Well, it's good to be here, isn't it? Thankful for another Lord's Day. You get me for a third time in a row. Thank you! That's encouraging. Well, let's bow and ask the Lord to draw near and bless our time. Our great God and Father, Again, we rejoice in you through our Lord Jesus Christ, your son. Thank you for the Lord's day. Thank you for your word in which you've caused us to hope, in which you guide us and teach us and feed us and correct us. It's a light into our path, a lamp for our feet. So we look to you and ask you to draw near. We ask you to be glorified. We pray that you will bless this meeting, and I pray you'll use me, help me to speak the truth in love and in faith with a sound mind, and that you would, by your spirit, minister to hearts. In the name of Christ, I pray, amen. All right. Well, this will be part three, I guess, of this theme of the fear of the Lord. And again, it's no peripheral theme, is it? It's no secondary, on-the-margins kind of idea that's once in a while mentioned in the Bible. Nope. You find it in Genesis, and you find it all the way to the last book of Revelation. It's there. And so this is a pervasive teaching. This is a fundamental teaching. And in theology, or Bible teaching or preaching even. A theologian is always making distinctions, aren't they? They have to. Making distinctions whether to define things or bring clarity or to point out that there's a difference between things. And there are separations, distinctions and separations. But they're not the same, they're not the same thing. For example, if I were to make a distinction between your soul and your body, then I'd be telling you that there's a difference, isn't there? You're made up of more than one thing. You're made up of a soul and a body, and they're not the same. One's temporal, one lives on forever. But if I were to make a separation between your soul and your body, then it would kill you, wouldn't it? See the difference? Separation. So I say that to just say that if we separate the fear of God from the Christian life, then you have no Christian life. It's that fundamental. It's that vital. It's that important. And it's that essential even to true religion, if I can put it that way. So last time, I spoke on the blessings that flow out of living in the fear of God. There are many blessings, many untold blessings. I just touched on a handful of them, didn't I? You know, a fountain of life versus snare of death. This fountain of life that the fear of the Lord is a fountain of life. It's not like a fountain of life. It is a fountain of life. This overflowing, this blessing, this nourishing, hydrating, life-giving, aspect that will help you avoid the snares, the traps of death. And it's a blessing to others, too, when you walk in the fear of the Lord. Not just you, but others, your wife, your children, others around you in your life will be blessed. They'll experience God's blessing. And you'll have the friendship of God, you know, the nearness of God, the angel of the Lord encampeth around those that fear him. and His provisions and protections, all these blessings that flow, that was the last message. And today, I want to focus, or I need to focus, on some negative aspects of what John Bunyan called the ungodly fears, ungodly fears. And so I want to focus on that today, and I also want to draw out some characteristics of those that don't fear God, what that looks like. And I did, by the way, I mentioned John Bunyan. He wrote a treatise on this. If you ever really want to go deep and get all you can get, that's an excellent resource. So it is a gold mine. It's my little honey hole, so to speak, right now on this subject. And I'm drawing out such good things from it. So a lot of what you're going to hear today is going to be very Bunyan-esque. It's going to have a lot of him. This isn't stuff I've just made up. These are old truths he saw, he's taught from the scriptures, and now, by God's grace, hopefully I can convey that on and help you all in this great subject. So, one important question regarding the whole reality of salvation. Salvation brings up a question, saved from what? This is fundamental. Saved from what? Some might say, well, saved from hell, saved from the wrath of God, saved from sin. Those are all true, but those aren't hitting the rock bottom of the question, are they? Saved from what? The answer would be saved from God, wouldn't it? When we are saved, we're saved from God, basically, at the very heart of it. And that is the reality that we find all through the Bible, too. Salvation is of the Lord, and salvation is from God. Sin will condemn you, but it will condemn you in the eyes of God, right? Hell is His just wrath upon sinful, unrepentant people. And there are, in all of humanity, there are people that fear God, and there are people that don't fear God, aren't there? morally upright, decent, what we would call nice people in the earth that don't fear God. They don't. And, you know, I