Fear God alone

[Wootah]

One of things all people but I presume Christians actually try to do it is to fear God and not fear other things.

examples from: https://www.openbible.info/topics/fear_of_the_lord

Proverbs 1:7 ESV
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge; fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Deuteronomy 10:12 ESV
“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you, but to fear the Lord your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul,

Psalm 23:4 ESV
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me.

Now here are some examples saying to not fear man https://bible.knowing-jesus.com/topics/Do-Not-Fear-Men

Psalm 118:6 ESV
The Lord is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me?

1 Peter 2:17 ESV
Honor everyone. Love the brotherhood. Fear God. Honor the emperor.

Proverbs 29:25 ESV / 399 helpful votes
The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe.

I like 1 Peter 2 because it says clearly to honour the emperor but not fear the emperor and we can apply that to all kings and rulers.

The general point is that Christians are only meant to fear God and not fear man (or other things pretending to be God or angels). On angels, angels say fear not quite often. I think this is partly due to the fact they are probably terrifying but also because they do not want us to worship them. Only fear God.

Do you agree?

If you do agree can you explain this verse in the Bible?

https://biblehub.com/ephesians/5-21.htm
https://biblehub.com/ephesians/5-21.htm

New International Version
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

New Living Translation
And further, submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

English Standard Version
submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Berean Standard Bible
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Berean Literal Bible
Be submitting yourselves to one another in reverence of Christ:

King James Bible
Submitting yourselves one to another in the fear of God.

New King James Version
submitting to one another in the fear of God.

New American Standard Bible
and subject yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ.

NASB 1995
and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.

NASB 1977
and be subject to one another in the fear of Christ.

Legacy Standard Bible
and being subject to one another in the fear of Christ.

Amplified Bible
being subject to one another out of reverence for Christ.

Christian Standard Bible
submitting to one another in the fear of Christ.

Holman Christian Standard Bible
submitting to one another in the fear of Christ.

American Standard Version
subjecting yourselves one to another in the fear of Christ.

Aramaic Bible in Plain English
Be subject to one another in the love of The Messiah.

Contemporary English Version
Honor Christ and put others first.

Douay-Rheims Bible
Being subject one to another, in the fear of Christ.

English Revised Version
subjecting yourselves one to another in the fear of Christ.

GOD'S WORD® Translation
Place yourselves under each other's authority out of respect for Christ.

Good News Translation
Submit yourselves to one another because of your reverence for Christ.

International Standard Version
and you will submit to one another out of reverence for the Messiah.

Literal Standard Version
subjecting yourselves to one another in the fear of Christ.

Majority Standard Bible
Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ.

I notice that the Greek word is phobos (the word for fear, phobia) so translations using reverence are meaning well but are not accurate. Similar to how the word doulos means slave but gets translated servant a lot .

Question: If we are only meant to fear God, why does the Bible say to fear Christ?

Is this evidence that Christ is God and it is good to fear Christ or .... over to you.

[onewithhim]

Jesus didn't commit suicide by proxy. SUICIDE BY PROXY is when a person that commits capital crimes with the explicit goal of “earning” their executions. There is not record of Jesus committing any crime, much less a capital crime, so there is no evidence he committed suicide by proxy or by any other means.

Maybe you should read the Bible?

JehovahsWitness reads the Bible very thoroughly, as do I and the other JWs on these threads. It is true that Jesus never committed any crime against God or man. Are you intimating that he did? If that is what you are saying, YOU should read the Bible more closely.

[boatsnguitars]

Jesus didn't commit suicide by proxy. SUICIDE BY PROXY is when a person that commits capital crimes with the explicit goal of “earning” their executions. There is not record of Jesus committing any crime, much less a capital crime, so there is no evidence he committed suicide by proxy or by any other means.

Maybe you should read the Bible?

JehovahsWitness reads the Bible very thoroughly, as do I and the other JWs on these threads. It is true that Jesus never committed any crime against God or man. Are you intimating that he did? If that is what you are saying, YOU should read the Bible more closely.

Jesus breaks religious rules
As we live in an imperfect society we need some rules and laws to combat the worst forms of evil. Religion has its own sets of rules, but Jesus showed us that if we follow his way, love transcends rules. He was born into a Jewish society which had built up a complex set of rules to moderate and control how people lived their everyday lives. We will see in this article how Jesus broke many of the rules and traditions that religion imposed.

