at it not through crooked religious dogmas, but directly.
Anyone who wants to understand the words of the Bible about the fear of God should take note of the following: The fear of God has nothing to do with the fear of hell. Fearing God and fearing hell are completely different. He who fears hell fears Satan. And you need to fear God.
A disciple of Christ is not afraid of hell. “For You will not leave my soul in hell...” This is what the psalmist David said, a man who believed in God. (Psalm 15:10). It is clear that his prophetic words referred to Christ. And literally these words concerned himself, the believer David. And just as literally, these words of David apply to all believers in Christ. “I will redeem them from the power of hell, I will deliver them from death. Death! Where is your sting? hell! Where is your victory? I will have no repentance for that.” (Hosea 13:14).
A disciple of Christ is not afraid of hell, because he understands that hell is death, a sleep from which he will emerge at the resurrection of the dead. “I will redeem them from the power of hell, I will deliver them from death.” But a student of religion is afraid of hell, because he believes the lie that hell is a place of terrible torment, ruled by Satan and demons.
RELIGIOUS FALSE ABOUT THE FEAR OF GOD...
Religions do not provide a clear explanation of what the fear of God is, although some of the authors come quite close to the meaning of the topic. However, nothing more! But in the Holy Scriptures there is a direct and precise explanation of the concept of “fear of God.” Below we will see this explanation of the Bible.
But first, let’s compare how the fear of God is shown in the Church Bible, and how, for example, in the Modern Russian translation.
We read in the Synodal Translation of Psalm 33:10-12: “Fear the Lord, you His saints, for those who fear Him have no poverty. The Skimns are in poverty and suffer hunger, but those who seek the Lord do not suffer the need for any good. Come, children, listen to me; I will teach you the fear of the Lord."
Now we read these same verses in the Modern Russian translation: “Honor the Lord, all His saints; those who honor Him need nothing. Lions suffer poverty and hunger; those who seek the Lord know no need. Come, children, and listen to me, I will teach you to honor the Lord.”
So, before us is an example of how religion translated the words respect and veneration of God into words fear.
Let us also compare the text from Isaiah: “And a branch shall come forth from the root of Jesse, and a branch shall grow out of his root; and the Spirit of the Lord will rest upon Him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and strength, the spirit of knowledge and piety; and will be filled with the fear of the Lord...” (Isaiah 11:1-3).
Let's look at the Modern Russian translation. There, instead of the words “he will be filled with the fear of the Lord,” there are the words: “Reverence for the Lord will fill him!”
In this text, religion called reverence for the Lord fear, which completely changed the meaning.
Let's turn to the New Testament books. Let's read in Acts 9:31, in the King's Bible: "The churches in all Judea, Galilee and Samaria were at rest, walking and walking in the fear of the Lord, and being encouraged by the Holy Spirit, they increased in number."
Now we read in the Modern Russian translation: “Meanwhile, peace came to the Church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria. She strengthened herself and lived in reverent awe of the Lord. Thanks to the Holy Spirit, its numbers continued to increase.”
Again the word fear is translated into awe.
Let us also read these words of the Apostle Paul: “...Submit yourselves to one another in the fear of God...” (Eph. 5:21). The Modern Russian translation says: “...Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ...”.
And here in the church Bible, reverence is translated as fear.
WHAT IS THE FEAR OF GOD?
The good, merciful God has provided a complete explanation of the fear of God, the fear He desires to see in people. In the Holy Scriptures, this explanation of God appeared during the reign of the handwritten Law, a thousand years before Christ. For example, in the second chapter of the Proverbs of Solomon, the theme of the fear of God is literally laid out on the shelves, explained in detail. Let me quote the entire passage from the book of Proverbs:
"My son! If you accept my words and keep my commandments with you, so that your ear is attentive to wisdom, and your heart is inclined to meditation; if you call on knowledge and appeal to reason; if you seek it like silver and search for it like treasure; then you will understand the fear of the Lord and find the knowledge of God, for the Lord gives wisdom; from His mouth - knowledge and understanding; He reserves salvation for the righteous; He is a shield to those who walk uprightly; He guards the paths of righteousness, and preserves the path of His saints. Then you will understand righteousness and justice and uprightness, every good path. When wisdom enters your heart, and knowledge is pleasant to your soul, then prudence will protect you, reason will protect you...” (Proverbs 2:1-11).
I suggest everyone independently, slowly, and several times re-read these words of Scripture. Re-read without any religious interpretation, but simply and directly as they are written there. And then you will see that the “Fear of God” is WISDOM, MEDITATION, KNOWLEDGE, INTEGRITY, THE PATH OF RIGHTEOUSNESS, PRUDENCE, REASON...
