Here’s the dirty little secret you’re gonna find among the vast majority of people who insist we shouldn’t seek God-experiences: The very idea of coming face-to-face with the living God? Scares the poop out of ’em.
The reason they insist God doesn’t appear to people anymore, is because they’re hoping to goodness he doesn’t. They absolutely don’t want him to. Frightens them.
They’re also extremely nervous about the second coming. They might talk, and talk a lot, about how it may happen in their lifetime… but they really don’t want it to. That’s half the reason they’ve embraced End Times interpretations in which certain things must take place before Jesus’s return (even though nothing else has to): They want a heads-up. They wanna know he might be coming soon so they can get ready. Not because they’re sinning themselves sore and they wanna clean up first; mainly it’s to brace themselves for the absolutely petrifying prospect of encountering our Lord in person.
And of course they’re extremely nervous about death. Same reason.
Why are they afraid of God? Lots of reasons; none good. I suspect most of it comes from growing up, or worshiping, with Christians who don’t do grace. Been there! Instead of being introduced to a loving God who wants to save us, who already has a positive attitude towards us, who doesn’t merely have infinite patience for us but wants us to be with him… they’re taught all sorts of other unhealthy, dysfunctional things about God.
Mainly that God hates sin. That he can’t abide it; it absolutely cannot be in his holy presence. And since we humans are sinners… well when we stand before him, it’s not gonna be pleasant, is it? He’ll be furious with us. Good thing Jesus steps between his holy rage and us, and stops his Father from vaporizing us with a syllable. Although sometimes they’ve not been taught that either; sometimes Jesus is the one with all the holy rage, slaughtering sinners until the blood and gore is waist-deep over the land.
Seriously, that’s what they expect a God-experience to consist of. So of course they’re scared witless! They don’t want any such encounter with an wrathful God. They think we’re nuts for wanting to go there… and when we tell ’em how gracious God is, they’re pretty sure that can’t be a legitimate God-encounter, because God shoulda burnt us to a crisp. Must be the devil tricking people into believing God’s some kind of infinitely tolerant liberal. That way when Jesus finally does appear, these fools will run to embrace him, only to get butchered along with all the other sinners.
Yep, those graceless Christians really did the devil’s work on ’em—getting them to be terrified of the One who loves them the most in the universe.
Holy terror in the bible.
This irrational fear of God is hardly new. We find it in the bible too. Plenty of ancient people assumed all the same things about God—that he’s too holy to encounter sin, and since they’re sinners, they’re dead meat. They legitimately thought if they saw God, they’d die. Doesn’t God say, “No one can see my face and live” in the bible?
Now part of that is true; I’ll quote the whole passage.
- Judges 13.22 KJV
- 20And he said, Thou canst not see my face: for there shall no man see me, and live. 21And the LORD said, Behold, there is a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: 22and it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by: 23and I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen.
Moses had asked to see the LORD’s glory, Ex 33.18 and this was how the LORD accommodated him: Moses could see his
אָחֹר/akhór,
his back. Not his front. Seeing God’s glory from the front would kill a person. From the back… well, that’s fine.
And there are various other scriptures where people freak out at the idea of encountering God. The Hebrews round Mt Sinai thought hearing God’s voice—like they just had—would kill them. Ex 20.18-19 Manoah of Zorah, father of Samson, thought the LORD’s angel was God, and panicked because he thought he saw God and was gonna die now. Jg 13.22
And yet… people throughout the bible had God-encounters. Close, personal God-encounters. Saw God and lunched with him: Abraham, Ge 18 and all the elders of Israel. Ex 24.9-11 And let’s not forget Jesus, who is God, having lunches with his students for years. Plenty of people have seen Jesus face-to-face.
Face it: God accommodates us. You’re worried seeing God will kill you? God’s made it so seeing him won’t kill you. Same as he did with Moses. He put himself into a form that deliberately interacted with sinful humans on a constant basis—and loved ’em, forgave ’em, invited ’em to follow him, and still helps us when we call upon him. Your fears are only keeping you distant from him, when he wants you to come near, and made tremendous efforts to save you, not harm you.
Face it: You gotta learn to love God more than your malfunctioning self-preservation instinct.