Denouncing Authority
Jesus denounced the religious rulers because they heaped an impossible burden on ordinary people like you and me. To even attempt to allow all the rules you would have to devote your life, become a pharisee. The problem was that in keeping to the letter of the law they omitted to do more important things like caring for other people and promoting justice and mercy.

“Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You give a tenth of your spices – mint, dill and cumin. But you have neglected the more important matters of the law – justice, mercy and faithfulness. You should have practiced the latter, without neglecting the former.”(Matthew 23:23 NIV)

In denouncing the religious rulers he deliberately set himself against them so he could teach, and demonstrate a better way.

Touching Lepers
A man with leprosy came and knelt before him and said, “Lord, if you are willing, you can make me clean.” Jesus reached out his hand and touched the man. “I am willing,” he said. “Be clean!” Immediately he was cleansed of his leprosy. (Matthew 8:2-3 NIV)

According to Jewish law, if a person touched someone who was leprous, they would become unclean. Why did Jesus touch this leper? Jesus realised that this man’s needs were emotional as well as physical. This man mattered far more than rules and he needed touching! Jesus didn’t disobey rules to be rebellious but to demonstrate that love makes the rule redundant.

Healing on the sabbath
The law said that for one day each week, no work should be done. This was basically good because it avoided employers exploiting their workers. But the rules and traditions had made the law difficult to keep. Jesus pointed out that they were quite willing to save an animal on the sabbath, therefore it was quite reasonable to heal somebody on that day. This really infuriated the religious rulers who sought to kill him.

And a man with a shriveled hand was there. Looking for a reason to bring charges against Jesus, they asked him, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath?”

He said to them, “If any of you has a sheep and it falls into a pit on the Sabbath, will you not take hold of it and lift it out? How much more valuable is a person than a sheep! Therefore it is lawful to do good on the Sabbath.”

Then he said to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” So he stretched it out and it was completely restored, just as sound as the other. But the Pharisees went out and plotted how they might kill Jesus. (Matthew 12: 11-13)

Sabbath made for mans benefit
Religious rules, carried to the extreme, can just be plain silly. To equate picking a few grains of corn with the act of reaping a harvest is ridiculous. The sabbath day, and the principle of not working that day, was instituted by God for man’s benefit. The religious teachers had tried to define “work” to the nth degree. Rules dictated exactly what you could and couldn’t do, but Jesus was quite content to let his disciples break with rules and traditions to satisfy their hunger.

One Sabbath Jesus was going through the grain fields, and as his disciples walked along, they began to pick some heads of grain. The Pharisees said to him, “Look, why are they doing what is unlawful on the Sabbath?” — Then he said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath. (Mark 2:23-24, 27 NIV)

Talking to Women
In Jesus’s day it wasn’t considered right for a man to speak to a woman who was a stranger and certainly not one of doubtful character and of another ethic race. But again, Jesus wasn’t going to be tied down to convention when he met a woman at a well in Samaria. They had quite a discussion which resulted in many of that town believing in him as ‘the Savior of the world’.

The scandal of drinking his blood
The old testament Law forbid the drinking of blood.

For the life of every creature is its blood: its blood is its life. Therefore I have said to the people of Israel, You shall not eat the blood of any creature, for the life of every creature is its blood. Whoever eats it shall be cut off. (Leviticus 17:14 ESV)

Yet Jesus told his disciples they were to drink his blood. To the disciples who had been brought up in the Jewish traditions this must have sounded shocking, scandalous and repulsive.
“Whoever eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise them up at the last day.” (John 6:54 NIV)
But Jesus invites to share his life (blood) with us and this ushers in a new era. Trying to please God by obeying religious rules has been proven ineffective. God has intervened in human history and made the way open for all men to be one with God through Jesus Christ. We can ingest the very life of God into our lives

Other Examples
Overturning the money tables at the temple.
Eating with “sinners”, people of dubious reputation.
Not ritually washing hands before eating.
Jesus’ commitment to non-violence
Forgiving people’s sins and thus bypassing the temple sacrifices.

https://georgedowdell.org/2016/08/02/je ... ous-rules/


Read your Bible - with understanding.

[JehovahsWitness]

... Jesus' was found guilty of committing the capital crime of blasphemy

I didnt say he wasn't found giulty of the crime of blasphemy I said there is no record of Jesus committing any crime, and this would include the crime of blasphemy.


