Week 8 Deuteronomy 6
Moses explained an important connection between the Lord and the ten commandments: fear the Lord your God as long as you live by keeping all his decrees and commands. So there’s a link between complying with the 10Cs and with fearing the Lord. I checked three different bibles and they all used the word “fear”. Exactly what the Lord-10C linkage is and how it works is something for the back-burner. Right now the single issue about fearing-the-Lord is more important to me.
I used to have a repeater nightmare where I’d wake up petrifyingly afraid. But when Moses talks about fearing-the-Lord I’m pretty sure it’s not nightmare fear. So if that’s not what it is then what is it?
I checked a fourth bible and it said “deep reverence”. It makes pretty good sense to me to classify fear-of-the-Lord in the same family as reverence. Revering someone might be a subspecies of fear… Subtle or finely-pointed fear… Something more like an excited not-quite-trembling nervous uncertain respectful cautious don’t-want-to-mess-up elevated-heartrate expectant awestruck admirative-verging-on-panic psychically-weighted-with-ominosity and just-don’t-say-anything-stupid veneration. Something like that. Which isn’t happiness. But it’s not nightmare fear. It’s a fear that fits the circumstances.
If I meet someone who’s awesomely and spectacularly superior to me then I start naturally behaving like I’m standing with awesome & spectacular superiority. Which seems like a totally suitable and understandable class of afraidness.
Note: quote from Deuteronomy 6:2 (NIV).