Discipleship Series Part 1: THE FEAR AND THE FRIENDSHIP Joe Pienaar, 23rd January 2011

The world in which we live has never been more sceptical about objective truth; moral standards are slipping and our multi-faith society encourages us to pick and choose our beliefs from a variety of faiths. However, this culture has given rise to a growing desire for spiritual experiences and has manifested itself in a growing dissatisfaction with the shallowness and dryness often found in the church. The feeling is, if it doesn’t help me in my life then it doesn’t work! This has given rise to a renewed hunger for meaning, purpose and significance coupled with a more intense move among many Christians towards accountability and discipleship and an experience of God’s presence. Over the following weeks we are going to focus on going deeper into God’s word, whilst taking seriously issues of experiencing God and accountability even in the context of our services in order to stoke the fires of our faith again. This will be a journey with Christ rather than a journey to Christ. Today we are going to look at the aspects of fear and friendship in our relationship with God. Love needs to motivate our actions but a healthy fear of the Lord should keep us on the path. When we have these two parallel tracks in our lives – fear and friendship - we will grow towards maturity – overcoming our sin and our wrong patterns of thinking. We will be led by the Spirit and have the mind of Christ; we will hate evil and run from sin; we will be co-workers with God ushering in his Kingdom rule with our very lives. Nothing will be impossible for us – because nothing is impossible for God - we will be overcomers!

The God of the Bible is personal, infinite and triune in nature – one God but three persons - Father, Son and Holy Spirit. God loves us and wants to grow in a close relationship with us; this is the purpose for which we were created - to know, love, enjoy and honour Him. Yet he is also the God of all creation as David reminds us:

‘When I consider your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?’ (Psalm 8:3-4)

When David wrote these words there were only a few thousand stars visible to the naked eye. Recent developments in astronomy have revealed that our galaxy - the Milky Way - is part of a local cluster of 20 galaxies which is just one member of a massive super-cluster of thousands of galaxies. There are an estimated 100,000,000,000 super-clusters of galaxies. That is phenomenal! The question posed by David was right: “What are human beings that you care for them?” This is one reason for my love of John’s gospel. John, sometimes known as John the beloved, was one of the closest friends of Jesus yet he describes him with such awe. He knew that whilst he was a friend of Jesus, he was not an equal. At the end of the gospel he writes,

‘Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written.’ (John 21: 25)

John also starts his gospel with the famous words:

‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made.’ (John 1:1-3)

John wants to make sure people know that this Jesus who died and was resurrected, was and is God in flesh; that God and Jesus are one and the same. This God-man, Jesus, was there when the super-clusters of galaxies were created – they were created through him. This is the same God who was born as a baby at that first Christmas. Doesn’t that blow your mind? If it doesn’t, it should! The FEAR God’s awesomeness and mystery should cause us to fear, respect and be in awe of him, but for some reason the concept of "fear and trembling" in connection with God is not a popular concept today. Mike Yaconelli says:

"We have defanged the tiger of truth. We have tamed the lion. The tragedy of modern faith is that we no longer are capable of being terrified."

Understandably people prefer to hear about God's love and mercy, but could the lack of a fear of God be one reason why many Christians are so apathetic in their devotion and service? I know I have been guilty of wilfully committing sins, thinking to myself, “Well, God will forgive me anyway!” Doesn’t this just cheapen his grace? Could it be we have forgotten that this God is awesome and terrifying, so much so that no-one could even look upon his face and live?! Many Christians live comfortably with sin, satisfied with their relationship with God, rather than desperate to seek God’s forgiveness and determined to pursue holiness so as to please him and grow in relationship with Him. There are many scriptures referring to the fear of God being a good and worthy attribute of his followers:

‘But from everlasting to everlasting the LORD’s love is with those who fear him, and his righteousness with their children’s children.’ (Psalm 103:17)

‘For great is the LORD and most worthy of praise; he is to be feared above all gods.’ (Psalm 96:4)

‘The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom; all who follow his precepts have good understanding.’ (Psalm 111:10)

And even in the New Testament we find this concept:

‘It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.’ (Heb 10:31 (KJV))

‘Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace and was strengthened. Living in the fear of the Lord and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, it increased in numbers.’ (Acts 9:31)

Note that these early disciples of Jesus were "l iving in the fear of the Lord"! The word used for FEAR in the Hebrew (“YIR'AH") and Greek ("PHOBOS") describe: an awesome or terrifying thing and something deserving respect and reverence. The fear of the Lord is often defined as reverence or awe, but I am not sure this definition goes far enough. Though the terms "reverence" and "awe" imply a place for "trembling", do we ever that connection? Paul told us to work out our salvation with fear and trembling (Philippians 2:12) and Jesus also taught us to fear the Lord and tremble as if in the presence of someone able to take our lives:

‘Don’t be afraid of those who want to kill your body; they cannot touch your soul. Fear only God, who can destroy both soul and body in hell.’ (Matthew 10:28)

A healthy "fear of the lord" should include:

• Reverence and awe. • Being afraid to offend God in any way. • Trembling and quaking if we know we have offended God.

