Love toward God (which we have discussed), engenders the fear of God—which we shall now consider. Love and fear are conjoined in Deut 10:12: “And now, Israel, what doth the Lord thy God require of thee, but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him.”
The Word Fear Defined
Fear is either expressive of reverence or terror. Fear as terror is generally expressed by the Hebrew words מגור (magor), and פחד (pachadh), and by the Greek word φόβος (phobos). Fear as being reverence is denominated in Hebrew as יראה (yirah), and in Greek as εὐαβεία (eulabeia). However, these words are occasionally also used without this distinction.1
Fear issues forth from love—either for ourselves or for God. Self-love engenders fear when something occurs which could deprive us of something good or whereby some evil could befall us. We fear deprivation, or the evil itself, and whatever or whoever would deprive us of that which is good or whereby evil could be inflicted upon us. God has created self-love in man and wills that we make use of it. The law requires that we love our neighbor as ourselves (Matt 22:39). It is therefore not sinful to fear deprivation and evil. This fear was inherent in Adam’s nature prior to the fall, even though there was no occasion for this fear to arise in him. The Lord Jesus also had such fear (cf. Matt 26:37; Heb 5:7). One may indeed be fearful of death and other discomforts, and thus also of wild animals and evil men. This fear becomes evil, however, if it begets the use of evil means—either to preserve or acquire that which is good, or to avoid evil. This is true if we fear man more than God and, in neglecting both the fear of God and obedience toward His commandments, we seek to get man on our side in sinful ways. We then give no heed as to whether we displease God; as long as we can please men in order that they will do us no evil, but good. “And fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell” (Matt 10:28).
Since we must have love for ourselves, and fear issues forth therefrom, we must have more fear for evil which relates to the soul than to the body. Since, the soul’s well or woe is dependent upon God, we must be fearful out of love for our own salvation, and must fear God’s wrath and judgments. “My flesh trembleth for fear of Thee; and I am afraid of Thy judgments” (Ps 119:120). An unconverted person must also, by fear for the eternal wrath of God, be persuaded to believe (2 Cor 5:11). A converted person must, for fear of spiritual harm, stir himself up to be earnest. “Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into His rest, any of you should seem to come short of it” (Heb 4:1).
Two Kinds of Fear: Slavish and Filial Fear
Relative to this fear, a distinction is made between slavish and filial fear. Slavish fear causes a slave to do the will of his master for fear of being struck. Such slavish fear of God is better than a stubborn and insensitive despising of God and His judgments. It is useful if someone is brought to repentance by this (cf. Matt 3:7; Amos 4:12). Someone who is presently converted need not be concerned whether or not his conversion is genuine, because he was driven to Christ out of fear for damnation rather than love to God, for we have shown that we must cherish our well-being and fear that which is evil for us—this compelling us to repentance. Slavish fear is evil, however, if it is nothing more than terror causing us to flee from God. We repeat: Man, out of love for his salvation and out of fear for his damnation, must fear God and thereby be compelled to repentance and obedience. Self-love is, however, not the basis for filial fear. To be fearful of provoking God to anger because He has power to punish; to be obedient so that He would not withdraw His favor from us, but manifest more of it to us—this is not the nature of filial fear, even though the matter itself is good and characteristic of God’s people. The motivation for the filial fear of God is not self-love, but love to God because He is God and with view to His majesty—even if this were to result neither in good nor evil on our behalf.