talked last time about God storing up goodness. He stores up goodness, however that looks, whatever kind of storage house or savings or storage facility, spiritually speaking, he has. It's full of goodness. And it's stored up for those who fear the Lord. But it also talks about storing up something else for those who don't fear the Lord, and what was it? Romans 2, wrath. There's wrath being stored up for those who are sinful, don't fear the Lord. Neglect him, don't walk in his ways. And the scriptures make it clear that the wicked person, Now I use the word wicked because the scriptures use the word wicked. It seems like a harsh word almost. And yet it's wicked in the eyes of God. What God says is wicked is wicked. That's all that matters. You may think, well that's not necessarily wicked. But if God calls it wicked, it is. Well, the wicked person does not fear God. And he doesn't stand in awe of God. That reverential awe of God just isn't there. He has a low view of God. He has a wrong view of God. He neglects God. He avoids God. And the unbeliever does not revere him with that reverential awe or that reverential love and godly fear. So in Romans 3, Paul talks about that, doesn't he? And he's quoting from Psalm 36. So for our first verse today, there'll be several verses. You don't have to look them all up, Psalm 36 might be worth opening to if you're following along. And at the very beginning of Psalm 36, I said Paul quotes him. I'll get to that in a minute. But King David is the one speaking, the psalmist in this psalm. And he says, transgression speaks to the wicked deep in his heart. There is no fear of God before his eyes. For he flatters himself in his own eyes that his iniquity cannot be found out and hated. The words of his mouth are trouble and deceit. He has ceased to act wisely and to do good. So here we are, as opposed to God speaking deep in the, look here, what's speaking deep in his heart is transgression. Sin. That's what's doing the deep talking. Sin is master. Sin is in control. Transgressions. And there's now this absence of the fear of God. It's void. It isn't there. There is none. There is no fear of God. Not there is a little, but there is none. And in Romans 3, Paul draws from this, doesn't he? And it's in that long list of things that he's saying that there's none righteous, no one, no one seeks for God, no one understands. And in the end of that list, in verse 18, he says, there is no fear of God before their eyes. And that's, that's amazing. And that's, that's how the unbelievers are. That's how the wicked are. And there's this aspect, isn't there, of this self-flattery. They flatter themselves. There's a self-flattery. They think that God's not seeing this. And that He doesn't care. Because they don't believe. They flatter themselves thinking He doesn't see. It can't be, it cannot be found out. And it cannot be hated. But that's not true at all, is it? One thing that should and ought to trigger even or promote this aspect of the fear of the Lord is God's omnipresence. He's everywhere and He's omniscient. He knows everything. There is nothing about you, no thought, no word, no deed. He doesn't know intimately, perfectly. And He's not apathetic about that either is he, about sin or transgressions. He hates it, doesn't he? It's what the scriptures say, he hates it. Well, those that don't fear God, they're not seeing that. They're flattering themselves that this isn't a reality. So, there are ungodly fears that affect people's lives. That's how Bunyan calls them, ungodly fears. And I want us to start by looking at this this verse in Romans 8.15 also. I thought this was important in Romans 8. It's verse 15. I'll start reading in 14 though. Paul says, For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God. For you did not receive the spirit of slavery to fall back into fear. that you have received the spirit of adoption as sons by whom we cry, Abba, Father." Very well-known verse. We're studying Romans right now, and we'll get to it in the months ahead, but I'm going to blitz it just a little bit because it's pertinent, I think, to this topic of the fear of the Lord. And these are deep waters, but I'm just going to draw out this one aspect here about how the Holy Spirit operates in a person pertaining to this particular thing, the fear of God. So after the work of regeneration in a believer's heart, the Holy Spirit, as he says here, does not cause them to fall back into fear. Now, I believe this is addressing this ungodly fear, even this fear of judgment, that slavish fear, that fear of bondage that comes. The Holy Spirit does not lead you back into that. Does that make sense? Notice, he says in this passage, the spirit of slavery. This is the servile fear I talked about. Remember I said there are two kinds of fears, the servile fear, which is the fear of a slave against a harsh, unyielding, mean master, or a new marine to his drill sergeant. The fear of punishment, the fear of