Fear of the Lord

I talked with my pastor this weekend about my struggle with being in a personal relationship with the Lord. The retreat I attended in November 2008 and the book "God and His Image" caused an earthquake in my spiritual life centered around the concept of divine filiation. Previously my real spiritual life (as opposed to my intellectual understanding) was based on God as an impersonal force whom it was just for me to worship, who was indeed all-beautiful, all-good, and all-truth, but still an impersonal force, like a forest or the sea, something to appreciate, even worship, but not something to relate to like I relate to my friends or my family.

The deep prayer offered by the retreat let me start to penetrate this shell and worship God because, and as, my Father. What a tremendous difference! The difference between joy and aesthetics.

But that joy touched something deep in me, and this something struck back, and then the struggle was on. The six or seven weeks since the retreat have been as great a period of spiritual warfare as any I've experienced. As always, the Church gives us the weapons: prayer, the sacraments, the Mass, the beauty of the faith.

Anyway, my pastor and I talked about all this. He says this reaction of fear to the Lord's gift of himself is very common. Knowing our own sinfulness, how can we not shrink from the Lord's light? The darkness in us wants to protect itself. My pastor pointed out Peter's reaction when he first became aware of the Lord's divinity: "Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man." (Luke 5:8) Well, unlike Peter, I didn't ask the Lord to leave; I ran as hard as I could in the other direction!

He also had a simple strategy for enlisting Divine help with this problem: just acknowledge my fear to the Lord. When I pray - and prayer is time spent specifically in talking with the Lord - just acknowledge to Him that I am afraid of His friendship, and ask for His help to dispel the fear. Dispelling this fear amounts to dispelling the darkness within me, which is specifically what Jesus wants.

At the November retreat the priest gave me a little formula for my prayers that I can easily adapt: "Lord, I love Thee, help me to love Thee more and more." Now I can say:

"Lord, I love Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."
"Lord, I fear Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."
"Lord, I love Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."
"Lord, I fear Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."
"Lord, I love Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."
"Lord, I fear Thee, help me to love Thee more and more."