Fear is Just the Beginning
It was my first year of full-time ministry. I was fresh out of grad school and preaching for a beautiful church in a rural, cotton-farming community south of Abilene. Anxious to certify my Church-of-Christ credentials with the congregation, I started a Wednesday night series on the topic of baptism.
Every Wednesday, several of our most faithful volunteers hosted about 50 children for a weekly meal in our fellowship hall (which was separated from the main building, of course). After the chaos was relocated to the auditorium for Bible classes, I would sit down with a dozen or so of those volunteers for our own Bible study. On the first night of the baptism series, I asked the question, “What motivated you to get baptized?”
Do you know what the unanimous answer was? Fear.
Fear of hell. Fear of God’s judgment. Fear of dying in a car wreck on the way to get baptized. Fear of rejection from the church. Fear of disappointing their parents. Fear of not fitting in with their friends. Fear.
In some ways, their answer was not surprising. Most of them were in their sixties and seventies at the time and had grown up in the revivalism that defined Church-of-Christ evangelistic strategy when they were coming of age. I grew up in Churches of Christ in the 90s, and I have never once experienced a “Gospel Meeting” – but all of them had. Their earliest religious experiences were likely filled with “hellfire and brimstone.”
My initial reaction to their stories was pity. I was sad that they had to endure such a traumatic entrance into faith. And to be clear, I would still be critical of using fear as an evangelistic strategy, especially with teens. I consider such tactics to be highly manipulative and ill-advised as a foundation for long-term discipleship.
But I recently came across a thought from Maximus the Confessor that has made me rethink the role of fear in our spiritual lives:
“If you have faith in the Lord, you will fear punishment, and this fear will lead you to control the passions. Once you control the passions, you will accept affliction patiently, and through such acceptance you will acquire hope in God. Hope in God separates the intellect from every worldly attachment, and when the intellect is detached in this way, it will acquire love for God.” [1]
Notice that Maximus is not being prescriptive here. He is not saying that our faith should begin with fear. He just notices that it does begin that way. It’s simply the natural course of events. When we first meet God, we are afraid of Him.
And the Biblical witness confirms that insight repeatedly.
Most famously, Proverbs affirms that “the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom…” (Prov. 1:7; 9:10). The same statement shows up in the Psalms, as well (Ps. 111:10).
Interestingly, the same insight is reflected in Israel’s initial experience of God, too. Immediately after God speaks the Ten Commandments at Mount Sinai – the moment when Israel becomes Israel – this is how the people respond:
When the people saw the thunder and lightning and heard the trumpet and saw the mountain in smoke, they trembled with fear. They stayed at a distance and said to Moses, “Speak to us yourself and we will listen. But do not have God speak to us or we will die.” Moses said to the people, “Do not be afraid. God has come to test you, so that the fear of God will be with you to keep you from sinning.” (Exodus 20:18-20)
Not only does Israel’s relationship with God begin with fear, but we should also notice the role that their fear is said to play. Moses specifically tells them that their fear will “keep them from sinning.”
Maximus suggests the very same thing: “…this fear will lead you to control the passions.”
And once again, Scripture seems to confirm the role that fear can play in controlling our worst impulses:
[T]hrough the fear of the Lord, evil is avoided. (Prov. 16:6)
Do not take advantage of each other, but fear your God. (Lev. 25:17)
I have a message from God in my heart concerning the sinfulness of the wicked: There is no fear of God before their eyes. (Ps. 36:1)
What is the problem with the wicked? Well, they have no fear of God! The lack of fear for God is reflected in a concomitant lack of restraint. Fear, at its best, can teach us how to control ourselves.
All of this makes me wonder: what if fear is a necessary starting place for faith? Perhaps fear is what faith looks like at its inception. It has a role to play as we are starting out because we need a force strong enough to dampen our base instincts. So, when faith is immature it looks and feels like fear.
But here’s the good news: fear is just the beginning. Our faith is not meant to keep us locked in a state of perpetual fear. Rather, what if the presence of fear in our spiritual lives is a sign that we have not yet progressed into a deeper experience of God?
The final word on the fear of God comes not from Proverbs or Exodus, but from 1 John:
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love. (1 John 4:18)
When we first meet God, we are often just like the Israelites – we think we should be afraid of Him. But as we mature, we participate in His love in a way that makes that fear obsolete.
When faith is new, it often looks like fear. But when faith grows up, it looks like love.
Notice how this aligns exactly with what Maximus says at the end of the quote I shared: “…in this way it will acquire love for God.”
What begins in fear, ends in love.
Fear is not the end. Fear is just the beginning.