the pain that can be afflicted, the fear of what this person can do, and there's no love, there's no reverence, And then there's the filial fear, the fear that comes from the word even like family, family fear, this fear of displeasing a loving father. So right here, he's even bringing that up. And he's mentioning this, now you have the spirit of adoption. And he's giving us that filial fear of loving the father. And Paul already mentioned in Romans 8 that there's now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Of course, remember that verse, but think of how this relates. No condemnation for the law of the spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. So if you're in Christ, then you're out, you know, away with this idea of bondage, this slavish fear, This fear of condemnation is gone. It needs to be gone. This fear of being cast into hell forever. So when a person becomes a Christian, the Holy Spirit at first, before they're a Christian, He will awaken them with this spirit of bondage, with this reality that you have sinned against the Holy God. That's a function of the law. that it's defining sin and it's condemning all those who are guilty of sin. And the law was added because of sin, not because of transgressions. And it holds them in this bondage to fear. That's the work of the law. Holds them in this bondage and in this fear. And it at first is a work of the Holy Spirit. And he's bringing that about to them. But the Holy Spirit won't stop there. you will then drive the person to Christ, to the Lord Jesus Christ. And then they will put their faith in Christ and have salvation and be saved. When a person flies to Christ and they're trusting only in Him, there's this union that takes place. We heard about that in our last study, if you're listening to Brother Lee teach. There's a union with Christ now. And there's in you, Christ is in you, and the Holy Spirit has put in this new spirit in you too, this spirit of adoption, which has birthed now this filial aspect, this filial fear, of which we cry to God, what? Abba, Father. So it's the same Holy Spirit who at first, he'll put that spirit of bondage and fear, but in regeneration, he's the one who will convince you of adoption and sonship, and deliver you out of that bondage. So whenever we've sinned, rather than run from God, we run to God. Jeremiah 32, God will put the fear of me in their hearts that they not turn from me. I mentioned last time, we usually turn from something we're afraid of, don't we? We're afraid of that. We're fearful of that person, that bully, or that Police officer if you're a criminal or whatever. That thing, you have a phobia, you're afraid of it, you run, you get out. But the fear of the Lord's different. It's like a magnet. So I'll put the fear of me that they not turn from me. Actually, they'll turn to me. They'll come to me. So when we sin, we come to him. We flee to God. That's an apostolic command. When you sin, go to God. Confess your sin to him. Own it before him. It's an invitation by God, too, to his children. Any loving father would want you to come to them. Come to me. Don't run from me. Don't flee home. Come to me. We'll deal with this. So when we're afraid, when we need help, we need wisdom, we've blown it, and we're just at our worst, the Christian may not at first always feel this initially, may not feel it, but deep down, deep down, They know I've got to go to God. I want to go to God. He's the only one I can go to. He's the only one that can help. And that's the fear of the Lord operating in a person. I'm drawn to Him for the deliverance of this, for help in this. This renewed mind, whatever, grace, mercy, clarity. He's the one. The spirit of slavery that leads to fear in God's wrath and condemnation, the Holy Spirit will never bring that back up again. I think that's what Romans 8 is teaching. The spirit of damnation and bondage is good up until the point a person leads to Christ. And you have that deliverance. And then this fear is not good. He's bringing it up here in Romans 8. right on the heels of Romans 7, that this spirit of bondage, this slavery stuff, this condemnation stuff, away with that. You're in Christ. You're trusted in Him. I just want to briefly, John, 1 John 4, 18, I think it's a similar thought. 