From my latest book that I have just(very eager and most excited am I!!!) begun…Studies in the Sermon on the Mount by D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones…
There was a time when the designation applied to the Christian was that he was a ‘God-fearing’ man. I do not think you can ever improve on that – a ‘God-fearing’ man. It does not mean craven fear, it does not mean ‘the fear that hath torment’, but it is a wonderful description of the true Christian. He is of necessity, as we are reminded very forcibly in the seventh chapter of this Gospel, a man who lives in the fear of God. We can say of our blessed Lord Himself that His life was a God-fearing life. You see how important that view of the Christian is. So often, as I have been pointing out, modern Christians, who may be able to give very bright and apparently thrilling testimonies of some experience they have had, do not suggest they are God-fearing people, but give the impression of being men of the world, both in dress and appearance, and in a kind of boisterousness and easy confidence.
So we must not only take the injunctions of the Sermon seriously. We must also check our particular interpretation in the light of the principles I have given. Beware of the spirit of arguing against them; beware of making them ridiculous; and beware of so interpreting them as to regard any one of them as impossible. Here is the life to which we were called, and I maintain again that if only every Christian in the Church today were living the Sermon on the Mount, the great revival for which we are praying and longing would already have started. Amazing and astounding things would happen; the world would be shocked, and men and women would be drawn and attracted to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
May God give us grace to consider this Sermon on the Mount and to remember that we are not to sit in judgment on it, but that we ourselves are under judgment, and that the building we are erecting in this world and in this life will have to face His final test and the ultimate scrutiny of the eye of the Lamb of God that once was slain.
-D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Studies in the Sermon on the Mount, page 23
May I be known as a God-fearing man. This is my prayer this night. All glory to God – the Author of my salvation and the Lord of my life. My song rises to the heavens – sing ye to the Lord, all ye His saints!