Godly fear

Over the past two nights I have been blessed enough to catch some chilling warnings on the Vision Radio network in the form of Rescued, an audio drama adapted from a John Bevere novel.

Rescued examines the vivid experience of hell and eternal judgement by a pastor during a near death experience. Without going into detail about the plot, the imagery, sound effects & first person narrative of hell, judgement and the lake of fire is a wake up call.

After hearing the first part last night I remarked to a friend that most Christians don't really believe in hell. What I mean is, we give mental assent to the Scriptural teachings on the afterlife, but because hell isn't a nice thing, we don't let it get very far into our theology.

As others with far more talent in communication than myself have expressed, an accurate realisation of hell magnifies both one's reverence for a Holy God who must execute divine judgement and a desperation to prevent one's self and others from meeting this terrible fate.

While the Word tells us to think upon the lovely things, we must at some point in time give serious thought to this unbearably dreadful destination and maintain an appropriate response in our lives. Indeed, what I'm saying is in order to have that eusebeia godliness and correct attitude towards God, we must also have the right attitude towards sin (ie; hatred) and hell (ie; horror).

If we merely condense it to a distant reality where severe heat is a daily occurence and strange fiends run around with pitchforks, godly fear will disappear out the window. Because a theology that points toward a God unable or unwilling to punish sin, eliminates reverence, cheapens grace and emasculates* efforts in evangelism.

You'll no doubt see many posts on godly fear as an aspect of eusebeia here in the future, because the people of Australia, New Zealand, North America and Europe need frequent reminders of this part of Christianity that has been neglected in recent times.

To conclude with another insight provided by Bevere, the attribute ascribed to God the most strongly in the Scriptures is holiness ("Holy Holy Holy is the Lord God Almighty") and consequently reverence is one of the most important (perhaps the most important) aspect of our relationship with the King of Kings & Lord of Lords. We hear so much about God's love and His love is of great importance indeed, however I am growing in the opinion that God's great love is also a wondrous expression of His Glory (only a truly Magnificant Deity could love us in the manner that the LORD does). So whenever we rejoice in the greatest love the universe could ever know, we must never deprive the love-giver of the glory he deserves.

*I apologise if any readers find this adjective too strong (or perhaps confusing), however I think it comes close to explaining the state of evangelistic efforts minus the consequence of rejection.

Postscript

After writing this post I began surfing our links and found an amazing correlation at Christian Discernment Ministries' Herescope site:

"The Bible teaches that unbelievers will be condemned to an eternity in Hell (Revelation 20:14-15). If we really believed that, we would be spending much more time on our knees in prayer. And we would be pleading with people to make right with God with a sincerity and conviction that would convince many that we actually believed what we were saying."

So if that's not confirmation, I don't know what is...

A life pleasing to God - Christian research network

Here is an article by Mike Ratliff at Christian Research Network, looking at a few issues pertaining to life and the correct way to go about it.

http://mikeratliff.wordpress.com/2007/11/25/a-life-pleasing-to-god/

Thoughts on godliness from a bygone era

Here is an excerpt from Willem Teellinck's book "The Path of True Godliness" provided by Jim Bublitz at Old Truth.
http://www.oldtruth.com/blog.cfm/id.2.pid.810

Since the book title is perfectly compatible with the focus of Eusebeian Way and the topics covered in the Eusebeia blog, it is an irresistable article to link to as something to explore. Also fascinating is the date of writing - 1621. Note the distinctions between Teellinck's point of view and the current-day perspectives we hear concerning godliness, holiness & sanctification.

Also be sure to read Jim's comment beneath the article, there is some good insight there into the author and his life.

We always need to look to the Scriptures for guidance in life, but on questions of godliness it is beneficial to look at the gap between interpretations of certain Scriptures (or perhaps merely the application) from the past and today and ponder what is really driving the change...

Happenings of elsewhere...

I noticed in my travels through the little blogroll-realm we've set-up here with Eusebeian Way, an article by Bill Muehlenberg at his Culture Watch site, covering a topic we recently discussed in our introductory series: http://www.billmuehlenberg.com/2007/10/26/contentment-in-an-age-of-excess/.

In it, Bill quotes the Scripture on godliness and contentment in 1 Timothy 6:6-8, “But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it. But if we have food and clothing, we will be content with that.”

The article concludes with Mr. Muehlenberg suggesting that, "... at a fundamental level, any message or any gospel which keeps us fixated on our material wants can be said to be a false gospel." If you recall, when looking at this Scripture I mused that one could not help but think of the prosperity gospel when thinking of the temporal state of material possessions described in this portion of the Word.

I think that materialism and consumerism are true obstacles to godliness. How can one worship God in the correct way if one knee is already bowed to mammon? In the religions of the world, asceticism or the renouncing of goods and possessions is seen as a great sign of piety. While I do not think that this in itself constitutes godliness buy any means, I would be inclined to think that many times over material greed (covetousness says the commandment) has disqualified the living of a eusebeian life.

I'll probably look at this issue further in a future series titled "Culture contrary to godliness", along with other obstacles that are readily embraced even by whole churches, with dire consequences to personal and corporate godliness.

In any case it is great to see another witness in our loop speaking on this common subject.