The Connection Between the Fear of God and Justification

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experience, forgiveness, God's love, grace, Jesus Christ, joy, justification, peace, repentance, righteousness by faith, sin, sinner, suffering, the fear of God, The Fear of the Lord, the new self, the old self, true faith

Garden in Weihenstephan (Upper Bavaria)

The following is an excerpt of a (not published) book I wrote about seven years ago. I just translated a text of my journal which should clarify that the experience of the fear of God and being justified by Him usually go hand in hand.

To separate awe from God from an everyday, natural fear is not easy. For it is real fear as other languages ​​also make clear:

Gottesfurcht (German)

crainte de Dieu (French)

timore di Dio (Italian)

temor de Dios (Spanish)

The fear of God is, above all, the fear of displeasing God by transgressing His commandments. I believe a further difference compared with other fears is that our natural anxieties cause narrowness inside our mind and make us think of running away from a frightening situation. “Cut and run!” the thief might think when suddenly confronted with the policeman. He, too, is, or at least should be frightened when he must face governmental authority. Nevertheless, it might happen that the thief, instead, goes over to attacking the authority figure when he realizes that his getaway route has been cut off.

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What hinders spiritual growth

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deception, discerning the spirits, exhortation, experience, eyes of the heart, feelings, fellowship, following Jesus, God's guidance, God's love, intellect, preaching, suffering, T.A. Sparks, teaching, true faith, Truth in Love

STOP!!! … AND RUN when you sense deceiving spirits approaching you! (Photo by Susanne Schuberth)

Let me begin with an analogy we all know. Imagine you see a small child that has not been fed properly by his parents. Instead, he was badly nourished and therefore grows slowly, even much slower than his peers. Maybe, his parents are extremely poor and cannot feed this child as they should. If this small child gets no help from others, sooner or later the first sicknesses will befall him and most probably, he won’t get that old, either. What is so sad to observe in the physical realm exists in the spiritual realm, too. Nonetheless, the difference is that it is easier to feed a malnourished child than a malnourished spirit being for we can see it immediately when a child is too lean, too pale, and very weak. But how can we discern a believer who has fed on the wrong spirits? Can we see the deception they have fallen prey to as well?  🙄

Before the thunderstorm…

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circumcision of the heart, discerning the spirits, dying to self, experience, following Jesus, Michael Clark, pain, resurrection, Satan, the cross, the new self, the old self

Yesterday, before the thunderstorm…
(Photo by Susanne Schuberth)

Let me provoke you here a bit. I argue that Satan has ruled the Institutional Church (IC) from her early beginnings and I also believe he did not stop there. The devil even goes so far to draw those into his spider web of lies again who once would leave the institutional church system because they saw its serious shortcomings. And it does not seem to me that he has had great difficulties in doing so. Whoever does not preach the true gospel of Christ, but a mixed version that is more pleasing to the listener’s ear, has become deceived whether they know it or not. But alas, they do not know it. If they did, they would not be deceived, right? They could repent if God gave them eyes to see the truth. It is so saddening to observe when they are confronted with the truth, instead of repentance, false spirits rise up and manifest the spirit of antichrist aka the ‘instead-of-Christ-spirit’ as Michael Clark told me several times in the past. There is our old self’s nature, our fallen human nature, the flesh that always wants to be like God without obeying Him and His Spirit’s leading (cf. Gal 5:14). In his recent recent article Michael wrote,

Man loves to try to do the works of God, accumulate knowledge, know with his own mind, and imitate God instead of knowing God intimately with his heart and allowing God to conform him into the image of Christ by the plan and design of the Father. The fleshly state of fallen man still loves to eat the fruit of that same forbidden tree instead of Jesus, the Tree of Life (See John 6:51).

Religious man loves to collect Bible knowledge and knowledge of doctrines so he can decide for himself what is good and what is evil. He loves to heap to himself teachers that tickle his religious ears and to garner to himself degrees in theology. Yet, when the New Testament speaks of “knowing the Lord,” it speaks of an intimate knowing that goes much deeper than a mere accumulation of facts.

“Who are our Brethren?” Some Thoughts on The Final Judgment

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carnal mind, discerning the spirits, experience, following Jesus, Life and Death, Michael Clark, spirit and life, spiritual mind

“But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.” (Amos 5:24 KJV) – Photo by Susanne Schuberth

If you, like me, were raised in the RCC, and even more so, in liberal circles, you might have heard the statement that all people on earth have eventually become our brothers and sisters because of Christ. But is that true? Also, are all Christians automatically His sheep who will find themselves on that very day of the Final Judgment on Christ’s right side? Let’s read the whole story in its context.

