A30211:116
A treatise of the fear of God showing what it is, and how distinguished…A treatise of the fear of God shewing what it is, and how distinguished…
A treatise of the fear of God showing what it is, and how distinguished from that what is not so : also whence it comes, who has it, what are the effects, and what the privileges of those that have it in their hearts / by John Bunyan.A treatise of the fear of God shewing what it is, and how distinguished from that what is not so : also whence it comes, who has it, what are the effects, and what the priviledges of those that have it in their hearts / by John Bunyan.
London: printed for N. Ponder, 1679
Of several sorts of fear of God in the heart of the Children of men.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
The same fear also possessed the children of Israel when they heard the law delivered to them on Mount Sinai: as is evident, for it made them that they could neither abide his presence, nor hear his word. It drove them back from the Mountain. It made them, saith the Apostle to Hebrews, That they could not endure that which was commanded, Heb. 12. Wherefore this FEAR Moses rebukes, and forbids their giving way thereto. Fear not, said he, but had THAT fear been godly, he would have encouraged it, and not forbid, and rebuke it as he did. Fear not, said he, for God is come to prove you, they thought otherwise. God saith he, is come to prove ⟨p. 39⟩you, and that HIS fear may be before your faces. Therefore that fear that already had taken possession of them, was not the fear of God, but a fear that was of Satan, of their own misjudging hearts, and so a fear that was ungodly, Exod. 20.18.19. Mark you, here is a fear and a fear, a fear forbidden, and a fear commended, a fear forbidden because it engendered their hearts to bondage, and to ungodly thoughts of God, and of his word; It made them that they could not desire to hear God speak to them any more, ver. 19.20, 21.
The same fear also possessed the children of Israel when they heard the law delivered to them on Mount Sinai: as is evident, for it made them that they could neither abide his presence, nor hear his word. It drove them back from the Mountain. It made them, saith the Apostle to Hebrews, That they could not endure that which was commanded, Heb. 12. Wherefore this FEAR Moses rebukes, and forbids their giving way thereto. Fear not, said he, but had THAT fear been godly, he would have incouraged it, and not forbid, and rebuke it as he did. Fear not, said he, for God is come to prove you, they thought otherwise. God saith he, is come to prove ⟨p. 39⟩you, and that HIS fear may be before your faces. Therefore that fear that already had taken possession of them, was not the fear of God, but a fear that was of Satan, of their own misjudging hearts, and so a fear that was ungodly,