It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

Today I was reading the ENT and studying for our quiz and I read the part about Merrill C. Tenney and the verse that he had written underneath his signature to that young student.

        “But my righteous one will live by faith. And if he
        shrinks back, I will         not be pleased with him.”

                                        - Hebrews 10:38

I then went back and reread Hebrews 10. And my eyes became fixated on verse 31, “It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.” This might very well be the first time that I have fully understood what it means to fear the Lord. Unfortunately, although hearing about the fear of God and even wrestling with the thought of fearing one who loves me, my picture of God has been incomplete. I do not believe that most churches today do service to our God when we do not speak also of his wrath. I had a conversation the other day with a fellow Pac Rim student about a few lines from Rob Bell’s book Velvet Elvis.
        
        In heaven, there are people that God forgives and that he loves.
        In hell, there are people that God forgives and that he loves.

I argued that without repentance than there is nor forgiveness of sins and that there is only wrath stored up for the sinner.

This student then went on a postmodern rant about how that was my interpretation of the scriptures. God’s love had been so ingrained in his mind through what he has been taught at various churches that he held God’s love as His highest attribute. But I retorted back that none of God’s attributes are higher than the others; in fact his holiness, wrath, justice and others are all equal.

The conversation ended there as we both had other pressing engagements. But my mind kept thinking upon the fact that the “church” today has skewed the biblical view of God in order to be “relevant” to today’s emerging culture. But I would argue that by doing so they have become increasingly irrelevant because what they preach, even if it is touching many hearts is not the full truth. The danger is that God is not glorified to His utmost. The fear and reverence that He requires of us His people is being replaced with a warm fuzzy feeling (which is also good but not complete). And thus man is raised up as the object of God’s love and affection rather than God being the object of our love, affection, fear and reverence.

When I was young I had a fear of cats because every time one came near it would dig its claws into my thigh. That’s why I will never own one.
In the same way “cats” have dug their claws into my thinking while growing up in church.

Oh God, please forgive me for taking so long to realize what true fear is. Help me to never, ever forget.