The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge….”

(Proverbs 1:7a)

Yir’ah, is the Hebrew word translated here as fear. But the Hebrew concept of fear of God is not the stomach knotting, heat-up-the-back-of-the-neck, trembling that causes us to freeze and cringe or make panicked choices. Yir’ah is more akin to awe; the feeling that we can get when we look up at the night sky and feel overwhelmed by the immensity of space and simultaneously terrified at the thought of our own smallness. The feeling of being overtaken by the truth that there is a reality far, far greater than ourselves and our own lives and that somehow we are intimately and inextricably a part of it and its purposes.

Living a life in “fear of the Lord” is to live a life in trembling awareness that our living has ultimate meaning. That the choices we make have an ultimate significance far beyond our abilities to think or feel or ascertain their value. It is living our days in trembling awareness of the Divine presence all around us.

Albert Einstein wrote: “The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the power of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. To know that what is impenetrable to us really exists, manifesting itself as the highest wisdom and the most radiant beauty, which our dull faculties can comprehend only in their most primitive form so this knowledge, this feeling, is at the center of true religiousness. In this sense, and in this sense only, I belong to the rank of devoutly religious men.”

May we come in prayer this week seeking the Diving presence in all that is around us. Many we come asking that our small and prayerful hearts be opened to the truth of the impenetrable mystery of our existence; to the depth of wisdom, of radiant beauty, of awe which is at once incomprehensible to us and woven most intimately into our very beings. May we seek there to make choices for our living which will deepen our knowledge of the Divine reality by which grace we are free to know and choose. Amen.