Second. There is a fear of God that drives a man away from God—I speak not now of the atheist, nor of the pleasurable sinner, nor yet of these, and that fear that I spoke of just now—I speak now of such who through a sense of sin and of God's justice fly from him of slavish ungodly fear. This ungodly fear possessed Adam's heart in the day that he did eat of the tree concerning which the Lord has said unto him, "In the day that thou eat thereof, thou shalt surely die." For then, he feared God so much that he sought to hide himself from his presence. "I heard," said he, "thy voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid" (Gen 3:10). Mind it, he had a fear of God, but it was not godly. It was not that that made him afterward submit himself unto him; for that would have kept him from not departing from him, or else have brought him to him again, with bowed, broken, and contrite spirit. But this fear, as the rest of his sin, managed his departing from his God and pursued him to provoke him still so to do; by it, he kept himself from God; his whole man was carried away from him. I call it ungodly fear because it begat in him ungodly apprehensions of his Maker. After all, it confined Adam's conscience to the sense of justice only and consequently to despair.
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 the Hebrews, that "they could not endure that which was commanded" (Heb 12:20). Wherefore this fear Moses rebukes and forbids their giving way to that. "Fear not," said he, but had that fear been godly, he would have encouraged it and not forbid and rebuked it as he did. "Fear not," said he, "for God has come to prove you," but they thought otherwise. "God," saith he, "is come to prove you and that his fear may be before your faces." Therefore, that fear that had already 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 (Exo 20:18-20). 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 anymore (vv 19-21).
Many also at this day are possessed with this ungodly fear, and you may know them by this—they cannot abide conviction for sin. If at any time the word of the law, by the preaching of the word, comes near them, they will not accept that preacher, nor such kind of sermons anymore. They are, as they deem, best at ease when furthest off of God and of the power of his word. The word preached brings God nearer to them than they desire he should come because whenever God comes near, their sins by him are manifest, and so is the judgment too that to them is due. Now these not having faith in the mercy of God through Christ, nor that grace that tends to bring them to him, they cannot but think of God amiss, and their so thinking of him makes them say unto him, "Depart from us, for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways" (Job 21:14). Wherefore their wrong thoughts of God beget in them this ungodly fear; and again, this ungodly fear doth maintain in them the continuance of these evil and unworthy thoughts of God, and therefore, through that devilish service wherewith they strengthen one another, the sinner, without a miracle of grace prevents him, is drowned in destruction and perdition. It was this ungodly fear of God that carried Cain from the presence of God into the land of Nod and that put him there upon any carnal, worldly business if perhaps he might, by so doing, stifle convictions of the majesty and justice of God against his sin, and so live the rest of his vain life in the more sinful security and fleshly ease. This ungodly fear is also what Samuel perceived at the people's apprehension of their sin, to begin to get hold of their hearts; therefore, as Moses before him, quickly forbids their entertaining it. "Fear not," said he, "ye have done all this wickedness, yet turn not aside from following the Lord." To turn them aside from following him was the natural tendency of this fear. "But fear not," said he, with that fear that tended to turn you aside. Now, I say, the matter that this fear worketh upon, as in Adam, and the Israelites mentioned before, was their sin. You have sinned, says he, that is true, yet turn not aside, yet fear not with that fear that would make you so do (1 Sam 12:20). Note by the way, sinner, that when the greatness of thy sins, being apprehended by thee, shall work in thee that fear of God, as shall incline thy heart to fly from him, thou art possessed with a fear of God that is ungodly, yea, so ungodly, that not any of thy sins for heinousness may be compared therewith, as might be made manifest in many particulars, but Samuel having rebuked this fear, presently sets before the people another, to wit, the true fear of God; "fear the Lord," says he, "serve him—with all your heart" (v 24). And he giveth them this encouragement so to do, "for the Lord will not forsake his people." This ungodly fear is that which you read of in Isaiah 2, and in many other places, and God's people should shun it, as they would shun the devil, because its natural tendency is to forward the destruction of the soul in which it has taken possession.
