For the past few years I have been trying to convey some spiritual concepts to my church going friends in the west about the way God is viewed in the Eastern Christian ethos. I have been trying to explain the concept of “Reverence” and what it is “to revere” the divine and be “in awe” of God.

The bible in short defines righteous or Godly men and woman as those who “revere” or “reverence” God and are “in awe” of him. This “reverence for and awe of” God makes for a way of living and morality that is determined by this approach to God. The reverence for God in turn inspires or in a sense governs every aspect of the believer’s life, down to, if I may exaggerate in saying, “the Molecular Level”.

Having reverence for God and developing a relationship with God on these grounds in turn inspires the believer to seek to respect and emulate the divine’s nature and ethics and actively participate in seeking and doing his will. As the believer experiences God’s presence first hand, they want to convey it as a witness to the divines power. The believer loves every aspect of the Devine’s creation with a deep respect of God’s purpose and plan, acknowledging and fully respecting his perfection, wisdom and power. In respecting God’s creation they extend kindness to all of his creation and live their lives with a sense of humility, compassion, equity and justice towards all living things, especially human beings.
With that said, the general attitude of a believer is “how can I live a life that is pleasing to God and that humbly conveys his righteousness to everyone I meet?…..EVERYONE I meet? How can I better understand his purpose and plan and his ways and how I should treat his creation? What are the purpose of his instructions and laws given to previous generations and what purpose do they serve in the here and now?

One of the problems I always encountered in growing up in the west is that regardless of denomination, church or “theological” persuasion, there was always the approach to God that allowed a person to pick and choose what aspects of God they liked, question his actions and motives and “do away” with whatever wasn’t convenient or conducive to a comfortable lifestyle. God wasn’t revered, he was not held in awe, he was not the center of life that influenced or guided ones behavior or moral code. Rather he was “an add on”, a political tool, a being in the background who answered material whims or in some cases was on the payroll to respond to one’s material or superfluous request. In the west, our morality wasn’t/isn’t governed by God because our God was/is us….and social and moral behaviors reflected the idolatry we practice.

I always heard and still hear, “the law is done away”, you don’t have to do this, you don’t have to do that, etc, etc, etc. “Just believe” and say his name. Problem is, how can you believe in a God you partially reject? How can you have your morality shaped by a God you second guess and claim to know more than? And how can you claim a God who actually takes a back seat to your own ego?
I reflected on this in contrast to what I saw today in Ethiopia. Today I watched grown men and woman lay prostrate, face to ground as they prayed to God. I watched armies of my elders at times in tears as they prayed to the Father through Christos. I watched people who, like their counterparts in other parts of the Eastern and pockets of the western world who actually revere and hold in awe the God of the Hebrew Scriptures. People who make the homeless, the orphan, the foreigner, the elderly, the needy, at risk and abused a priority for service. I have been living among and am watching those who exhibit the attitude and posture towards God I simply characterize as “reverence and awe”. The day we all begin to revere and respect the creator of the universe, and learn to desire the same things he wants for his creation is the same day we all begin to move forward and make our planet a better place to live and exists for all mankind, until the kingdom is fully established on the Earth.