FEAR AND WORSHIP
BY: Rev. Arnel Tan
“Great fear gripped the entire church and all others who heard what had happened.” Acts 5:11 NLT
There’s a big difference between intimacy and familiarity. Unknowingly we have treated these two things as if they were the same. As the news spread about God’s judgment on Ananias and Saphira fear gripped the entire church. It is when the fear of the Lord is restored in the lives of his children and in life of the church that worship is authentic again. The term “praise and worship” is a familiar among the circles of evangelicals while fear and worship is the foundation of it. As the church enjoyed a remarkable growth and a wonderful prayer life the temptation to be just familiar with God instead of being close to Him is the nearest trap.
If worship is an expression of our deep and holy admiration of God, the love of money is the enemy of true worship. It is here under the cloak of good intention that Anaias and Saphira fell flat and died! When fear of God and trembling is no longer a part of our communion with God we are settling for something less in fact something bogus. Holy fear is a result of being reminded that God has not abandoned His being Holy to give way to grace. God’s grace is a vehicle in which we enjoy and tremble at the holiness of God. When was the last time you and I felt that holy fear in our hearts and in the context of our congregational life?
Usually the fear of the Lord is a result of God’s intervention in the midst of the assumption of the majority that all is well. Surely it will be a shock when God steps in and expose our shallowness and pretensions. Here the church learns to tremble again and listens to the Lord again. Brokenness once more leads to spiritual sensitivity and a fresh opportunity to corporately cultivate a heart that discerns the will of God from willfulness of man. It took death and destruction of the pretenders for the church to be awakened. It is also hear that we see fear leads to worship, considering that occurrences like this is in a minimal rather than a weekly norm!
Indeed it is by the mercy of the Lord that we are not consumed. It is also an act of grace that the Lord allows restoration of trembling in the assembly that we can see God as Holy! Sermons, songs and other methods are used by God to edify His people but nothing is so successful in leading us to tremble than God’s judgment. Here we see God interested with personal purity and also with congregational purity. When there is no holy fear of God most likely there is no authentic worship of God
