The Fear of the Lord

‘“* The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” Psatm cxi. 10.

Tue fear of the Lord is the beginning, but it is not a beginning which we can ever leave behind as a stake can be discarded by a sapling when it has grown stronger and more matured. This reverence is not a beginning in the sense of being a rudiment. It is a beginning which is carried forward through all succeeding stages, and even into ultimate issues. It is like the alphabet which, while forming the beginnings of literature, yet enters vitally into the loftiest creations of a Shakespeare or a Milton. Without the alphabet there can be no literature; without reverence there can be no religion.

It is in reverence that we must begin our quest of divine wisdom. We do not begin in faith, or in hope, or in love, but in vital and creative reverence, even in the fear of God which is the foundation of life. When the veil is lifted in Isaiah’s vision, the seraphim who stand before us are revealed in very significant endowment. Each of them has six wings: ‘“‘ with twain he covered his face, and with twain he covered his feet, and with twain he did fly.” Four wings for reverence and two for practical service. We need have no uncertainty about our power of motion if we have the requisite mood. Perhaps the reason why our two wings are so often ineffective may be found in the absence of the four. We are feverishly ready for flight, but we are not so ready to bow before the Lord and veil the face in reverent homage and communion. And may not it be that the two wings so frequently and so easily tire because they have not the restful support of the four wings, hiding the soul in the secret fellowship of God? We so often fail in service because we have forgotten or ignored the creative beginnings of things, which is the fear of God.

It is the mood of reverence which gives the soul its initial posture for discovering the things of God. In the quest of divine secrets it is infinitely more necessary to have the reverent spirit than to have a learned mind. There is all the difference in the world between mere cleverness and spiritual discernment. One is just worldly sharpness; the other is heavenly vision. “I thank Thee that Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent and hast revealed them unto babes.”’

In matters of spiritual understanding the first requisite is a certain kind of mood rather than a certain quality of intellect. We enter the secret place not by logic but by disposition. Reverence has its own senses, its own discernment: it has intuitions which give the most assured experiences. I am therefore not surprised to read the sequence of the Psalmist’s word, and to find that “a good understanding”’ follows in the wake of ‘“‘ the fear of God.” The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him, and He will show them His covenant.