The value of such an attitude is outlined in the book of proverbs:

• The "fear of the Lord" is the beginning of knowledge - Pr 1:7 • The "fear of the Lord" will cause us to hate evil - Pr 8:13 and run from it - Pr 16:6 • The "fear of the Lord" will prolong life - Pr 10:27

But without a fear of the Lord:

• We deny ourselves God's wisdom and knowledge • We will flirt with evil and become corrupted by it • We cheapen God’s grace and mercy • We will not be truly be motivated to "work out our own salvation"

How do we develop a fear of the Lord?

• By reading all of God’s word – not just our favourite bits or the ‘nice’ bits. • By regularly enjoying God’s creation and reminding ourselves of the one who holds

it together. • By remembering that one day we will all have to give an account of the way we

have lived our lives. • By praying for God to give us an enlarged view of who he is and convict our wrong

thinking. Digging Deeper Question

• Do you fear God? If so how? If not why?

The FRIENDSHIP

The fear of the Lord may be the beginning of wisdom, but the end is love! The commonly used passage in John 15 explains the concept of friendship with God. Jesus said:

You are my friends if you do what I command. I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you. (John 15:14-15)

The fact is when we come into a relationship with God we come as slaves – slaves to sin then through a process, slaves to righteousness. Paul writes,

Though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey… and therefore been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness. (Romans 6:17-18)

Note that the process of transformation from a slave of sin to that of righteousness is through obedience; but our relationship with Jesus is not to stop there – we are supposed to move from slavery to friendship. This is the process of a maturing relationship. But how do you become a friend of God? First you need to become a good slave! Only when we learn how to obey, can we then move into friendship with God. The dynamic of the friendship with God is different from that of other friendships. Jesus is my best friend but he is also my Lord. It’s not like most normal friendships in that we are friends but we are not equals. I guess its like Tim and I – we are friends and love and care for one another, but we are not equals, he is my boss. Sometimes when he wears his vicar hat (not his robes – although he has worn them more recently!) he pulls rank on me and my responsibility in that moment is one of submission. That doesn’t mean we don’t disagree from time to time and wrestle through issues and decisions, but my responsibility is ultimately to yield to Tim and allow him to make decisions as my boss. God is my best friend, but He pulls rank and He is not my equal! All of us need to be willing to submit and to obey - this is part of God’s pruning work in us and enables us to move from slavery to friendship and from immaturity to maturity! In John 15 Jesus continues that unless we obey and are pruned we won’t bear fruit that we are able to produce, and if we let God’s word prune us we can ask whatever we wish and it will be given to us. Why is this? Because once we are pruned we will have the maturity to ask for the right things with the right motives in prayer – but if you aren’t pruned then you won’t have maturity to handle the responsibility! There seems to be a direct correlation with those who have prayers answered and those who allow God to prune them. This pruning does not come directly from God – we need to be accountable to each other as the Lord uses those around us to prune us. If you can’t submit to those you can see, how are you able to submit to God who you can’t see? Jesus himself learned obedience through the things he suffered. Jesus never sinned, but he learned obedience through suffering. Was Jesus ever disobedient? No, because that would have been sin! The goal of life modelled by Jesus is not just to avoid wrongdoing, but surrender, submission and obedience. What is the hallmark of this friendship with God? Revelation is the fruit of friendship. We get to know what the Father knows. A slave only does what he is told, but to be a friend we need to capture the heart of the other person. You don’t get this kind of revelation from hours of study – though I am an advocate of the discipline of study –this kind of revelation

comes from relationship – this kind of revelation inspires transformation; when we see him more clearly we’ll become more like him. Did you know you can’t become what you can’t see! In becoming a friend of God we go from merely being obedient to going beyond what the Father asks. Jesus makes this clear in the Sermon on the Mount – he takes the Ten Commandments and goes much further in his teaching than that which was required because he knows the heart of the one who issued those commandments – because God’s heart is his heart. Jesus said,

“You have heard that it was said to the people long ago, ‘You shall not murder, and anyone who murders will be subject to judgment.’ But I tell you that anyone who is angry with a brother or sister will be subject to judgment. (Matthew 5:21-22)

“You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I tell you that anyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. (Matthew 5:27-28)

This is where we should be aiming for - to capture the heart of God so we go beyond what he is asking - this is the heart of friendship to do something that the other person desires even before they ask. Digging Deeper Questions

• Where am I on my journey of faith? Slave to sin? Slave to righteous? Or friend of God? • Where am I able to go beyond what God has asked?