Friendship Without Familiarity: Learning to Fear the Lord

Imagine being invited to Buckingham Palace to meet the King. Even if the monarchy is not really your thing, I suspect you would give some thought to what you wore, what you said and how you behaved. You probably would not walk in, put your feet on the furniture and act as though you owned the place.

Now imagine that, over time, you became the King’s friend. There would be warmth, conversation and genuine closeness. You would become more comfortable in his company. But friendship would not mean that he had stopped being the King.

That was the picture I kept returning to on Sunday, because I wonder whether we sometimes confuse intimacy with familiarity in our relationship with God. We have rightly learned that, through Jesus, we can approach the Father with confidence. We know that He loves us and welcomes us. Yet have we become so comfortable with the language of grace and friendship that we have forgotten the holiness and majesty of the One who welcomes us?

The kind of fear that draws us nearer

The word fear usually sounds negative. We think of anxiety, panic or something to overcome. Scripture often tells us not to be afraid, yet the same Bible says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. So what are we meant to do with that?

Exodus 20 gives us a striking moment. Israel stands before Mount Sinai amid thunder, lightning, smoke and the sound of a trumpet. The people are terrified and want to retreat. Moses tells them, “Do not fear,” and then immediately says that the fear of God is to be before them so that they may not sin. At first glance, it sounds contradictory.

The distinction is in the context. Moses is telling them not to run from God in hopeless terror, but to live with a settled awareness of who He is. This is reverent awe: recognising His holiness, authority and majesty in a way that changes how we live. Holy fear does not drive us away from God; it teaches us how to draw near.

Confidence must not become casualness

There is something wonderfully challenging in the next verse. The people remain at a distance, but Moses draws near to the thick darkness where God is. That image stays with me. It is possible to believe in God, be grateful for what He has done and still remain at a safe distance from deeper fellowship with Him.

Perhaps we know about God but resist the closeness that would require change. We want comfort, guidance and blessing, but intimacy also means allowing His Word to correct us. It means His priorities begin to matter more than our preferences.

Psalm 25 says that the friendship of the Lord is for those who fear Him. The Hebrew word used there carries the sense of trusted counsel and close fellowship. God is not inviting us into cold distance. Quite the opposite. He invites us into friendship, but friendship with the holy God can never mean treating Him casually. Wonder and closeness belong together.

Friendship that listens

Jesus makes this very practical in John 15: “You are my friends if you do what I command you.” He is not saying that we earn His friendship by behaving well enough. In the same conversation, Jesus reminds the disciples that He chose them. Grace comes first. Love comes first. The invitation comes first.

But grace does not make obedience irrelevant. If anything, being loved by Jesus gives us a deeper reason to listen. Obedience is not payment for His affection; it is the response of people who already have it.

The clip from The Lord of the Rings helped me see this. Bilbo and Gandalf are old friends. There is affection between them, but Bilbo has become attached to the ring and does not like being challenged. For a moment, he is reminded that Gandalf is not merely a comfortable companion whose advice can be ignored. Gandalf confronts him because he is trying to help him let go of something that is doing him harm.

There are things we hold on to as well: resentment, an attitude, a habit or a compromise we have made room for. When God’s Word challenges us, do we listen and surrender, or push back because we do not like what He is asking? The One who confronts us has not stopped loving us. His correction is often part of His mercy.

When nobody else is watching

The fear of the Lord goes deeper than a moving worship song or an emotional moment in a service. Proverbs 8 connects it with hating evil. It changes what we do when nobody else is watching.

There is a difference between avoiding sin because we might be exposed and resisting it because it dishonours the God we love. Christians still stumble. We still need mercy, forgiveness and the transforming work of the Holy Spirit. But grace never asks us to settle down comfortably in compromise. There should be a growing unwillingness to make peace with the very things Jesus died to save us from.

That is uncomfortable, I know. It is uncomfortable for me too. On Sunday I spoke about having to put something right when nobody else would necessarily have known. The fear of the Lord reminds me that His Word matters and my response matters. Not because I am trying to perform for applause, but because I want my private life and public worship to belong to the same Lord.

The invitation is still to draw near

James writes to Christians whose fellowship with God and one another had been damaged by pride, selfish desire and divided loyalties. His words are direct, but in the middle of them comes a beautiful promise: draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.

This is not an invitation to manufacture a feeling. James speaks about cleansing our hands, purifying our hearts and humbling ourselves. Drawing near involves honesty, repentance and surrender. Yet notice that God is not telling us to sort ourselves out completely and then hope He might allow us back. He calls us to come.

And we can come because Jesus has opened the way. At Sinai, boundaries surrounded the mountain. Through Christ’s death and resurrection, we are given confidence to enter God’s holy presence. His blood brings forgiveness and access to the Father. But confidence is not casualness. Grace does not make God less holy; it makes His invitation all the more astonishing.

The five-day devotional takes these themes further through reverence, friendship, obedience, freedom from compromise and wholehearted surrender.

You can also browse the Five-Day Devotionals collection. You are warmly invited to join us at Flame Community Church, Cardale Street, Blackheath, West Midlands, B65 0LY, or contact info@theflamecc.org.uk.