Sin does not equal sin or… God only judges the heart

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discerning the spirits, exhortation, experience, forgiveness, grace, heart, judging others, light, rest, sin, truth

Fall Has Come…
(Photo by Susanne Schuberth)

While typing the headline, I myself just wondered about the wording of this title. You and I know what sin is when we read or talk about it, however, is it possible that there are differences of motives when we fall in sin? I was just thinking about the Pharisees who by condemning a woman who had been caught in the act of adultery basically did no wrong thing according to their own law as they wanted to stone her. The Jews indeed had the right to judge those who belonged to them, just as they had no right to do so with others who were no Jews like the Gentiles. But here stood Jesus who represented the end of the Old Covenant, the end of the law for all those who believe in Him (cf. Rom 10:4). He alone was the One who could show grace to this poor woman “for the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (Jn 1:17 ESV)

What is the Fear of God?

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Albert Barnes, condemnation, curses, discerning the spirits, exhortation, experience, freedom, God's love, joy, judging others, love, obedience, peace, spiritual blessings, spiritual power, T.A. Sparks, true faith

“If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.” (Jn 15:10-11 ESV) – Picture credits http://deeperwaters.us/the-joy-of-obedience/

Although this article springs from my own experiences with the fear of God, I did not describe here how it really feels to be struck all of a sudden by this special spirit of Him who rules the universe. If you like to read more about that, though, click here. In this entry you will rather find a definition by T. Austin Sparks’ of the fear of the Lord and some implications of what it means to truly belong to God’s people. Contrasting the evil of fear imposed on us by Satan in order to torment and paralyze us, TAS wrote regarding the fear of God,

But this fear is a holy fear. Let no one think for a moment that this fear of the Lord is death, bondage, stultification and repression. Not at all. Wherever you find this fear of the Lord you find joy, love, peace and liberty. People are not afraid of the Lord. But they are careful not to grieve the Lord. They do not take liberties with the Lord. They do not think of spiritual liberty as spiritual licence. They do not cast off restraint, they do not ride rough-shod over all sacred things, calling it liberty. No, there is holy fear which restrains and in restraining keeps things pure and keeps things clear and makes a straight way for the Lord. The true fear of the Lord is not dread. It is a very blessed and precious thing.

Speaking the Truth IN Love

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Albert Barnes, discerning the spirits, exhortation, experience, God's love, joy, love, peace, Truth in Love

LOVE – the more excellent way
(Picture credits https://denigustafson.files.wordpress.com/2013/10/0522-joh013035engkjv08000480-000.jpg)

As these two caps in my headline might already point to, speaking the truth in love is not something we can do on our own. Actually, we must be in love with our Creator through Jesus Christ, so that we can behave toward all other human beings as we should. Loving them unconditionally does not mean that we cave in if we disagree with them. No, if God wants us to take a stand, we should do it – always. However, if we are not IN love with God, what will happen is most probably something that some of us already did: they tried to speak the truth in love by telling others what they believed, and perhaps it was really the truth (!), but they did not wait on the Lord to nudge them to do so and thus it got all harsh and judgmental. They might have felt that there was something wrong about it and thus they added some pleasantry in order to show that they really loved the other person. Well, I believe that is not the way God intended it to be.

Is the Church Age over?

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called by God, church, experience, glory, joy, Michael Clark, prophesy, suffering, T.A. Sparks, the cross

Destruction of the Church of Reconciliation in Berlin’s ‘death zone’ in January 1985
(Picture credits https://www.rbb-online.de)

My thoughts on this issue were inspired by Michael Clark with whom I had an exchange regarding the time we might live in now, about 2,000 years after Jesus Christ’s crucifixion. Even if we merely look at the circumstances around us, the political situation of so many run-down countries, the increasing number of trouble spots in the world, and the not even remotely comprehensible approaches of “truths” in religion, science, and pseudo-scientific fields (such as esoteric and occult doctrines), we might begin to feel uneasy by the threat of chaos closing in on us.

Some Thoughts on the First Commandment

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darkness, experience, first commandment, following Jesus, heart, idolatry, Jesus Christ, light, Martin Luther, mind, other gods, the cross

Rose Hips above the Rhine-Main-Danube-Canal
(Photo by Susanne Schuberth)

Actually, I do not want to convey the impression I was into law keeping here since we live in New Covenantal times. Instead, I think we could use the OT law at times as a mirror that shows us what might be still wrong in our hearts and minds.
It appears to me that keeping the first commandment that says we should have no other gods beside our God tells us to somehow look through everything of which we think it is good around us as being blessing from God only. As soon as we cling to a person or a blessing they gave us as if he, she, or it represented the ultimate good that could make us happy or unhappy if we lost it, we have another god. I just thought I could share some thoughts on this topic from my fellow countryman Martin Luther with you on here.

When the horizon opens up…

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darkness, experience, God's love, joy, light, love, peace, psychology, rest, thought life

Tulip Flower Field (Wallpaper)

The more we dare to freely admit before God how our real heart condition is and who we really are, the more we will be able to let other people into our hearts as well. The more we understand that we are truly loved without strings attached, the more we will long to show others how much they are loved too.