“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge.” (Proverbs 1:7a, NIV)
“The fear of the LORD is the beginning of wisdom.” (Proverbs 9:10a, NIV)
Do you want knowledge? What about wisdom? According to the Book of Proverbs, the fear of Yahweh is the beginning of both knowledge and wisdom.
Why is it that fearing Yahweh is related to knowledge and wisdom?
First we probably ought to come to terms with what it is to “fear” Yahweh (God). What usually comes to mind for most of us when we think about fearing God is being afraid of him in the sense that he scares us. Why are we scared of things? Typically it’s because we think whatever it is might hurt us or it could be that we just don’t understanding something, so naturally we’re scared of what might hurt us or what we don’t understand. And so we take our experience of “being scared” and apply that to fearing God. In some sense it’s helpful, but in others it really isn’t.
Let’s first deal with how it’s not helpful.
When we apply our experience of being scared to the biblical experience of fearing God, we assume Scripture is telling us that God might hurt us, so we should be afraid of him. Our natural response to this is then to do whatever we need to do in order to keep God at a safe distance, because if he gets to close he might really hurt us. That’s just not a helpful picture for what the Bible means by fearing Yahweh.
So, let’s deal with how our experience of being scared is helpful.
We know what it feels like to be scared of something and usually those feelings are justified because the thing is either dangerous or we don’t know enough about it. This can helpfully apply to God. If we get to the point where we think we know everything about God, then we’ve come to a dangerous place. He’s Yahweh—the great I AM. It’s not possible for us to know everything about him; therefore, if we think we do, we’re on dangerous ground and we ought to be scared. The other idea is one of danger. Here C. S. Lewis is helpful. In the Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe there’s a scene between Susan, Mrs. Beaver, and Mr. Beaver about Aslan the lion.
“Aslan is a lion—the Lion, the great Lion." "Ooh," said Susan. "I'd thought he was a man. Is he—quite safe? I shall feel rather nervous about meeting a lion." "Safe?" said Mr Beaver; "don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? 'Course he isn't safe. But he's good. He's the King, I tell you.”
You see, Aslan is lion and he’s not a tame lion. Susan thought he was safe, as in she could forget that he was actually a lion. This is a mistake. It’s healthy for her to fear Aslan, not because he’ll hurt her or because he’s unpredictable, but because he’s a lion. She can, however, trust him because he’s good—he’s the king.
I think this helps us in our understanding of fearing God. Do we have to be scared of him? No. Is he unpredictable? No. Is he tame? Absolutely, not! He’s God! And, therefore, it’s proper for us to “fear the LORD”. You can see this healthy response to God throughout Scripture. When people in the Bible encounter God they often fall on their faces thinking they’re going to die. This is not because God is scary, it’s because he’s God and there’s no one like him.
So, now we come back to the two statements in Proverbs 2 and 9. The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge and wisdom.
Again, why is this the case?
Because, without first starting with a true recognition of who God is, we can never really expect to know anything else. How can we possibly expect to have real knowledge and real wisdom if we’ve ignored the source of all true knowledge and wisdom by refusing to see him for who he is?
Do you want knowledge? Fear God, because he’s good and he’ll give you true knowledge.
Do you want wisdom? Fear God, because he’s good and he’ll give you true wisdom.
Start with the fear of the LORD, not because you’re scared of him, but because you recognize that he is good.