In ordinary life, in communication with reasonable people, sometimes we hear, for example, the following instruction: “When you fear God, then you will be able to save yourself from sinning...”. What is the meaning of this instruction? What does it mean to “fear God”? Solomon answered: “When wisdom enters your heart, and knowledge is pleasant to your soul, then prudence will protect you, reason will protect you...”
The fear of God is not an emotion. In other words, the fear of God is an internal state of spiritual perfection inherent in a rational person in Christ. “The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil.” (Proverbs 8:13. Modern Russian translation)
“THE BEGINNING OF WISDOM IS THE FEAR OF THE LORD.” That's what it says in the Bible. (Psalm 110:10. Proverbs 1:7). How does religion interpret these words? She says wisdom begins with fear. They say, start fearing God, and you will become wiser. This is what religion teaches. And it completely changes the meaning! But the meaning of these Biblical words is the opposite. The Bible says that - gain wisdom, then you will understand what it means to fear God. Although, in principle, even in the Synodal translation one can correctly understand the phrase “The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord.” But for this you need to read the entire text to the end. It goes on to say, “Fools only despise wisdom and instruction.”
The fear of God is a sound mind. If it is said: “there is no fear of God in them,” then it is said that they have no sound mind. A believer does not violate God’s commandments because he understands and understands with his mind how wrong and harmful it is to not fulfill God’s commandments.
As a small but important note, I would like to say that the quotes given here from the Modern Russian translation, in general, are not the basis for understanding the essence of the issue of the fear of God. The meaning of the expression “fear of God” can also be understood by reading the church, Synodal translation. By the way, the quotation from the Proverbs of Solomon, explaining what the fear of God is, is given here from the Synodal translation. To understand the Holy Scriptures, a spiritual person does not turn to scientific works, no matter how correct they may be, but to the Lord Jesus Christ Himself. For the rest of the people, religion has so clouded their thinking that many of them really can’t do it without outside support. To help such believers, quotes from another, non-church translation of the Bible are given.
HOW TO ACQUIRE THE FEAR OF GOD.
Why doesn't any religion say that the fear of God begins with wisdom? Yes, because religion is a killer of wisdom. If religion says that you must acquire wisdom, then if you follow this path, you will then be able to understand that religion is deceiving you. Calling people to wisdom for religion means suicide. Religion does not call for wisdom, but for fear. Religion frightens people. Religion turns everything upside down, they say, first you start to be afraid, and then you will understand something, you will become wiser. Nonsense! Fear, on the contrary, dulls and paralyzes the ability to think. That is why among religious people there are so few who understand the meaning of the Holy Scriptures.
You need to start by separating from evil. You need to understand with your mind that evil is not good. Then - consciously retreat from evil and sensibly become imbued with reverence for God. Preaching the Gospel preaches repentance. The sinner did not know God. This means that he was not afraid of God. Then he heard about God, recognized God, repented, and began to fear God. How did he develop the fear of God? What was the beginning of his fear of God? Acquired wisdom.
THE BIBLE CONCEPT OF FEAR…
Why does the Holy Scripture, when speaking about the wisdom of a believer, about the wisdom of faith itself, use the word “fear”? Probably the reason is the following: Living NOT according to wisdom, living ignoring wisdom, rejecting sound mind and prudence is actually very, very dangerous, simply scary. Indeed, isn't it scary to build a house on sand? And who builds on sand? The man is reckless. But the wise man builds on the rock. This means that a wise man has the fear of God. (Matt. 7:24-27).
In the Bible, the concepts of “wisdom, knowledge, prudence, sound mind”, etc. - are offered not as something abstract, ephemeral, abstract, but as strictly practical, directly related to the present and future life of a person. How can one show in one word the importance, the necessity of obedience to God, the fulfillment of His commandments and reasonable behavior and lifestyle, and so that this word reveals not only the necessity, but also the extreme danger of the absence of all of the above? Can all this be said in one word? Yes! This word is "fear". He who lives according to the laws of a sound mind and the commandments of God has the fear of God. Therefore, the future is not scary for him. And whoever is not friends with common sense does not have the fear of God. Accordingly, his future is very scary. By using the word “fear,” the Holy Spirit found a truly ingenious solution in Scripture. But religion turned everything upside down, and turned the sacred understanding of God’s fear into an instrument of oppression and intimidation of people.
THERE IS NO FEAR IN LOVE...
The commandment says, commands: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your mind...”. There is no other commandment about God. Including there is no commandment “Fear God.” There are instructions, calls, advice to fear God. For example, the book of Ecclesiastes ends with this logical conclusion: “Let us hear the essence of everything: fear God and keep His commandments, because this is all for man.” (Eccl. 12:13.14). But there is no command to fear God in the Bible. God does not command you to fear Him. But God commands us to love Him.
