"So the church throughout all Judea and Galilee and Samaria enjoyed peace, being built up; and going on in the fear of the Lord and in the comfort of the Holy Spirit, it continued to increase." Acts 9.31 really makes me wish I had my journal from the trip so I could see what hit me when I first read it. But right now its on my professor's desk being graded, so we're going to work off of what hits me now.
The first thing we see is that the church enjoyed peace. I've written on peace before, you can read about in the Fruit of the Spirit section I've done. I think this is something missing from a lot of churches today. My mentor's cousin (I believe) was a pastor, and he had a heart attack and died during a board meeting. Another pastor friend's doctor told him to take a month off due to his high stress levels. When I was a youth pastor in Michigan I would wake up with chest pains. This isn't the picture I get from Acts 9.31.
It says that the Church was being built up. Again, I've seen a lot of this not happening too. Many churches aren't growing. Some are sitting stagnant, and some are declining (really both of these situations are on the decline). But I don't think this is simply talking about physical growth, but the building up of people. After all that's why the church exists. But today we have gossip that tears people down and cliches which cut people out, in the church. We have people who are angry and bitter over changes that happen, and they don't fail to make their voices heard even if it's silently. How does any of this defeat the gates of Hell?
The reason for the above attitudes and situations is because there is no fear of the Lord in today church. This verse in Acts 9 leads me to believe that it was a central part of the first church, so why have we lost this? I think part of it is that we've watered it down considerable. How many of us have heard a sermon where the pastor is reading a verse that contains the words "fear of God" and when he gets there pauses and says, "Now let me clarify, when I read this I don't mean fear, it's more of an awe, or a respect." Every hand is raised. Recently on a bus in Jordan I had this conversation. An college student hit me with the fear as respect thing, and my response is, "Read Exodus 19 and 20 and tell me that those people's reaction was respect. Read Isaiah 6 and tell me Isaiah's reaction is awe."
They are terrified, so terrified that they don't even want to talk with God, they beg Moses to be their intercessor. The fear of the Lord is legitimate fear. I think that's the only reaction that we can have when we come face to face with that power and holiness. In that moment we will see just how weak and unworthy we are. We're told in Psalm 111.10 that "The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." In Isaiah 44.6-7 God tells us about Himself, "Thus says the Lord, the King of Israel and his Redeemer, the Lord of hosts: ‘I am the first and I am the last, and there is no God besides Me. ‘Who is like Me? Let him proclaim and declare it; yes, let him recount it to Me in order, from the time that I established the ancient nation. And let them declare to them the things that are coming and the events that are going to take place." It's only when we fear Him that we can begin to understand who God is and what God's will is. And it was this attitude that the first church lived with.
But they lived with more than the fear of the Lord, they also had the comfort of the Holy Spirit. Isaiah 44.8 begins, "Do not tremble and do not be afraid;". The Spirit helps us to see that God loves us, that God desires a relationship with us. It is through the power of the Holy Spirit that we are empowered to live life in a manner pleasing and acceptable to God. But since the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, we can only begin to know the comfort of the Holy Spirit when we first know the fear of the Lord.
(Bits of the last three paragraphs come from Francis Chan's dvd "Fear God" from the Basic series).
Peace comes form the comfort of the Spirit that is possible only when we have the fear of the Lord. And when that happens the Church will increase because those who make it are built up. When we fear the Lord we won't tear down His Church, we won't gossip about others in the body, and we won't exclude those who aren't like us. The fear of the Lord fills us with humility and the comfort of the Spirit enables us to love as He loves. It is in love that the Church is built up, and when the Church is built up, the gates of Hell cannot withstand the assault.
If we want to be God's Church, we must understand and realize the fear of the Lord. I think this may be the thing that is missing most from the Church today. And once we have that, God will be able to show us more of who He is through His Holy Spirit.
"I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread."
To God alone be the Glory!
Peace be with you
No comments:
Post a Comment