"If that’s true, if you don’t know who I am,
then maybe your best course… would be to tread lightly."
Walter White, "Breaking Bad"
"Then they set out, and the terror of the God fell upon the towns all around them so that no one pursued them." Genesis 35:5 (Emphasis mine)
Do you remember how the Lord Jesus used an unjust judge as an illustration of God, the perfectly just judge? I'm about to do something like that. Again, this is not going to be a one to one correlation.
Having said that...
When I thought of the terror of God as I read Genesis chapter 35, the character Walter White came to mind. I thought about his scariness and realized it wasn't his meth dealing power or incredibly evil acts done in the name of his family or his ego. It was an indescribable intensity that communicated immanent danger if you crossed him. Not muscle or might. Presence. Danger's essence. Manifest. Real. You can see and feel.
The terror of God is like that with the children of God who trust Him and are forgiven of sin.
In Genesis 35, Jacob and his family were obeying a command from God to go to Bethel, purifying themselves, and removing all idols from their midst. In chapter 34, Jacob's sons had just killed all of the men in a town where their sister Dinah was raped. Jacob feared danger from the surrounding cities, but instead the surrounding cities experienced the terror of God falling upon them, and did not pursue Jacob and his family. The terror of God. A feeling. Menacing.
The cities may not have known who God was, but because of this, they knew they should tread lightly!
If you are a child of God, trusting in Him, and purified from all your sin, then as you go through life, know that the terror of God is felt by those who mean you harm.
But if you are not God's child, or you are His child and are living in sin, know that YOU will feel the terror of God. Tread lightly. Turn from your sin. Do it now.
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