What does “fearing God” mean?

[an anarchist]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

 

[JoshuaTree]

Reverence.

 

[Nimos]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

From my understand of reading the bible, the word "fear" seem to have multiple meanings depending on context, but most commonly and assume that is what you refer to, it seem to simply refer to being "aware of" or "keep in mind" and not so much the normal understanding of being afraid of something. But you would probably need to reference an actual passage to see what is meant.

 

[CBM]

Fear of tarnishing the love for God/ relationship with God by doing things that distance one from God.
In Hebrew it’s “Yirah M’Ahava”.

Fear inspired by, and which only exists because of, a deep love.

 

[Jeremiah Ames]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

for me, fear is the terrifying feeling that I may disobey God

not the fear of punishment, but the fear of losing God’s guidance

 

[Deeje]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

I believe that it is the same kind of fear we had for our fleshly father when we were young. (provided we grew up in a typical family back then) We knew he loved us but when he got mad at us for something we did wrong, it made us fearful because the last thing you want to do is make your Dad mad at you. But because he loves you he will administer just punishment to teach you that your actions have consequences.
Justice never leaves scars....only injustice does.

Our fear is therefore not dread....but a wholesome fear of displeasing someone you love and respect.
That is how it is for me at least.

 

[Brickjectivity]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

Its a situation in which the concordance is mostly useless. The definition derived is usually circular, coming from assumptions about what it means. We interpolate it to mean either mortal fear or reverence, but this is not a useful explanation by itself. What we're asking is what is reverence, but what the concordance tells us stupidly is that it means reverence. Reverence means reverence?

"But what is reverence?"

"Its reverential treatment and stuff."

Concordances are gateways to madness. They are interesting though, and they do offer insights to we who cannot read the language. They just aren't all that great. They use interpolation sometimes to determine what words mean, but we can usually do that ourselves. They do what we do then put an official stamp on it, and its slightly dishonest. They should say "We interpolate it to mean thus" and instead they don't say so. We have to figure that out, because they don't say it.

*******************
FEAR

In Genesis 42:18 Joseph lies to his brothers, and to prove what he's saying is true he says "For I fear God." He does. That much is true. He does fear the same God, yet he's lying to them. Its confusing.
*********************
REVERENCE

I can interpret a reverent definition by reading Exodus 18:21: "...provide out of all the people able men, such as fear God, men of truth, hating covetousness..." which provides a little bit of a definition of what reverence must entail. Its possible to therefore do a better job than the concordance by proceeding to look up all uses of reverence and fear and to accumulate what traits go with it. Its not a 'Definition' though.
**************

 

[Trailblazer]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

I believe that God is love but also has wrath, so God is to be feared. I believe that because God's mercy exceeds His wrath. Otherwise, humanity would have been wiped off the face of the Earth by now.

I believe that fear of God is humanity's greatest protection.

“The first word which the Abhá Pen hath revealed and inscribed on the first leaf of Paradise is this: “Verily I say: The fear of God hath ever been a sure defence and a safe stronghold for all the peoples of the world. It is the chief cause of the protection of mankind, and the supreme instrument for its preservation. Indeed, there existeth in man a faculty which deterreth him from, and guardeth him against, whatever is unworthy and unseemly, and which is known as his sense of shame. This, however, is confined to but a few; all have not possessed, and do not possess, it.”
Epistle to the Son of the Wolf, p. 27

Fear of God also has a secondary purpose.

“Cleanse from your hearts the love of worldly things, from your tongues every remembrance except His remembrance, from your entire being whatsoever may deter you from beholding His face, or may tempt you to follow the promptings of your evil and corrupt inclinations. Let God be your fear, O people, and be ye of them that tread the path of righteousness.”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 275

 

[Epic Beard Man]

Pretty much all of you are right. For me, it's this:

Fear of tarnishing the love for God/ relationship with God by doing things that distance one from God.
In Hebrew it’s “Yirah M’Ahava”.

Fear inspired by, and which only exists because of, a deep love.

 

[Sirona]

Maybe it's a variation of "(too much) familiarity breeds contempt", so that you have to fear God to keep respect of him.

 

[DNB]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

To fear God means to acknowledge and respect His Majesty, Holiness, Justice and Wrath.
Be humble before Him, and appreciate where you stand before Him.

 

[steveb1]

I would say that this has been the most common question I’ve received while discussing God with people in my day to day life. Often times, they are struggling to reconcile the idea that you are supposed to love God, while being in fear of Him simultaneously.
What fearing God is for me is this: it is having absolute faith that He exists, and that He is just. I believe that karma physically exists, so for any negative thought or deed that I do, I will reap negative karma for it. Because I believe God is true, I believe it is sure to happen. Because I believe He is just, my negative thoughts and deeds will surely affect me negatively.

To fear God, to me, means to reverence God; to fear loss of God's grace; to trust in God's justice as well as God's mercy; to respect God's "Otherness" and realize that his thoughts are not our thoughts, his ways are not our ways.

 

[Trailblazer]

To fear God, to me, means to reverence God; to fear loss of God's grace; to trust in God's justice as well as God's mercy; to respect God's "Otherness" and realize that his thoughts are not our thoughts, his ways are not our ways.

I fully agree but I am curious about something. All the Buddhists on this forum tell me that Buddhists don't believe that the Buddha taught that there is a God, so they do not believe in God. I believe that Buddha taught that there is one true God but the Buddhists here are all over me for saying that and they say I am "projecting" my religion onto Buddhism. I don't think that is true, I think that Buddhists believe many different things because Buddhism is divided and has many different sects.

 

[Peter Stanley]

Well if you read how it is written - he lived his life in fear of the lord - doesn't mean he was actually living in fear - it was said about the people who lived to the law of God - its more of a description of someone living a religious life and following the law. "Look he is living in fear of the Lord. "