1 John 4, 18, a few of you even asked me about this verse, personally, where it says, there is no fear in love, but perfect love cast out fear, for fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love." So, what does that mean? You know, the fear of the Lord, we're talking about, which is the beginning of knowledge, it's the beginning of wisdom, it's this fountain of life, brings all these blessings, that's not what's mentioned here, I don't think, at all. John's talking about this fear of judgment. The context is based around that, this fear of judgment and punishment. And if you have a Reformation study Bible, which is the one that, I believe it was R.C. Sproul's general editor may have written some of the notes, I thought I had a good note on this verse, where it says, God's love is perfect in itself and it brings to us the sure promise of perfection as soon as we receive it, But because we are being made perfect in his love over time, the remnants of fear may temporarily coexist with love. And then this statement, perfected love from God casts out fear progressively rather than immediately. So this is why I'm teaching this, because I even know in my own heart, I need to grow in this. This fear of the Lord, this perfected love from God casts out fear progressively. Not immediately. And I think that's getting at the heart of 1 John 4, 18. Well, amen. I want to focus now. I want to bring up something that Mr. Bunyan brought up. And I want to start asking 10 questions. I want to ask you 10 questions. I won't dwell long on each one of them, but I want you to think about these things. I want you to evaluate yourself. and it's pertaining to ungodly fears. But think of this. Number one, do these fears make you question whether there was ever a work of grace in your soul? Do these fears make you question whether there was ever a work of grace in your soul? Question number two, do these fears make you question whether your first fears were ever a work of the Holy Spirit? Remember those first fears I mentioned? He does that. Do the fears now in you make you question that? Does that ever work in the Holy Spirit? Number three, do these fears make you question whether you have ever had any true comfort from the Bible and the Holy Spirit? Are they doing that in you? Are you questioning now, have I ever had real comfort from the Scriptures or from the Holy Spirit? Number four, do you find mixed with these fears plain assertions that your first comforts were either from your own imagination or from the devil and they're just a delusion? Those fears and you cause that. This is just a delusion. This is from the devil or I just dreamed this up. They weren't real. Question number five, do these fears weaken your heart in prayer? Number six, do these fears keep you back from laying hold of the promise of salvation by Jesus Christ? They hold you back, these fears. Number seven, do these fears tend to the hardening of your heart and the making of you desperate? Is that going on? Number eight, do these fears hinder you from profiting in hearing or reading the word of God? Number nine, do these fears tend to the stirring up of blasphemies in your heart against God? Are these fears operating that way, stirring that up? And number 10, do these fears make you sometimes think that it is pointless for you to wait upon the Lord any longer? So the final question would be, how much of the work of God or the work of the Holy Spirit is in those fears? Zero. None. None at all. These are not fears that the Holy Spirit produces in a person. At all. You can be sure of it. These are not the effects of the work of the Holy Spirit. This is more of that spirit of bondage, that suppression, keeping and fleeing from God, turning from Him, no longer waiting on Him, no longer praying. What's the point? What's the point of praying? What's the point if all these things are a delusion? See, certain fears can bring these things up in us, can't they? But these are not of His doings. As Bunyan says, the paw of the devil is involved in every one of these. I like that. This is the work of Satan because he does want you feeling like that, doesn't he? So we have to understand that by faith we truly are forgiven of our sins. We really are. Before God, your sins are forgiven. You're no longer under condemnation. God will not change his mind about that. The Holy Spirit will not remove that spirit of adoption that he's given you. and then place you back under that condemnation. That's not his work. This is the work of the enemy, and even of the flesh. The Holy Spirit, again, he's changed our hearts. So what do we do? We cry out to God now. We cry out to God as Abba Father, and he won't contradict his gospel. See? It causes you to fall back into your first fear. He will not do that. The devil will try, He'll do all he can in the life of a Christian to bring about these things, to stir these things up, and get you far from God. Well, I thought those were helpful. I wanted just to present those to us as a church. So are there any, well, let me just keep moving for the sake of time. I think we'll have plenty of time for questions. If you have a question, just write it down or note it. Because now I want to move into some characteristics of those who do not fear God. These are kind of defining characteristics. Now there could be a lot, but just for sake of time in today's study, I only brought about seven of them here. And again, Mr. Bunyan has helped me in this, has brought these, I think, out for us. And before I start though, because it can seem like, oh, that's me. But if it is, just remember, we're all growing in grace. Some of us may