It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.
7 sermons cite this verse
… if you don't have the blood of Jesus covering your life it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God and just because he's sovereign doesn't mean you won't stand before him one day and give an account for everything done whether good or bad but for the believer it is actually this accountability that brings that much more value and purpose to every day of our life. Because it is God alone who will be able to answer the question posed in verse 9. And bring profit from what we do in this life as we live in the fear of God and we give him glory. It's actually only then that every day matters. That every day will have a benefit because God says, I see your labor of love. And it will matter. There is a purpose beyond your life. To fear God is to trust his timing, his plans, and his ways, knowing that he is in total control. If you were to read on in Ecclesiastes, and I told you, you always want to make sure you read the end, or you'll leave very discouraged and depressed. …
… night, all of these promises of condemnation and judgment came true. Less than a century after, God utters them. It's what the author of Hebrews says. It's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of a living God. Babylonians fell into the hands of the living God. Much of it because of what they did to the Israelites and to so many others. God did not ignore their injustice. And you can better believe God does not ignore or turn a blind eye to the injustice that you are experiencing in your life. God sees it. Look at verse 13. This is basically what happens is Habakkuk responds. He's, because we're going to find out he's a worship leader. He's not a pastor. He's a worship leader. He responds to all of this pain and suffering, this heaviness with creativity. I think there's something very beautiful with that. But he writes this Psalm in chapter three, but this is how he describes God. He says this in verse 12 of chapter three. You marched through the land in indignation. You trampled the nations in anger. You went forth for the salvation of your people, for the salvation with your anointed. You struck the head from the house of the wicked. …
… the meaning of fear, because some of you are going to say, I don't want to be afraid of God. It's not to be afraid of God, although Paul, the apostle, does say it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. It means that it is a very sobering reality. But the word in Hebrew here is to be awe-inspiring, or more exact, the awesome nature of God, or to appreciate, or to embrace, to look into the word of God, to discover the awesome nature of God, that he is, in fact, awesome, and that generates reverence. So today, I passed by one of the kiosks outside, and I said, with the clouds outside, which, by the way, is kind of weird. Did we have a forecast for clouds? I didn't notice this. Anyway, I said, hey, I hope it lightnings and thunders today. I like that stuff. You may not like it, but I like it. You know, we're Southern Californians. We're terrible. But pastor, I just had my car washed. We'll take the rain over your clean car, right? But there's weather out there. It is describing and displaying that something's going on. And if you've ever experienced real weather, it causes you to feel very small. …
… upon those who have deliberately transgressed that law. What a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. If you want to bring a Muslim to Christ, lay the weight of the law upon him. I witness to a lot of Muslims, and I do something right at the beginning. See you a Muslim? Yeah. Thanks for listening to me. Let me just share a little illustration with you. Let's say a man's robbed a bank, he shot a guard, and he died in a very serious crime. He's standing in front of a judge, and the judge says, You're guilty, and the man says, Yeah, I'm guilty. But he says, I want you to know this, judge. I'm really sorry, and I won't do it again. So is the judge going to let him go? And the Muslim says, Of course not. I say, No, he's bound to do that which is right and just. He's going to jail. So being sorry and saying you won't do it again, it's not going to help, because of course you should be sorry. …
… The author to Hebrews says this. He says, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. Not because God's bad, but because in that moment, there will be no escaping goodness. in that moment, there will be no avoiding truth. And so this has often been my prayer. This is something that I kneel right there, here in the chapel, and I remember or enact what will it be like in the moment of moments when I know, and this is the thing I pray about, I know and I see what it's, I see what it was to have been loved so much. and to not love him back. What will that moment of moments be like? When I know, I know what it was, I know, I will know what it will have been to have been given so much grace, to have been given so many chances. in that moment of moment, standing before God and knowing without doubt the sheer amount of mercy, the sheer amount of love that God has been offering to me every moment of my entire life, to see and to know the truth that each thought, every word is known, and not just to others, like it says in the gospel, but to me. …
… Don't resist him. Hebrews chapter 10 verse 31 says, it is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. I put that verse in there, it popped into my mind, and I think about, Lord, that just seems out of context to me, but you brought it to my memory in putting this together this morning. What is this? Paul the Apostle said that. I believe it's Paul, doesn't matter, that wrote Hebrews. It's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God. So do we have a contradiction in the Bible? It's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God? Or are we safe and secure in Christ? The answer is both. When it says it's a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God, it means that you are going to meet God someday and he's not a human. God is spirit. And Mary had a little lamb 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem. The lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. …
… He didn't show up in the list. But, Hebrews 10 31 says, it is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God. In Luke 12, 5, Jesus said, I will warn you who to fear. the one who after he has killed... has the authority to cast you into hell. Fear Him. You don't hear a lot about that, even from evangelical pulpits. The most terrifying force in the universe is God Himself. There's a day coming when the world will begin to feel the terror at a level that perhaps could only be grasped in some measure by the people who drowned in the flood. When they realize they are being completely overcome, then they can't do anything about it. In Luke 21, you might want to look at that for a moment. I'll show you a few passages as we go. But in Luke 21, that's a passage that the Lord is talking about His second coming, and He describes it. You go down to verse 25, there will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and we'll see specifically what they are in Revelation. …