Fear or Fearless?

I spent a large portion of my life, up to this point, confused when someone mention fearing God.  I thought of the definition that most people think of when the word fear is mentioned.  According to Dictionary.com Fear is defined as:

a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil,pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined; the feeling or condition of being afraid

When I attempted to apply this definition to God, I  had a difficult time.  I couldn't figure out why you would ever want to be afraid of God, and it always seemed backwards to me.  However, over the past two years as I have grown in my faith, I've discovered a much different meaning of fear.  

In Deuteronomy 28:58: If you do not carefully observe all the words of this law that are written in this book, that you may fear this glorious and awesome name, THE LORD YOUR GOD

This verse I believe clears up what it means to fear God.  When we are growing up, our parents placed rules on each on of us, these rules were meant to guide our lives and protect us from danger.  I don't think there is anyone out there anywhere who can say that as a child, you obeyed your parents rules all the time and you never got in trouble.  I think the fear of God is much like the fear that you felt as a child when you did something wrong...or was about to do something wrong and you knew that you were going to get in trouble.  I remember as a kid, when I did something, and I knew my parents would be upset, that i would get that feeling of dread in the pit of your stomach and I feared what my parents would say or do when I got home. I think this fear is a lot like the fear of God.  God has set down rules for our lives, and there are definitely consequences to our breaking God's rules.  

There are several places throughout the Bible where God's fear goes hand in hand with a person's faith in God.  Read Genesis 22:1-12.  In this scripture God is testing Abraham's Faith, when He asks Abraham to sacrifice his only son.  Go back now and read Genesis 22:12:  And He said, “Do not lay your hand on the lad, or do anything to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”  As you can see, your faith in God depends a lot on your fear of God.  When God asked Abraham to sacrifice his only Son I'm sure that Abraham had to be taken a aback.  However, Abraham had faith in God, that God had a perfect purpose for this request.  He had a healthy fear of God in that he went forward with what God had asked him to do.  

If as Christians, we can develop a fear of God, our relationship with God will grow stronger, see Proverbs 2:5 Then you will understand the fear of the Lord, And find the knowledge of God.  As our relationship grows with God, our Fear of God will also grow, and in that we will be able to better see the paths that God has directed us to.  There are other scripture which tells us that a fear of God is vital to following God.

Psalm 128:1  Blessed is every one who fears the Lord, Who walks in His ways.

Proverbs 1:7  The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, But fools despise wisdom and instruction

To me the easiest way to look at it is this, Look to God as your heavenly father, He had given us an entire book which should be used in guiding how we live our lives.  Just as our earthly father may have told us not to climb to high in a tree, our heavenly father has given us the Bible which contains commandments for our lives.  Our earthly Father put rules in place to protect us from harm, so does our heavenly father.