Looking Past My Teddy Bear

If you read my last blog post, Keys, you saw that at the end I gave a little rant about octopuses. They have been made into adorable stuffed animals and cartoon figures, but in real life they are terrifying and in my opinion, gross as heck. Super slimy with eight legs that will suction cup you to death. Why oh why do we make them cute and cuddly? (If you happen to actually love the real version of octopuses, please don't take offense.)

Same goes for Bears. Stephen Colbert has proclaimed a war on Bears for this very reason. We let kids hug their teddy bears and fall in love, yet let a kid hug a real bear and chances are they will be eaten. The grizzly man was convinced that Bears were just misunderstood, but even he was eaten by a Bear.

We like to take things like Octopuses, and Bears, and many other things and portray them as much safer than they really are. We take all of the fear out of them and think of them as comforting and cuddly. I was thinking about this, and I realize that I do the same thing to God.

It is so easy to remember the safe characteristics of God, to think of him as a dotting Father, to camp on the stories of Christ loving on children and dining with prostitutes. To celebrate the verses in Zephaniah that declare that God rejoices over us with singing. The reality is that we are also commanded to fear God. 

Philippians 2:12-13
 Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling,  for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Psalm 128:1
Blessed is everyone who fears the LORD, who walks in his ways!

I've been reading through the old testament this year, and God is indeed scary. People are struck down for what seems to be the smallest of sins. There is war upon war. Oh and there is also that little story of a flood that wipes out the entire population, save Noah and a boat full of animals. What do we do with this God who is worthy of fear and trembling?


I know for a long time I just didn't dwell on the scary side of God. I would steer clear of Acts, because I didn't want to think about Ananias and Sapphira. I made excuses that the Old Testament was a different time, a different covenant. The reality is that God is constant and never changing, and the fearsome God that the Israelites worshiped it the very same God I talk to everyday.

It is also true that God is only good. There is no evil in Him and so these parts of God that are scary, they too are worthy of my praise. They are to be embraced and rejoiced over. It seems very strange to celebrate some of these things, like a flood wiping out the worlds population, or a woman turned to a pillar of salting for looking back at her old life, (however wrong her old life was) but this is what I am learning to do. I am learning to rejoice over all of who God is, not just the parts that are comfortable and easy. I am learning to look past my teddy bear aside, and to see the bear as he truly is.