need to really repent, but I'm not saying anyone here perfectly fears God like they should. We're all a work in progress. My aim is to stir this up, the prime of the pump, to get us focused on this reality. And these are in no particular order of importance, okay? Not at all. These are all valid characteristics, I think, of those who do not fear God. So number one is a characteristic of those who do not fear God is those who are proud and have a high mind. They do not fear God. Pride, arrogance, King James says it's high-mindedness, that and the fear of God do not match. They do not go together. They are in direct opposition to each other, actually. And he that is proud of who he is, his person, his status in life, his wealth or possessions, or his intellect, whatever. If they're pride, if that's going on, then they're not fearing God. See, God resists the proud, doesn't he? He resists the proud. He holds them off from afar, as the scriptures say. First Peter 5.5, Peter says, likewise, you who are younger, be subject to the elders. Clothe yourselves, all of you, with humility toward one another. For God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble. And you remember when Paul, I'm blitzing some Roman studies, so maybe this will get you thinking about these things before. Romans 11, remember this is to Christians Paul's writing to. And in Romans 11, in 18 and following, he says, regarding that natural olive tree, remember, which was Israel, and broken off branches, Israel was, some branches were broken off, you might be grafted in. This picture is the context of this, and he says, do not be arrogant toward the branches. If you are, remember, it's not you who support the root, but the root that supports you. And then you will say, branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. That's true. It says, they were broken off because of their unbelief, but you stand fast through faith. So do not become proud, but fear. Not become proud, but fear. Now, that's how we are to be as Christians. And we're not talking about fear of condemnation either. You just talked about that in Romans 8. So you're not going to go contradicting that. This is the good fear of God. This is the good fear of God. This is preserving. This is an antidote against pride. That's what this here is. It's going to help you fight off that pride. And the blessing will flow from that, this good godly fear of God. That is a preserving aspect of your Christianity. You keep on fearing God. Keep walking in the fear of God. Never stop that. Don't become proud of fear. The second characteristic I have here is those that give themselves to drunkenness and gluttony, they do not fear God. Think about that. Drunkenness for sure. Gluttony is a little hard to define, isn't it? In our American society full of food, we walk into a building full of food and we have an abundance. But those who are given to that don't fear God. Proverbs 23, 19 and 20, he says, hear my son and be wise and direct your heart in the way. Do not be among drunkards or among gluttonous eaters of meat. So, here we go. Gluttony, gluttonous. I mean, I think it's basically you're hurting yourself with food. You're just over, always overdoing it. It's not like you had a good Thanksgiving meal. It's maybe a little gluttonous in that sense, but it's a characteristic. You're hurting yourself with food as one hurts themselves with wine, drunkenness. It's the drunkenness with food, so to speak. And I love how John Bunyan said this. He said, Alas, some men are as if they were for naught else born but to eat and to drink and pamper their carcasses with the dainies of this world, quite forgetting why God sent them hither. But such as is said, fear not God. And so consequently are the number of them upon whom the day of judgment will come at unwares. They pamper their carcasses with the dainties of this world. That's what you're all about. Those who don't fear God, hey, let's just eat, drink, and be merry. This is just life. This is how it is when you're not walking in the fear of the Lord. Jesus too, Luke 21, 34 said, watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness. and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly, like a trap. There's that trap language again. The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life, that you might avoid the snares, traps of death. Don't be given into this drunkenness stuff, that the day of the Lord come upon you. You're not walking in the fear of the Lord, you're falling into that drunkenness trap. It's a trap, and it's a snare. I gotta keep moving here. The third characteristic is the covetous and greedy person does not fear God. Covetous and greedy person does not fear God. Men that fear God are said to hate covetousness and greed. You remember in Moses' day when he was responsible for watching over Israel and it was just a vast people? And his father-in-law came and said, look, you can't handle this. You need help. And