Dan Phillips has written an excellent post on why fear and comfort are a healthy combination.
Wouldn’t you think that “fear” and “comfort” are antonyms, like “love” and “hate,” or “darkness” and “light”?
In a Biblical context, we might most quickly associate the word “fear” with “of the LORD,” or “of Yahweh.” That topic — “the fear of Yahweh” — is a major Biblical theme. Clearly, in Proverbs, it is a literally foundational thought (cf. 1:7; 9:10; 31:30). In the Proverbs book, a chapter of 40+ pages traces the concept its older Old Testament appearances, just so we can begin to understand of Solomon’s use throughout the book of Proverbs. One discovery is that the concept itself frames and must color our understanding of each individual verse within the entire book.
When we develop the concept Biblically, we feel the burden to show that the fear of Yahweh is not (as some might think) an Old Testament concept as opposed to a New Testament concept. Indeed, it is quite literally a pan-Biblical concept.
This stood out to me in a recent daily Bible reading. Acts 9:31 leapt out at me in this context:
Ἡ μὲν οὖν ἐκκλησία καθ᾽ ὅλης τῆς Ἰουδαίας καὶ Γαλιλαίας καὶ Σαμαρείας εἶχεν εἰρήνην οἰκοδομουμένη καὶ πορευομένη τῷ φόβῳ τοῦ κυρίου καὶ τῇ παρακλήσει τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος ἐπληθύνετο.
So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria had peace and was being built up. And walking in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it multiplied.
Read the rest here.
Thanks, Chris. The pyromaniacs blog is a great resource, isn’t it?
In church yesterday, I sang “Amazing Grace” for the umpteenth time, but finally I noticed this line: “’twas grace that caused by heart to fear, and grace my fear relieved.” I noticed the balance and completeness of grace in this – by grace He awakens in us a proper fear, and by the same grace He comforts us, allaying those fears in the gift of salvation by amazing grace through simple faith.
And this salvation is so thorough that we have His promise that we will be changed into His likeness, and made righteous like the Son, so that we finally, actually, for all eternity get to serve God in perfect holy fear!