“The awe of the Lord is
the fruit of deception.”
It appears that modern
Christians have finally surpassed the angels in spiritual refinement. While the
seraphim in Isaiah 6 foolishly hide their faces beneath their wings, trembling
before the Holy One as though divine holiness were overwhelming, we enlightened
souls know better. We stand upright. We raise our chins. We do not cry out in
terror. We lift our hands gently toward the Light as though greeting a familiar
friend. The living creatures of Revelation 4, poor archaic things who insist on
clinging to their old ways, still fall down day and night, casting crowns as if
the throne of God were something before which creatures should prostrate
themselves. How quaint. Someone should tell them that the approved posture in
this advanced age is not fear but awe. Why didn’t John himself tell the angels?
Perhaps one day those celestial beings will take instruction from our worship services
and cease their unnecessary trembling. Satirical as this is, it cuts because
Scripture does not correct the angels. It corrects us.
Let us speak plainly.
I heard the Moderator of the Presbyterian Church of Victoria declare recently in a sermon on 2Cor5 that “fear does not mean being terrified of God. Judgment simply reminds us to have a worshipful awe of our holy God.”
Now, no-one could accuse the Moderator of lacking
pastoral warmth, but this is not
pastoral gentleness. It is doctrinal collapse. It does not clarify Scripture.
It displaces Scripture. It trades the biblical category of fear of the Lord for
the human-centred psychology of awe. And once this exchange is made, every
major Christian doctrine is distorted: the nature of God, the condition of man,
the necessity of a Mediator, the meaning of judgment, the ground of
justification, the role of revelation, and the character of worship. Awe is not
a biblical posture. Awe is the vocabulary of a church that no longer knows the
God who speaks from the mountain of fire.
What follows is a very
brief account of some of the damage “awe” does in the pulpit.
1. The doctrine of God
is distorted at the foundation
Fear in Scripture is not an emotional tremor but a theological confession. It is the creature’s acknowledgement of the Creator’s holiness, justice, sovereignty, and judgment. It is the knowledge that God is not safe for sinners. It is the truth that His presence is morally searching and His voice morally binding. Awe, by contrast, is an aesthetic response to greatness. Mountains inspire awe. Oceans inspire awe. God does not inspire awe. God is holy, and holiness is not a category of beauty but a category of being. Holiness unmakes the self, it does not leave a person intact, rather it reveals what a person truly is before God. Read for example, Isa 6; Ezek 1; Dan 10; Luke5; Rev 1.
On the other hand, awe admires. Now, I do not intend to give an extensive list of examples of awe in Scripture. There are many examples but Mark 6:20—Herod’s reaction to John the Baptist, and Acts 24:25—Felix trembling before Paul will suffice. The difference between fear and awe in Scripture may be summed up as:
Awe is what sinners feel before they return to their sin.
Fear is what sinners feel before they flee to Christ.
Fear bows. Awe speaks of impressiveness. Fear speaks of reality. To tell a congregation they no longer need to fear the Lord but only to hold Him in awe is effectively to say they no longer need to flee to Him for mercy. It is to deny the holiness that unmakes the sinner and the sin that demands a Mediator. To replace fear with awe is to replace the God of Scripture with a magnified creature, a God to be admired rather than obeyed, observed rather than worshipped.
2. The doctrine of sin is denied, and Pelagianism rises in its place
Fear presupposes fallen man. It presupposes a heart that is hostile to God, a will that resists God, a conscience that hides from God. Holiness exposes. Sin recoils. Awe presupposes something else entirely. Awe imagines a spiritually open observer who simply needs to be elevated by divine grandeur. Awe does not reckon with guilt, corruption, blindness, or rebellion. Awe imagines that the sinner needs inspiration rather than mercy. This is not biblical anthropology. It is Pelagian optimism. Pelagius taught that the human will is naturally capable of choosing God when sufficiently enlightened. Awe fits comfortably in that system. It turns the fallen sinner into a morally neutral admirer who merely needs to be impressed with God’s greatness. Fear tells the truth: the sinner needs atonement, not uplift. The sinner needs a Mediator, not mood.
And here’s the rub: the closer one draws near to the Lord, the more conscious we become of our sin. Sanctification can only take place where true apprehension of sin causes us to fall down upon our knees in fear, not theatrical fear, but with the horror of a conscience awakened by holiness. Not to do so, but to hold God in awe at the prospect of Judgement Day, is presumption that flatters the sinner into thinking he can stand where prophets fell and call it worship.