that was from the Lord. He did need help. And by inspiration, he says, it's in the scriptures, Exodus 18, 21, regarding greed or covetousness, he says, look for able men from all the people, men who fear God, who are trustworthy and hate a bribe. Look for those guys. They fear God, and one thing about that is they hate a bribe. They're not greedy. These are the ones to look after you, look over you, and help you, Moses, look over them. Place such men over the peoples as chiefs of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and of tens. Psalm 10, verse three says, for the wicked boasts of the desires of his soul, And the one greedy for gain curses and renounces the Lord. So the greedy person, covetous, are not walking in the fear of the Lord, do not fear God. That's what struck Paul that wasn't in Romans 7, he realized how covetous he was. But people will try to get This greed, this drive will try to get people to get what they want out of life. They want the world. And Jesus says, if you gain the whole world and lose your soul, what's it profited you? You go to hell, right? You had the world for a little while, then you just go to hell. No, people even use religion to get to get. They'll use that as their motive, to get, to feed their greed. Number four, the liar. The liar is not fear of God. The root of all lies, bearing false witness, is this lack of the fear of God. That's what it is. And Satan is the father of lies, isn't he? One of the Ten Commandments right there, you shall not lie, you shall not bear false witness. And this comes in all kinds of disguises, in all formats, isn't it? There's this, the profane, bold-faced liar, who's just lying, you know it. Or there's the hypocritical, religious lie. You're living a lie. You're not walking in the fear of the Lord. Or the cunning, artificial, you're not, you're scheming, is what you're doing. you're spinning or you're scheming to get some political or business advantage or some advantage over someone. Well, there's many, many, many different forms of this, but this is reality. Unless they repent, they'll end up in hell, just like Revelation 22 verse 15 says. And verse 14 before that, Revelation 22 says, blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life, that they may enter the city by the gates. Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. This love of falsehood, this love and practice of falsehood. These are not walking in the fear of the Lord. Fifth thing, fifth characteristic. This is interesting. Those who cry out to God for help in time of need, where there are troubles, and when they are delivered, they then return to their former rebellion or sins. These do not fear the Lord. Pharaoh's a good example, isn't he? All these plagues start hitting, so Moses appealed to God for deliverance. And he would, it'd be delivered, and he'd just return right back to it. Proverbs speak to this thing, the dog returning to his vomit. But people receive blessings, and it's a dreadful thing, it's a scary thing to receive all these blessings and then take these blessings and use them in rebellion against God. They're not walking in the fear of the Lord. They don't fear God if that's what they're doing. You cry to God for help when you're sick, you want healing, or you're in a desperate financial situation, and you've now, the Lord's somehow provided out of His just calm and grace, or you just, you're in bondage to something, He's given deliverance, or you take these blessings and rebel, This happens, doesn't it? This happens. I mean, God's blessed us anyway with life. We've been taking God's blessings and using them as an instrument of rebellion against God. These are not fearing God. A few months back, Brother Lee preached from Ezekiel 16. This picture of this baby girl that God, or this man found as the Lord, that wallowing in her blood, dying, he saved, healed, raised, fed, nourished, provided for, she became beautiful. And the essence of Ezekiel 16 there is that you also took your beautiful jewels and my gold and silver and you played the harlot with them. So they're not, this is not the fear of the Lord, you see. Sixth thing, I think I'm gonna stop with seven today, but sixth thing is those who cause God's people to stumble, or who rejoice at the afflictions, temptations, and backslidings of Christians. Those people do not fear God. You can guarantee it. It would be better to have a great millstone tied around your neck than to harm one of Christ's sheep. Jesus taught that. The Apostle Paul, before he was converted again, he truly wasn't walking in the fear of God, was he? Even though he was a religious man. That's all it was. He was religious. He wasn't really fearing God when he was persecuting Christians. And after becoming a Christian, he was singing a totally different tune, wasn't he? I won't eat meat. I won't drink wine. I won't do anything to cause one of the brethren to stumble, to hurt them. That's walking in the fear of