The Love of God Controls Us
Devotions:
“And we have known and believed the love that God hath to us. God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him. Herein is our love made perfect, that we may have boldness in the day of judgment: because as he is, so are we in this world. There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us.” 1 John 4:16-19 KJV
The Fear of the Lord is to respect, honor and esteem the Lord, treating Him with greatest value and highest worth.
"The word 'fear' means to stand in awe of, respect, expect of, honor, and submit to. It is a phrase that in the Old Testament describes the character of the faith we have in God. we stand in awe of Him, giving Him honor and respect, and in obedience submit to Him.
This awe, respect, honor and submission to, is based on a love relationship.. As John said that we have come to know and believe the love that God has to us. God's love is pervasive. God's love is transformational. The more that we know of His love for us the. Less we will want to do anything to cause Him grief. The more that we know Him the more we freely acknowledge His superiority over all His creation, including us and we see it as a privilege to serve Him. Our commitment is a love commitment based on His love for us which is unsearchable and creates in us a love for Him and His creation. When we know His love we know that even when we sin, the judgement was layed on Jesus so we have no fear of punishment. This does not make us want to sin more but to sin less. Our love relationship controls us.