Albert N. Martin
The fear of God is one of the great and dominant themes of Holy Scripture. However, it is a subject concerning which there is almost total silence in our day. It is a theme that was very prominent both in the thinking and in the preaching of our forefathers. It is interesting that, when our spiritual forefathers desired to describe someone who was marked by unusual godliness, they would often call him a “God-fearing man.”
The fear of God is the soul of godliness. Take away the soul from the body and all you have left, in a few days, is a stinking carcass. Take away the fear of God from any expression of godliness and all you have left is the stinking carcass of Pharisaism and barren religiosity.
One does not need a great measure of learning to be able to reach the conclusion that the fear of God is a predominant theme in the Bible. In fact, armed with a relatively good concordance and about an hour’s time, you could pretty well lay out the study that I am here presenting. If you took your concordance and looked up the word “fear,” you would notice that there are no fewer than 150 to 175 distinct, explicit references to the fear of God. If you add to these explicit references all of the instances in Scripture where the fear of God is illustrated, though not explicitly stated, it is accurate to say that the references to the fear of God will run well into the hundreds. Isn’t it amazing, then, that a theme so dominant in the Old and the New Testaments can be either so completely overlooked, or so shallowly and carelessly handled as it is in our day? I trust after we grasp something of the predominance of this theme, that we will not be content with a mere cursory knowledge or acquaintance with this theme of the fear of God.
The Fear of God in the Old Testament and the New Testament
…In the light of these pivotal texts in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, I believe we are warranted to conclude that to be devoid of the fear of God is to be devoid of biblical religion.
For other conclusions from the biblical evidence see: Conclusions from the Biblical Evidence
All rights reserved. This is an extract from messages on The Fear of God by Albert N. Martin.
The Forgotten Fear: Where Have All the God Fearers Gone?
Albert N. Martin
Expected release date is October 14, 2015
The fear of God is an important theme in the Bible, yet many Christians today overlook it or treat it carelessly. Fearing God is the soul of godliness, and those who claim to love God should desire to understand what it means to fear Him. The Forgotten Fear revisits this important topic.
We recommend this book. It will soon be available at Trinity Book Service: