God is holy in His being and                      generation who were not as enlightened as
                  awesome in His essence.         we.
                  What a marvel that we have
                  come to know this God;              The Old Testament is replete with occa-
                  what a responsibility to        sions when men in all their frailty got a vision
honor this God in our lives. We are reminded      of God. John tells us that when they saw the
that “holy and reverend is His Name” (Psa         glory of God, they were actually seeing the
111:9). While a responsibility, it is also a      Lord Jesus (John 12:41; Heb 1:3). Whether
privilege to be able to bestow honor and to       we consider Moses, Joshua, Isaiah, Gideon,
display reverence to Him from a heart filled      Manoah and his wife, or Daniel, every sight
with worship for Him.                             of the throne and of the Throne-Sitter had
                                                  the same response: a deep sense of unworthi-
The Problem                                       ness and a reverential posture before the
                                                  Lord. Reverence was the result of these polar
    But what is reverence? The very mention       opposites - who we are as mortal men, and
of the word, to some, conjures up images of       Who God is in His self-existent majesty.
people with somber faces, tip-toeing into as-
sembly gatherings, speaking in muted tones,           An argument can be made that in this
and looking as humble as possible. Dress is       day of grace we have been made “sons” and
rigorously prescribed: white shirts only for      enjoy the intimacy of knowing the majestic
men and three piece suits, no open toed           and awesome God as our Father. Point well
shoes for the sisters, and only black or similar  taken! But keep in mind that when John had
drab colors for both the suits of the brethren    a vision of the risen Christ in Revelation 1,
and the dresses of the sisters. Total silence     he, the sole disciple who knew what it was to
prior to the meeting’s commencement and           actually recline on Jesus’ breast, fell at His feet
somberness bordering on melancholy are the        as dead. So great was the majesty, so over-
order of the day. A uniformity which borders      whelming the sight that the only suitable
on cult-like adherence is stamped on the          place was at His feet.
minds of many in association with the word
“reverence.” As a result, the concept of rever-       Reverence as a theme is not absent in the
ence is almost mocked in our contemporary         New Testament. As a word, it is actually
society as something linked with a previous       mentioned seven times in the OldTestament,
                                                  and an equal number in the New Testament.