Love God. Fear God.

 

Love God. Fear God.

Of all the contradictions in the Bible, these two have given me the most trouble. “It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God” and “Be not afraid”, and “God is a terrible God” has given me pause to think about my relationship with God. Any person who treats another like this is controlling and abusive. I remember one time in my life where I spoke angrily to God and asked him how he could demand that I love Him. That crises came when I realized I could not doubt or deny his existence.

And yet the Bible continues to pile on with “Fear not”, and “Nothing can separate us from God’s love”. I do not doubt that God is Love, despite what I read in the Old Testament, or that Hell is real because of what Jesus reveals about it in the New Testament. The key for me is understanding the relationship between love and fear.

We are all afraid of something. Fear controls the world around us and gives rise to all the anger and wrath that separates us from each other. We cannot really love one another or love our enemies because we are afraid. We will lose control, or we will lose our security. Our idols.

When we trust God completely it is because we love Him completely, like a child. We are finally able to give up all our idols and no longer be controlled by them. We fear nothing because we fear God completely and only.

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