The Concern of God
C. I. Scofield as soon as known as the worry of God “a phrase of Previous Testomony piety.”1 And so certainly it was. Nonetheless, the worry of God will not be a phrase of Previous Testomony piety solely, for the fitting worry of God is, fairly explicitly, a blessing of the brand new covenant. Talking of the brand new covenant, the Lord promised by way of Jeremiah:
They usually shall be my folks, and I might be their God. I’ll give them one coronary heart and a method, that they might worry me without end, for their very own good and the nice of their youngsters after them. I’ll make with them an eternal covenant, that I can’t flip away from doing good to them. And I’ll put the worry of me of their hearts, that they might not flip from me. (Jer. 32:38–40)
What is that this worry that the Lord will put within the hearts of his folks within the new covenant? Not like that devilish worry we now have seen that might drive us away from God, it is a worry that retains us from drawing again or turning away from him. Is it, then, the type of “spirit of slavery” (Rom. 8:15) that John Newton wrote of in his hymn “Wonderful Grace”?
’Twas grace that taught my coronary heart to worry,
And style my fears relieved.
Nicely, definitely, the Spirit could cause a worry in these he’s convicting of sin, a worry that drives them to Christ for refuge. However, as Newton mentioned, that worry is then relieved by grace: it’s not applicable for a believer as soon as she or he has trusted in Christ. It’s a Spirit-worked worry that serves goal in driving sinners to Christ; it’s not, nonetheless, that worry which is “the soul of godliness”2 or “the start of knowledge” (Prov. 9:10).
This guide argues from Scripture that godly worry is the other of being afraid of God or his punishment, as if he have been a tyrant. As an alternative, it’s the depth of the saints’ love for, enjoyment of, and delight of all that God is.
An Sudden Concern
In Jeremiah 33, the Lord goes on to clarify the character of this new covenant worry in phrases so putting they overturn all our expectations. He guarantees:
I’ll cleanse them from all of the guilt of their sin towards me, and I’ll forgive all of the guilt of their sin and rebel towards me. And this metropolis shall be to me a reputation of pleasure, a reward and a glory earlier than all of the nations of the earth who shall hear of all the nice that I do for them. They shall worry and tremble due to all the nice and all of the prosperity I present for it. (Jer. 33:8–9)
This isn’t a worry of punishment—of what God may do if his folks flip away from him. Fairly the other: in Jeremiah 33, the Lord reels off a catalog of pure blessing.3 He’ll cleanse them, forgive them, and do nice good for them. They usually worry and tremble exactly due to all the nice he does for them.
Right here will not be a worry that stands on the flip facet of the grace and goodness of God. It’s the type of worry Hosea describes when he prophesies how “the kids of Israel shall return and search the Lord their God, and David their king, and so they shall are available worry to the Lord and to his goodness within the latter days” (Hos. 3:5). It’s a worry “to the Lord and to his goodness.” It’s a worry that, as Charles Spurgeon put it, “leans towards the Lord” due to his very goodness.4 It’s the type of marveling worry we come throughout within the face of Jesus’s giving of life. When Jesus raised the widow of Nain’s son, we learn,
Then he got here up and touched the bier, and the bearers stood nonetheless. And he mentioned, “Younger man, I say to you, come up.” And the useless man sat up and started to talk, and Jesus gave him to his mom. Concern seized all of them, and so they glorified God, saying, “An ideal prophet has arisen amongst us!” and “God has visited his folks!” (Luke 7:14–16)
Concern and Love
Clearly, the worry of God is under no circumstances what we, with our tradition’s allergic response to the very idea of worry, may anticipate. As an alternative, we will say with Spurgeon that that is the “type of worry which has in it the very essence of affection, and with out which there could be no pleasure even within the presence of God.”5 Actually, the nearer we glance, the nearer worry of God and love of God seem. Generally worry of God and love of God are put in parallel, as in Psalm 145:
He fulfills the need of those that worry him;
he additionally hears their cry and saves them.
The Lord preserves all who love him,
however all of the depraved he’ll destroy. (Ps. 145:19–20)
Equally, consider how Moses equates worry and love in his abstract of the regulation.