JW



RELATED POSTS

Did Jesus commit the crime of blasphemy?
viewtopic.php?p=981228#p981228

Was Jesus a BLASPHEMER?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 90#p983490

[JehovahsWitness]

Jesus breaks religious rules...

Jesus may indeed have broken religious "rules"*, what there is no record of him ever doing is breaking THE MOSAIC LAW CODE as recorded in the Hebrew bible.

• Healing on the Sabbath : Legal - there was no law that prohibited good deeds on the Sabbath

• Plucking grains on the Sabbath : Legal - there was no law that stipulated it was illegal to pluck a few grains to eat on the Sabbath. The law prohibited "work" without specifying what was or was not to be classed as such

Drinking blood: totally Illegal ; but Jesus never advocated drinking literal blood. He commanded the drinking of wine that represented his blood.

• Talking to women : Legal

• Eating with “sinners”, people of dubious reputation : Legal

• Not ritually washing hands before eating.

* religious leaders,of his day added a large number of non-biblical oral rules and traditions that burdened the people and distracted from God's mercy and justice.




OTHER LEGAL ACTIONS

Did Jesus sin when he threw the money-changers out of the temple?
http://debatingchristianity.com/forum/v ... 99#p976999

To learn more please go to other posts related to

"BAD JESUS" , "FARICATED JESUS" and ... JESUS OF NAZARETH

[JehovahsWitness]

DID JESUS BREAK THE MOSAIC LAW BY TOUCHING A LEPER?

No. There was no law that prohibited touching a leper; the only stipulation being if one does he or she would have to remain ceremonially "unclean" for a period of time.

Did Jesus need to remain unclean because he touched a leper? No because he didnt touch a leper he touched a cured leper. As of Jesus intention, the leper ceased to be infectious and whether he touched him as he spoke or spoke after touching the leper, Jesus removed the source of the man's uncleanness and so there would have been no need for Jesus to have been considered "unclean" under law.

[JehovahsWitness]

Duplicate. Sorry

[Miles]

... Jesus' was found guilty of committing the capital crime of blasphemy

I didnt say he wasn't found giulty of the crime of blasphemy I said there is no record of Jesus committing any crime, and this would include the crime of blasphemy.

So what do you think it means to be found guilty of a crime if it isn't having committed such a crime?


THE RECORD of Jesus committing the crime of blasphemy: Matthew 26:64
THE FINDING OF GUILT of Jesus committing the crime of blasphemy: Matthew 26:65-66

Matthew 26:63-66
63 . . . .I adjure thee by the living God that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God.”
64 Jesus said unto him, “Thou hast said; nevertheless I say unto you, hereafter shall ye see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.”
65 Then the high priest rent his clothes, saying, “He hath spoken blasphemy! What further need have we of witnesses? Behold, now ye have heard his blasphemy!
66 "What think ye?" They answered and said, “He is deserving of death!”

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[JehovahsWitness]

... Jesus' was found guilty of committing the capital crime of blasphemy

I didnt say he wasn't found giulty of the crime of blasphemy I said there is no record of Jesus committing any crime, and this would include the crime of blasphemy.

So what do you think it means to be found guilty of a crime if it isn't having committed such a crime?

It's usually called a travesty of justice

TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE

something that fails to represent the values and qualities that it is intended to represent, in a way that is shocking. - Cambridge Dictionary

RELATED POSTS

Why were there no riots at Jesus arrest?
viewtopic.php?p=920344#p920344

Was Jesus night trial legal?
viewtopic.php?p=1083570#p1083570

[Diogenes]

So the case has been well made, that we should fear God and fear Jesus. We are also told to love God.
How can we truly love God if we also fear him?
How can love truly be love if it is coerced by fear?

[Miles]

... Jesus' was found guilty of committing the capital crime of blasphemy

I didnt say he wasn't found giulty of the crime of blasphemy I said there is no record of Jesus committing any crime, and this would include the crime of blasphemy.

So what do you think it means to be found guilty of a crime if it isn't having committed such a crime?

It's usually called a travesty of justice

......... ......................

Maybe where you live, but in the USA whether or not a crime fails to represent the values and qualities that it is intended to represent, it's still a crime. We don't pussy-foot around crime trying to sugar coat it or rename it. A crime is a crime is a crime.

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