the Lord. And that's a blessing. That's a blessed life, actually. That's a mature Christian right there. Avoiding traps, avoiding these things or any temptations that would therefore cause ease to stumble. So he had some self-control, didn't he? Well, those that rail at Christians, Remember that little part when Jesus was on the cross and both thieves on the cross? One of them was railing at Jesus, wasn't he? And the other thief countered him and says, hey guy, what was the question he asked him? Do you... He's been good. Do you not fear God, seeing that we are justly under this condemnation? He's done nothing wrong. He brought this up. He said, do you not fear God even in this, in the situation we are with nails in our hands? And you're railing at Him? Well, people rail at Christians. They love seeing Christians stumble. They love seeing Christians fail. They try to trip them up. They try to trap. They try to do things. Where they secretly are just watching, hoping, I hope they blow it. That is, they do not fear God. That's the case. Okay, number seven. Those who take more heed to their own dreams than to the Word of God, do not fear God. Think of this one. You're more consumed with your own dreams, your own ambitions, your own plans, more than to what the Word of God says. That's your driving force, so to speak. Ecclesiastes 5.7 says, for when dreams increase and words grow many, there is vanity. But God is the one you must fear. Isaiah 8.20 says, to the teaching and the testimony, if they will not speak according to this word, it is because they have no dawn. They have no light. They have no insight. It's knowledge. the pure Lord's beginning of knowledge. They have no wisdom, the pure Lord's beginning of wisdom. They're not heeding this word. They have no dawn, Isaiah says it. These dreams and plans and ambitions that come from the flesh or the world or the devil, at times they embolden people to hope that things are going to turn out good. They're going to make you happy. This is what will make me happy, this dream I have, or this ambition, this lifestyle. Whereas the Word of God may be in complete contradiction to what that dream is saying, or driving you to do, or that ambition. The Word of God is saying, watch out for that. Those who live that way, they don't fear God, they don't. They're in that state of flattery, self-flattery. They're blinded. They're flattering themselves. You just think of our day and age, and you can see this. You can see how people want to live a certain lifestyle, whether it be abandoning the natural form of marriage, man-woman relationships. This will make me happy. No, it won't. It will lead to death. It will lead to condemnation. Any dream that flies in the face of the scriptures is something that's causing you not to walk in the fear of God. I want to read this, Jude 1 verses 17 and 18, verses 19. It says, you must remember, beloved, the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. They said to you, in the last time there will be scoffers following their own ungodly passions. It is these who cause divisions, worldly people devoid of the spirit. Okay. Well, there's more. Maybe in a minute, some of you may have some, but to sum it up, these are some important aspects of those that do not fear the Lord. Characteristics and some good questions to ask ourselves about ungodly fears and those that can be prompted by the flesh, the devil, or the world. And there may be some characteristics I've mentioned that we need to grow in sanctification in, right? We need to repent of, perhaps, and start walking in the fear of the Lord. And that's my aim for myself and for all of us, is to focus on this great theme and to think through this need and this blessing of walking in the fear of God, walking in the knowledge and the fear of the Lord. So next time, I think it's important, it won't be next week, but the next time we're willing, I'll talk about how to grow in the fear of the Lord. Okay, amen. We may have a few minutes for some questions or thoughts or anything you want to bring up that I may have not brought up you think is important, feel free or have a burning question. That thorough, huh? It's okay. All my aim is, this is just priming the pump. I have not exhausted this. You'll start reading your Bibles, and you'll start seeing this. That's my hope. Or else it'll start helping reinforce the joy, the liberty, the blessing, and the dangers. I'm just walking in the fear of the Lord in this. Okay, that's going to give us about 20 minutes to stand and enjoy each other and have some fellowship. Let me pray. Father, we praise your holy name. Do work in us, we pray, this godly fear. Unite our hearts to fear your name. Bless this truth to your people, Lord. If I said something amiss or inaccurate, I trust you to correct it. And Lord bless the fellowship and the upcoming time of worship and singing and hearing of the preaching of your word. We love you and pray in Jesus name. Amen.