In public worship our habit is to slouch or squat; we do not kneel nowadays,
let alone prostrate ourselves in humility before God. It is more
characteristic of us to clap our hands with joy than to blush with shame or
tears. We saunter up to God to claim his patronage and friendship; it does
not occur to us that he might send us away. We need to hear again the apostle
Peter's sobering words: "Since you call on a Father who judges each man's
work impartially, live your lives in reverent fear." In other words, if we
dare to call our Judge our Father, we must beware of presuming on him. It
must even be said that our evangelical emphasis on the atonement is dangerous
if we come to it too quickly. We learn to appreciate the access to God which
Christ has won for us only after we have first seen God's inaccessibility to
sinners. We can cry "Hallelujah" with authenticity only after we have first
cried "Woe is me, for I am lost." In Dale's words [R. W. Dale in his book
ATONEMENT], "it is partly because sin does not provoke our own wrath, that we
do not believe that sin provokes the wrath of God."
John Stott, in THE CROSS OF CHRIST, Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1986, p. 109.
tags: Fear Fear × God God × Holiness Holiness × Worship Worship ×