Articles
Losing Our Sense of Awe
One of the things we struggle with is our sense of awe. We scarcely stand in awe of anything today. When we think about God and our relationship with Him, we ought to be impressed and feel a sense of awe. This is the God who spoke the universe into existence. This is the God whose name is above every name in Heaven and on earth. This is the God who causes Satan and his demons to tremble because they know who He is.
Let’s take a look at the men who stood in awe when they were in the presence of God. In Exodus 20:18-20, Moses was receiving the commandments from God while the people were standing there. The entire mountain was quaking, and smoke was billowing from the top of the mountain. The voice of God was speaking--it was as thunder in their ears. The people are terrified for their life and they say to Moses, “You tell us what He said. You tell us what we need to know. Don’t let God speak to us. We are going to die.” Moses said, “That is what God wants you to feel. He wants you to have that fear so that you will not sin.” They couldn’t help but stand in awe and feared for their lives.
When Isaiah is called by God, he saw that the Lord was sitting on a throne (Isa. 6:1). So awesome is the presence of God in all His glory and His righteousness that Isaiah was immediately overwhelmed with a sense of unworthiness. As he stood in the presence of the righteousness of God, he was consumed with his own unrighteousness.
John paints a picture in his Revelation of Jesus Christ. It is a picture that is awesome! John said, “When I saw Him I fell at His feet like I was dead man” (Rev 1:17).
How is it possible that we have difficulty reminding ourselves to bow our heads in the presence of God and worship Him? It shouldn’t be hard to humble our hearts in His presence.
If we understand a thing to be sin, are we going to tell God to get over it? What is our concept of God? Do we think that we can hide from Him, fool Him, or think it just doesn’t matter? Two thousand and twenty-three years ago, the blood of Christ declared that sin matters. Every sin matters. We would do well to open our eyes and tremble in His presence. When we start to think sin isn’t really all that bad, we have lost sight of our wonder and amazement for God.
We have lost our sense of awe for God when we respond to His revelation as if it were a suggestion or doesn’t matter. The person who can respond to the inspired word of God and say that it’s not important and that God doesn’t care if we do it or not--that person doesn’t understand who God is. Truth matters because of Him from whom it came. Anyone who is disrespectful of truth is disrespectful of God.
What if when we assembled next, God caused the ground to open up, thunder and lightning flashed, and the voice of a trumpet would sound. God would bring us to our knees in wonder and reverence in His presence. Would that solve the problem of our indifference toward worship, sin and His revelation? Would it make an impression in our hearts we would never forget? We might think so, but it didn’t for Israel. They still drifted away from God. It is the heart that must be changed.
Rickie Jenkins