(By the way, is it possible to love by command? You can read about what the commandment-command “Love God...” means in the article “APPEAL TO THOSE WHO LOVE THE LORD JESUS CHRIST AND WHO WISH TO LIVE BY HIS COMMANDMENTS.”
Love and fear of a loved one are mutually exclusive concepts. No matter how religious interpreters try to unite these two different states, they fail to achieve anything positive. It is written in Scripture, as if written in stone: “There is no fear in love...He who fears is not perfect in love.” (1 John 4:18).
The words of John are conveyed very well in the Modern Russian translation: “There is no fear in love - perfect love casts out fear, because fear is associated with punishment and the one who is afraid has not achieved perfection in love.” We know well what it means to be a believer who has no love. Does not mean anything! He is an empty sound, “a ringing brass and a sounding cymbal”! (1 Corinthians 13).
APOSTOLIC INSIGHT.
The apostles knew what the fear of the Lord was. The apostles, preaching among people who believed in pagan posthumous torments, explained to their listeners the concept of the fear of God, so that people would not be afraid of religious fables.
“Therefore, knowing the fear of the Lord, we admonish people...” (2 Corinthians 5:11 Synod)
“And therefore we, knowing what the fear of the Lord is, are trying to convince others...” (From the time of.)
The apostles explained to their listeners that God is love, and that God must be loved and not feared through fear of punishment. In a sense, this was the preaching of the Gospel. People understood the Apostles. And now they understand. Unfortunately, not all...
“The fear of the Lord is to hate evil.” (Proverbs 8:13. Synod.)
“The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil.” (From the time of.)
A. Adadurov
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To fear God means to do His will.
Developing the above thoughts further, I want to say that I do not understand how a person can do the will of the Lord without having proper fear of Him, and how a person can fear God without doing His will. To fear God means to do His will. This means taking a step of faith and doing as God commands, even if we do not find a logical explanation for the situation and cannot see the full picture of what is happening. Those who fear God will strive to do the will of God. Any command of the Father is of paramount importance for them and is not subject to discussion, for it comes from the mouth of the Father Himself. Fear of the Lord, deepest reverence for Him and His will, and obedience to the Lord and His will will then accompany each other. Just imagine naughty children. Can we say that such children respect their father? Perhaps they come to him to get what they want from him, but they have no love or respect for him. If they loved him, they would respect his will and carry it out. Unfortunately, there are similar Christians who come to God only out of great need; the rest of the time they live according to the laws of the world. Naturally, this should not continue. Instead of this type of behavior, we should deepen our relationship with God by seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all other things will be added to us (Matthew 6:33). We are to follow in the footsteps of our Lord Jesus Christ as written in Philippians 2:5-11:
Philippians 2:5-11 “For let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus: He, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God; but he made himself of no reputation, taking the form of a servant, becoming in the likeness of men, and becoming in appearance like a man; He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even to the point of death, even death on the cross. Therefore God has highly exalted Him and given Him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
Scripture says that we should have the same feelings that were in our Lord Jesus Christ. What feelings did He have? His feelings were readiness for obedience, obedience even to death. His motto was, “Not my will, but yours, be done” (Luke 22:42).
With all of the above, I want to emphasize that we cannot say with all confidence that we have the fear of the Lord if we do not do His will. The same principle applies to loving the Lord. As He Himself said:
John 14:23-24 “...if anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make our abode with him. He who does not love Me does not keep My words; But the word that you hear is not Mine, but the Father’s who sent Me.”
We cannot say that we love the Lord if we do not do what He commands us. In the same way, I think we cannot say that we fear the Lord if we know what His will is but do not do it.
To conclude this section, let us repeat once again: the fear of the Lord implies obedience to the Lord. Fear of the Lord means having a high regard for God and His will, despite the circumstances. In short, it means putting God and His will above all else.
Fear of God and perfect love
Unfortunately, the Russian language does not convey all the semantics of the term “fear”. But in Latin there are many different words to denote shades of one concept: pavor, metus, terror ... But when talking about fear of God, they use only one word - timor . It does not include instinctive experiences, but reverent timidity, the fear of hurting another or losing something especially valuable. Therefore, in the Latin translation of the Bible, the concept of timor is used every time in relation to fear of God.
The Old Testament prophets, the apostles of Christ, and the New Testament saints experienced the same reverent awe. In this sense, the fear of the Lord is nothing more than a perfect measure of love , when you are not afraid of anything in the world except one thing - to remain without God, to betray Him with your sinful life.
What the martyrs of the first centuries feared most was not that they would be burned at the stake or thrown to the lions. They were afraid not so much of death as of living at least one day without Communion - that is, without connecting with God.
Over time, much has changed, but even in the first half of the twentieth century, many priests suffered for their faith. They were afraid of only one thing - to renounce the Lord.
