FEAR GOD AND GOD ALONE

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In Christ, Mark

The scriptures. May God bless the reading of His holy word.

God is renowned in Judah; in Israel, His name is great. His tent is in Salem, His dwelling place in Zion. There He broke the flashing arrows, the shields and the swords, the weapons of war.

You are radiant with light, more majestic than mountains rich with game. The valiant lie plundered, they sleep their last sleep; not one of the warriors can lift his hands. At your rebuke, God of Jacob, both horse and chariot lie still.

It is You alone who are to be feared. Who can stand before You when you are angry? From heaven You pronounced judgment, and the land feared and was quiet — when You, God, rose up to judge, to save all the afflicted of the land. Surely Your wrath against mankind brings You praise, and the survivors of Your wrath are restrained.

Make vows to the Lord Your God and fulfill them; let all the neighboring lands bring gifts to the One to be feared. He breaks the spirit of rulers; He is feared by the kings of the earth.

Psalm 76

This ends this reading from God's holy word. Thanks be to God.

Sometimes as I look at the Christian community today, I get very concerned about the body of Christ as it stands.

My concern centers on what I perceive as a comfortable approach to our Christianity and especially the matter of sinning. It seems more and more like there is an increasingly casual approach toward transgressions, so much so that many people try and compromise when it comes to sin, willing to give up some sins in exchange for retaining others. We want to live a give-and-take faith with Jesus, wanting His blessings but only accepting some of His desires as giving into all of them would involve us giving up indulgences we’ve become attached to. In other words, we are not amenable to give up everything for the Lord as He gave up everything for us.

I wonder how God feels about this, particularly in the light that He abhors sin and we know it but still are not willing to turn from it. The 76th Psalm offers us some reminders we would be well served to remember when it comes to our attitude about the sin in our life. Look again at this scripture:

God is renowned in Judah; in Israel, His name is great. His tent is in Salem, His dwelling place in Zion. There He broke the flashing arrows, the shields and the swords, the weapons of war.

You are radiant with light, more majestic than mountains rich with game. The valiant lie plundered, they sleep their last sleep; not one of the warriors can lift his hands. At your rebuke, God of Jacob, both horse and chariot lie still.

It is You alone who are to be feared. Who can stand before You when you are angry? From heaven You pronounced judgment, and the land feared and was quiet — when You, God, rose up to judge, to save all the afflicted of the land. Surely Your wrath against mankind brings You praise, and the survivors of Your wrath are restrained.

Make vows to the Lord Your God and fulfill them; let all the neighboring lands bring gifts to the One to be feared. He breaks the spirit of rulers; He is feared by the kings of the earth.

The psalmist reminds us of two important points regarding God.

First, it is He and He alone that we are to fear. We seem to get afraid over the things of life and yet not live with any fear of God and it’s Him we should fear above anything. Ask yourself this: Is there anything in your life more powerful than God? Of course, the answer is a resounding “no”! As we contemplate our decisions about whether or not to sin, we should factor in that God, the most powerful entity we know, hates sin and will judge any person who chooses to continue to do it willingly in violation of God’s commands and expectations as found in His Holy Word.

This leads to the second critical point of the psalmist. For he asks God, “Who can stand before You when You are angry?” The answer is again an easy one. For just as God is the most powerful force in our life, He is also THE Authority which every knee bows before. Truly, more mortals like you and me have no chance when facing God’s might let alone His wrath. And yet, we choose to behave in ways that we know antagonizes God. Do we seriously know what we’re doing? I don’t think we do because if we really considered God’s force, we wouldn’t want to fall out of favor with Him.

And just because we have professed Jesus as Savior doesn’t give us license to act however we want as if we have locked up our salvation and are immune from God’s penalties.

Think about how God must feel when we sin. He gave His only Son in Jesus as a living sacrifice to pay the price for the sins of mankind. This is how much He loved us, so much so that He would not be willing to allow us to perish but instead opted to allow His Son to be the perfect unblemished Lamb who would pay one sacrifice to atone for the sins of all. The nails driven through Jesus into the cross of Calvary served to attach our sins to Christ and He bore all the pain and suffering we should have bore. There was an incredible cost paid by Jesus and God lost His Son. So don’t think for a moment that God takes kindly to anyone who chooses to continue to sin after it was sin that led to Jesus’ death. We should, as the psalmist asserts, fear Him and Him alone, and let our behavior testify to that attitude.

So how should we approach sin?

We should be afraid to commit it, afraid that we will ignite God’s ire and afraid that our transgression will indicate that we feel Jesus died in vain for us. After all, what kind of gratitude do we show Christ when we continue to sin after He died to pay the price for us?

Friends, it’s time for us to clean up our respective acts. It’s time to get hypersensitive about sin, so much so that even the most minute flaw is unacceptable. It’s time to show Jesus how much we appreciate what He did for us on the cross by respecting Him and living in righteousness as He did. And maybe it’s time for us to remember the part of the prayer He taught us to pray, the part that says, “Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.” If you do, you’ll be taking the first steps toward living the way the Lord wants, in a way where He is guiding us and all we do.

Amen.

In Christ,

Mark

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