Fear God
Fear God:
As a matter of trust that there’s wisdom in the way those whom you acknowledge to be more knowledgeable and spiritually mature than yourself fear God.
Because you know that, whether you have trouble believing or accepting anything else that is said of God, He is at the very least the cause of your life and your only possible hope after death.
Because fear is only reasonable when the perfectly moral person would consider our condition so dire that He should suffer a torturous death on our behalf.
Because you know it would be healthy to have such a grounding when you’re floating on the surface of life with reckless indifference, tuned-out, unafraid of anything.
In such a way that it isn’t just the thesis to be countered by loving and trusting God in a Christian dialectic, as though you were setting-up fear of God as a bowling pin to knock down with the gospel.
How do I account for the fact that the consecrated religious of apostolic traditions carry themselves in a more convincing way as a people set apart and radically different than the laity? My experience in France for the several years that I was living there was that the monks I met were very different than their compatriots; whereas in the US, Lutherans—even pastors—are pretty much like everyone else except perhaps for their job description.
We Lutherans especially seem to want to find every reason to be ourselves unchanged: we have the doctrine of vocations which affirms our freedom to serve our neighbors in a common way that doesn’t privilege prayer over getting our hands dirty, for example. I am not convinced this is the right way. Neither, however, is the right way to tell those monks and nuns that they’re marked with a vocation that requires them to abide by the evangelical counsels and that they therefore must be more Christlike than the rest of us.
Who has lived as though he feared God? Is there a middle way between the Roman Catholic evangelical counsels for the few and the treatment of the law which rejects the notion of viewing the law and gospel in a simple dialectical relationship, where the law functions merely as a harsh demand that is later negated by the freeing power of the gospel?
Lutheran Pietism emerged in the late 17th century as a movement within Lutheranism that sought to revive personal faith and piety, reacting against what was perceived as a cold, formalistic orthodoxy. At its core, Pietism emphasized personal conversion, spiritual renewal, and active faith in the daily life of believers. The movement focused on an intimate relationship with God, rooted in a heartfelt response to the Gospel. Pietists did not view the fear of God as merely an external or legalistic obligation, but as a deep, reverent love for God that naturally flows from genuine faith.
What sets Lutheran Pietism apart is that it does not treat the law and the gospel as a simplistic dialectic, where the law is merely a burden to be replaced by the liberating gospel. Instead, Pietists see the law as something to be loved because it reflects God’s will and wisdom. They feared God in the most authentically Christian way by recognizing that the law, while convicting us of sin, is also a guide for how to live in response to the gospel. For the Pietist, the fear of God means living in awe and reverence, but not out of dread of judgment; it is grounded in trust and love for God’s righteousness, which the law reveals. They understood that the Christian life is not just about escaping condemnation, but about loving God's commandments because they are an expression of His holy character.
Pietists thus fear God not in a way that pits law against gospel, but in a way that sees both as harmonious parts of the Christian life. The law is no longer something to overcome but something to embrace as the good and perfect will of God. Because of their deep love for Christ and His redeeming work, Pietists aimed to live out their faith by embodying this love for God’s law in their daily lives, walking humbly in faith and obedience. In this sense, their fear of God is a fear filled with love and respect, grounded in the gospel and expressed through a joyful obedience to the law that no longer condemns, but now guides and shapes their life in Christ.