Fear Rightly

“Do not call conspiracy all that this people calls conspiracy, and do not fear what they fear, nor be in dread. But the Lord of hosts, him you shall honor as holy. Let him be your fear, and let him be your dread.” – Isaiah 8:12-13

Dave and I watched Contagion over the weekend, which was a bit nostalgic as we last saw it in a theater nearly ten years ago. I remember we went to see it because Dave was considering whether to work as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer, the role played by Kate Winslett in the movie (the movie was not the reason he didn’t take the job). Little did we know then that the shots of empty airport lobbies, corporate offices, and gyms would be a reality today. Unsurprisingly, it has been the most-streamed content from HBO every day for the past two weeks. I particularly liked one teenager’s reaction to the quarantine: “am I supposed to lose my spring and my summer too? Can someone invent a shot that stops time?”

The movie does tend to leave one more paranoid about catching a virus, and it reminded me how little we still really know about who is infected, who is not, and how safe it is to resume various activities. Everyone has different risk thresholds: some people sit apart chatting in backyards; others still rarely leave the house and wipe down all their groceries. This remains a time when fear can run like an undercurrent through our lives: if not fear of the virus, then fear of the unknown, fear of our inability to control or plan more, fear of the continued monotony of our days.

When God warns Isaiah to live differently from the people around him, he doesn’t say Isaiah should be different in morality, in his career or in his loves. God says Isaiah should be different in what he fears. What we fear matters. What we fear drives what we think about, what we do, how we feel—fear is, in a way, a kind of worship. It indicates where we direct our energies and resources; it reflects what we turn ourselves towards.

God deserves our fear. He is not only our loving Father but our just Judge. Peter says in the passage preached last Sunday: “And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile” (1 Peter 1:17). Peter alludes in this section to the Passover in Egypt, and I think about how the Israelites must have felt, walking under those doorframes smeared with blood, holding their firstborn sons just a bit tighter. Their hearts were probably pounding. The fact that God saves us through Jesus’ blood makes the fact that he judges unto death no less terrifying. If we’re going to dread anything, dread God; forget not his holiness. We should fear rightly so we may live rightly. We should fear rightly so we may align our expectations and hopes rightly. As Isaiah replies, “I will wait for the Lord… and I will hope in him” (8:17).