Men Must Tremble
Allen Hood's title for our class on Daniel 6 was “Men Must Tremble”. This personally is something that God has really been emphasizing for me in the last couple weeks, so it carried a great deal of relevance. I never really thought (or at least it hasn't dawned on me recently) that fear is a form of worship. Our fear of something is a statement of our heart that recognize the power of what we fear. We fear the shark because it can tear our flesh. A child fears the bully in the schoolyard because they can speak words that humiliate. One cannot fear something which is perceived to be powerless to do harm. We were meant to worship the Almighty, to tremble before his holiness to recognize the vastness of his power. All will tremble before him, either in voluntary awe and reverence, or in shear terror at the sudden comprehension of his holiness. Yet when we tremble before men, we recognize the power of another over and above God. In that moment we perceive the power of man, and not the power of God over all men. The problem is one of both perception and will. We choose not to see him as high as he is in order to preserve the self that we cling to, but in preserving that self we open ourselves up to fearing any greater than self. If we saw God for who he is, necessarily we could no longer chose to exalt ourselves over him. If we do not see the one who is so clearly high and exalted, then we cannot help to see the power that others greater than ourselves wield over us. When we rightly see the transcendent power of the Holy God we can understand that nothing holds any power over us except the mighty hand of our Father.
Removing our fear of man is something that can only be done then, by getting the fear of the Lord. That is not something really done easily, it is not easy to change the secret thoughts of the heart toward God. It is something that God must work in us, but there is a position we must put our hearts in to receive his work. We must meditate on his word, put ourselves on Mt. Sinai. We must feast our eyes not on the violent trash filling the screens of the theater, but rather set our eyes on the magnificent vastness of the heavens he created. We must ask for boldness before men, and actually act as one who is bold. The more we see how unfounded most of our fears are they will diminish. Every time we choose to fear man, we miss an opportunity for God to show himself safe.