"What THE FEAR OF THE LORD Looks Like!"

Inherent in the implication of the discussion about what the Fear of the Lord looks like is the true and deep revelation of God's GRACE and MERCY! There is a profound difference between my receiving death (grace) and deserving death (mercy).

The hard truth is that too many Christians have absolutely NO FEAR of God! Nie. Ni. Nein. Ohee. Lo. Nee. No. No matter what language you speak, the answer is the same! Before you bristle at this statement and hit the delete button on your smart phone, hear me out. How can I make such a bold declaration? Here it is:

We have often heard the scripture, "The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge; but fools despise wisdom and instruction." (Proverbs 1:7)  Two things are worth noting here, 1) In this instance the "fear" being referenced in this passage is not "reverence or respect" and although it is an aspect of fear, I contend the intent is for us to be literally "afraid" of God and 2) The LORD in this case is GOD ALMIGHTY, not Jesus and not the Holy Ghost!

This brings me me to my main point for this writing. "Respect or reverence does not denote fear or convey that an individual or group is afraid." Christians live their lives recklessly with dalliances in adultery, drugs addiction, bribery, etc. all the while conducting their nefarious activities in the dark from their wives, husbands, children and co-workers. We cannot be stopped until we achieve the "feeling" we are after. Isn't it comical that we do our dirt at night? The sinner thinks that GOD cannot see him in the dark! Is He even a consideration unless we fall prey to danger or get exposed? Of course at that time we utter those remorseful words, "Oh God!" But remorse is not repentance. Remorse is not being afraid of God. Remorse is simply getting caught.

One thing I know about the truth is that the "truth is invincible." The main opposition to the truth in God's Word is our mental resistance to change because, frankly speaking, "we love our sin too much!" There is a sociological term for this behavior. It is called "cognitive dissonance (CD)." CD is the "art of lying to yourself." It exists when an individual has a false belief system challenged by the truth and scrambles to defend that belief system by "rationalizing" certain behavior. The defense of that belief system is more important than the truth and thus the construction of the wall of "mental resistance" begins. We often see this in Christianity with any revelation of false teaching, corruption in church politics or questionable or illegal behavior in church leadership. I always say, "people will believe what they want to believe no matter how compelling the evidence may be to the contrary."

The fear (being scared, terrified) of the LORD will keep you alive! The Apostle Paul talked about his "thorn" in the flesh in 2 Cor. 12:7. I contend that the thorn Paul was referring to was the "fear" of the LORD. You see friends, God has absolutely zero concern for our mortal bodies. He simply states to us, "Watch my reaction to My Beloved Son's execution on the Cross; I didn't lift a finger to stop it!"

His Word says that, "God has not given us the spirit of fear; but of power and of love and of a sound mind." (2 Tim 1:7) There is a profound truth here I don't want you to miss. At the beginning of this writing I submitted to you that the "fear" of the Lord is the...." and God said He did not give you the "spirit" of fear. Here is the revelation:

"The spirit of fear (from the devil) is rooted in uncertainty and the fear (of the LORD) is certain!" Selah...