Is New Testament Worship about Fear, or Love?
Dec 6th, 2007 by Nathan White
“Though God commanded love in the Old Testament, yet the manner of giving the law bespoke more of fear than love -instead of the terrible voice of the law: ‘Do this and live’, the comfortable voice of the gospel is: ‘Grace, grace’. Upon this account, the principle of the Old Testament was fear, and the worship often expressed by the fear of God; the principle of the New Testament is love. “The mount Sinai gendereth to bondage“, Gal 4:14; mount Zion, from whence the gospel or evangelical law goes forth, gendereth to liberty –and therefore the worship of God, under the gospel or New Testament, is oftener expressed by love than fear, as proceeding from higher principles, and acting nobler passions.” – The Puritan Stephen Charnock.
It is certainly a given that New Testament worship is categorically different than Old Testament worship, at least in form. But in our understanding that New Testament worship is communicated in love (see the above quote), have we swung the pendulum too far in neglecting fear altogether? For example, the Pharisees were certainly over-zealous to harmful extents with their attempted practice of fearful worship, to the point of actually nullifying true worship in the process. Contrast this with the New Testament, where I believe that we have been so convinced that God has ‘eased up’, that we now take a casual attitude into worship, to the damage of our own souls.
We can find comfort in Jesus’ words that true worshipers worship in ‘Spirit and in truth’, but we must also recognize that New Testament instruction also commands ‘acceptable’ worship, with reverence and awe, as our God is a consuming fire.
Thus, we must have a proper balance, if we are to offer acceptable worship, and if it be in accords with ’spirit and truth’. True worship is taking our eyes completely off our ourselves. True worship is magnifying Christ with our minds, affections, attention, and actions. Any relaxation of these things is likely to lead to idolatrous worship: insincere or formal worship, or worship that is outside the prescribed bounds of scripture and in more accord with our own preferences.
The doctrine of worship is clearly communicated and taught to the Church via the Old Testament. The New Testament, in my opinion, certainly provides further illumination and clarification, but the foundational essence and principle is clearly laid in the Old Testament. Why have we so neglected the Old and over-emphasized the New? This is certainly most prevalent; although there are some who over-emphasize the New as opposed to the Old, as well as some who just don’t care one way or another, as worship is simply entertainment or a method to fulfill emotional needs.
Worship in most churches now days should sadden us, and even frighten us. I’m not trying to judge and point fingers by saying this, but instead I’m trying to emphasize that this points to a much deeper issue. People have forgotten or neglected to understand just who God is, in His attributes, in His glory, and in His word –both Old and New Testaments. The result of this is the entertainment, showmanship, ‘all about me’ songs, idolatry, insincerity, irreverence, and simply put, just plain self-worship instead of Him-worship.
Christianity is all about God and what He has done, is doing, and will do. Pharisee-ism is all about us and what we do, what we need, what we like, and what we plan to do. The format may have changed from Old to New (Pharisees then were rigid and legalistic, as opposed to now, where most ‘Pharisees’ are the opposite), but the self-seeking, self-instructing, and self-glorifying remains unchanged. Let us realize, from beginning to end, that Christianity is all about God, and not about us, and let that invoke a response back to Him with much reverence, awe, love, appreciate, affection, and yes, subjection to His prescribed methods of worship. Let us look to both Testaments, taking the fear and reverence of the Old, with the love and freedom in the New, and let us “offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.”
“Men cannot invent a surer and speedier way to their own ruin than to bring their own inventions into God’s worship.” – John Flavel
[...] This is a good topic at Shepherd the Flock written by Nathan White: Is New Testament Worship about Fear, or Love?- He nicely brings out the balance which is sorely needed today. I often wonder why we, as [...]
I think this is a really compelling question, and unfortunately I think most Western Christians have absolutely zero concept about what it means to fear the Lord. When God is incinerating the top of a mountain, his people cry out for him to stop speaking, because they can’t bear it. A lot of Christians I know I think would most likely be thankful that they no longer have a God like that, and that idea works itself out in the way they live and worship.
My problem now is being among a group of people where this is not largely felt or treasured, and learning how to live in love toward them, and move them toward what Solomon calls ‘the beginning of wisdom’. I also think, based on my theology, that I might be more in support of the idea of fearing than the Lord, than actually fearing him, because I so slightly understand it myself.
I do think in a lot of circles there is not a lot of reverence and fear of the Lord in our worship… But in a lot of Calvinistic circles there tends to be a movement to go to far the other way. A lot of Calvinistic circles put more emphasis on fear and forget the love… This can be seen in some preaching as well. Some sermons I have heard could have been preached in Old Testament times! There definitely needs to be fear and reverence in our worship. I want to end in saying that we must delight in the Lord in our worship as he delights in us! Which is with a lot of love, joy, passion… etc.
Matt said: But in a lot of Calvinistic circles there tends to be a movement to go to far the other way. A lot of Calvinistic circles put more emphasis on fear and forget the love…
I would probably be inclined to agree with you, but add that they do this for a good reason. Calvinism gets our eyes off of ourselves and our needs, and it tends to cause sound views of God and man to form in our lives. It brings to the table the reality that religion is not about us, but about God, and He is the focus of our worship. Where I would agree with you, however, is that sometimes Calvinist churches are bent on ‘protecting’ this view of fear against those who over-emphasis love.
And, at the same time, I think it’s impossible to truly love God without fearing him. To paraphrase Amy Carmichael to the point of complete distortion:
You can fear without loving,
but you cannot love without fearing.
The default position of humanity should be fearing. Those who know him and have been adopted by him only can love him, but their love may not leave fear behind. I do think Jerry Bridges’ distinction between servile and filial fear is important to grasp as well. We don’t fear God because horror awaits those who have offended holiness. We fear him as children. And only good children fear.
Well said Tim,
Jesus gave us the commandment to love the Lord our God with all our hearts, souls, minds, and strength. He didn’t say Fear me and Bow…. BUT if we do love him and truly know him we joyfully bow and are naturally inclined to fear God because of our love for him! Reformed theology has obviously shaped the church in many powerful ways, which is another reason why I hold to it dearly… But my fear is that we try fight the ‘American Church’ on what it does wrong and we end up going to far and missing the point. Too many times we make movements, denominations, and trends our enemy when we know that the battle is not against the flesh and blood!
Live the Word
Matt
Nathan,
By the way…You have won over another faithful blogger. I have read through your blog and I really enjoyed it! I am excited about your future posts and interaction…
Live the Word
Matt
Matt, glad to have you reading!
Matt, Tim,
Thinking about this issue more, I believe there is a slight misconception in our thinking when we consider how ‘mean’ God was in the OT (fear) and how ‘nice’ Jesus is in the NT (love). I believe, of course, that God’s nature did not change, but that He simply revealed Himself in different ways at different times. Thus, adding the two together gives us the full picture. However, the disconnect in the NT comes when we look at Jesus’ humanity alone. Jesus was clearly meek and lowly before His reurrection (in His humanity), but what of the picture John gives us in Revelation?? John, who was used to being around Jesus, fell as though dead when He appeared in His glory, and the picture that John gives us of that event is anything but meek and lowly.
So we must understand that Jesus was meek and lowly in His humanity, but that He is now ruling and reigning, and the OT picture of God has been restored to Him.
That ought to cause some fear, like it did with John, but of course we can balance that with the fact that He is our high priest, He intercedes with us, and He is aquainted with our weaknesses.