3. The necessity of the Mediator evaporates
Wherever Scripture reveals divine holiness, mediation is instantly required. Israel pleads for Moses. Isaiah cries out for cleansing. Ezekiel collapses. John falls as one dead. Holiness reveals the moral gulf that sin has created. Fear drives the sinner to seek rescue outside himself. Awe cannot perform this work. Awe turns Christ into an example rather than a Redeemer. Awe regards the cross as a demonstration of divine beauty rather than the place where wrath is satisfied. A God who evokes only awe does not require a Mediator.
It is not enough to exclaim that Christ has borne my sin. True as this is, every person in Scripture who falls in fear before God is one whom He has redeemed. And still they fear, because remaining sin is real, and divine holiness exposes what grace has not yet perfected. To lose fear is to lose the gospel’s centre. A gospel without fear is a gospel without blood.
4. Forensic righteousness is replaced with experiential righteousness
Justification by faith proclaims that the sinner stands before God on the basis of Christ’s righteousness, not his own. But if fear is removed and awe becomes the central posture, the focus shifts from Christ’s obedience to the believer’s interior state. The worshipper becomes acceptable insofar as he feels uplifted or reverent. This is not righteousness received. It is righteousness performed. Awe becomes a virtue. Reverence becomes currency. Emotion becomes standing. This is not Protestantism. It is a reversion to self-justification. When awe becomes central, the worshipper’s sensibility replaces Christ’s sufficiency.
In Reformed terms, this flattens justification and sanctification into a single spiritual state and assumes the believer already possesses what belongs only to the age to come.
5. Revelation is displaced by subjective impression
Fear is always a response to revelation. God speaks. God commands. God judges. God summons. Awe does not require speech. Awe can be manufactured by ambience, chords, dimmed lights, silence, or atmosphere. Awe appeals to sensation rather than truth. Once awe is enthroned, preaching drifts from proclamation to encouragement. Worship drifts from response to God’s Word to response to internal feeling. Revelation ceases to be the engine of worship. Human experience takes its place. This is not biblical faith. It is spiritualised impressionism.
In Scripture, revelation also includes judgment. The prospect of judgment terrifies because it is the ultimate and full unveiling of God’s holiness. The purpose of judgment is rescue, not ambience. Awe cannot interpret judgment because awe is not a moral category. Awe makes judgment impressive rather than consequential. A sinner who feels awe at judgment does not flee to Christ. He stands composed beneath the very decree that condemns him. A judgment that inspires awe is a judgment that cannot save. As hard as I try, I cannot imagine standing in awe when the stars begin to fall, when I hear howls and the gnashing of teeth, the elements are burning up the very ground I will be standing upon, and the sky is rolled away.
6. The Creator-creature distinction is flattened
Fear preserves the gulf between God and creation. It acknowledges that God is not merely greater than creation but other than creation. Awe places God at the top of the scale of the impressive, as though He were a more splendid version of the things He has made. Fear destroys that scale. Awe collapses it. When awe replaces fear, God becomes another object of human admiration. He is no longer the One before whom heaven falls silent and earth trembles.
7. Worship is reshaped into admiration rather than allegiance
Fear bends the will. Awe warms the heart. Fear produces obedience. Awe produces observers. Scripture does not call for spectators. It calls for disciples. The biblical God does not seek admirers. He seeks worshippers who fall before Him and rise in obedience. Awe can fill a sanctuary with uplifted voices. Fear alone can fill it with repentance, faith, and covenant loyalty.
Conclusion
Awe is not merely inadequate. Awe is incompatible with biblical faith. It is rooted in a false view of God and a false view of man. It imagines holiness as inspiring rather than terrifying, sin as weakness rather than guilt, judgment as dramatic rather than decisive, Christ as exemplar rather than Mediator, righteousness as inward posture rather than divine gift, revelation as ambience rather than speech, worship as emotion rather than submission.
Angels veil their faces.
Prophets fall as though dead.
Apostles tremble.
The nations shake.
The Judge stands at the door.
Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom, and it is the only posture that tells the truth about God and the truth about us, the sinner. Awe is a word for mountains. Fear is a word for God. And only those who fear Him flee to the One who can save them.