Now that is the commandment—the statutes and the principles—that the Lord your God commanded me to show you, that you could be do them within the land to which you’re going over, to own it, that you could be worry the Lord your God. . . .
Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. You shall love the Lord your God with all of your coronary heart and with all of your soul and with all of your may. (Deut. 6:1–5)
The rationale it’s not instantly apparent to us that worry and love are so comparable is that we simply misunderstand love. Love is a phrase bandied round in our lives. I “love” sitting in a comfortable armchair studying guide; I “love” my household; I “love” chortle with my mates. And so I can blithely assume that “love” for God is simply extra of the identical, which means nothing greater than a (maybe imprecise) predilection or choice. The place some get pleasure from pudding, I get pleasure from God.
Nonetheless, my love for one factor differs from my love for one more as a result of love modifications in accordance with its object. Certainly, the character of a love is outlined by its object. Let me illustrate with three true statements:
- I like and have actual affection for my canine.
- I like and have actual affection for my spouse.
- I like and have actual affection for my God.
Every is true, however studying them collectively like that ought to make you wince. You recognize there have to be one thing terribly unsuitable if I imply precisely the identical factor in every. You sincerely hope there’s a distinction. And there’s: the three loves differ as a result of the objects of the loves differ.
The residing God is infinitely excellent and quintessentially, overwhelmingly lovely in each manner: his righteousness, his graciousness, his majesty, his mercy, his all. And so we don’t love him aright if our love will not be a trembling, overwhelmed, and fearful love. In a way, then, the trembling “worry of God” is a manner of talking concerning the depth of the saints’ love for and delight of all that God is. The Puritan William Bates expressed it like this: “There’s nothing extra fearful than an ingenuous love, and nothing extra loving than a filial worry.”6 Equally, Spurgeon might say:
It’s not as a result of we’re afraid of him, however as a result of we enjoyment of him, that we worry earlier than him. . . . “Thine coronary heart shall worry, and be enlarged,” says the prophet Isaiah [Isa. 60:5], and so it involves go with us. The extra we worry the Lord, the extra we love him, till this turns into to us the true worry of God, to like him with all our coronary heart, and thoughts, and soul, and energy.7
The fitting worry of God, then, will not be the flip facet to our love for God. That sort of pondering was articulated by the Roman Catholic theologian Hans Urs von Balthasar when he argued that “the gospel of grace seem[s] not solely as love (which is what it’s in God) but in addition as regulation and command, as reverence, religio, distance and worry of the Lord.”8 However Moses’s command to Israel in summarizing the regulation was exactly that God’s folks ought to worry and love the Lord their God. Proper worry doesn’t stand in pressure with love for God. Proper worry falls on its face earlier than the Lord, however falls leaning “towards the Lord.”9 It’s not as if love attracts close to and worry distances. Neither is this worry of God one facet of our response to God. It’s not merely that we love God for his graciousness and worry him for his majesty. That will be a lopsided worry of God. We additionally love him in his holiness and tremble on the marvelousness of his mercy. True worry of God is real love for God outlined: it’s the proper response to God’s full-orbed revelation of himself in all his grace and glory.
Notes:
- Scofield Reference Bible, 1909 ed., 607n1.
- John Murray, Ideas of Conduct: Facets of Biblical Ethics (London: Tyndale, 1957), 229.
- See additionally Ps. 67:7 because the climax of the chiastic Ps. 67.
- C. H. Spurgeon, “A Concern to Be Desired,” in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit Sermons, 63 vols. (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1855–1917), 48:495.
- Spurgeon, “A Concern to Be Desired,” 494.
- William Bates, “On the Concern of God,” in The Entire Works of the Rev. W. Bates, vol. 3 (London: James Black, 1815), 187.
- Spurgeon, “A Concern to Be Desired,” 498.
- Hans Urs von Balthasar, The Theology of Karl Barth, trans. Edward Oakes (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1992).
- Spurgeon, “A Concern to Be Desired,” 495, my emphasis.
This text is tailored from Rejoice and Tremble: The Surprising Good News of the Fear of the Lord by Michael Reeves.
