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FEBRUARY 22
A LIBERATING FEAR
“O Lord, hear my prayer, give ear unto my supplication in Your truth;
hearken unto me in Your righteousness. And enter not into judgment with
Your servant, for no one living is righteous before You.” (Ps 142/143: 1-2)
The “fear of God,” that is, the fear of His judgment, is a liberating thing.
This is true for two reasons: 1. God, as the source of justice and truth,
is the only perfect Judge. As distinct from human beings, He does not
embrace prejudice, nor does He form trivial opinions or hold petty
grudges; and 2. His justice is not “fair.” He can be quite unreasonable,
bestowing mercy, no strings attached, to the repentant heart.
A fear of judgment is a gift, inherent to a normal human being from a very
young age. But a proper use of this gift, I think, is something we develop
and discern throughout the course of our spiritual struggle. Quite early
in life, children begin to care what other children think of them, and often
by their teenage years become entirely dependent on the opinions of
their peers.
I can similarly misdirect this gift, by focusing primarily on human
opinion of me. But when I place my focus on God’s judgment, rather than
on the ever-changing winds of human opinion, I liberate myself from the
needless fear of what everyone else thinks. This is why the “fear of God”
is a gift, ultimately teaching me humble self-acceptance. It reveals to me
the liberating fact that “no one living is righteous” before Him.
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