by Brandy Seay

Created on: June 08, 2009   Last Updated: June 19, 2009

Should we be God fearing? I think not. I believe there is a difference with God loving and God Fearing. The God that I know wants us to do the right things in life and have good morals. He does not want us to live our life scared of him.

I recently had this discussion with a teacher at my child's Christian school. Now mind you, he was 5 and in Preschool. However, they were teaching the children in my opinion to be God-fearing. I have a problem with the fact that this was causing my son great distress. His 5-year-old mind could not fully wrap around the concept. He believed that if he did "anything" wrong he would go to the "bad place." When I asked him to take some medicine he told me that only God could heal you, when I told him that the medicine would help his stuffy nose he replied with "that's not true, only God can heal you and if you don't believe that, then you are going to go to the bad place." Imagine my alarm! When I tried to discuss this with the teacher, I was told that I was attacking her beliefs. Attacking her? What about the well being of the children?

I believe that there are people who would recite the Bible and tell you that God does want you to fear him and his almighty power could strike you down in an instant. I believe that the Bible are "teachings" that are meant for interpretation not necessarily to be held as truth verbatim. The times have changed since Jesus walked the Earth and therefore, there has to be evolution in religion. I believe that each person is put on this Earth to do a certain amount of things, to teach people, to not be selfish and to touch the lives of others. I think when you have done your job, then your time is up. I do not believe that God sits above and says well he is a bad person so I will strike him dead now for eternal damnation. If he really did that, would we live in a world of pedophiles and murderers and rapists?

I also find it interesting that most of the people who claim to be God-fearing are usually the most judgemental. They believe what they believe and that is the only way...their way. If you try to engage or enlighten or even discuss a difference in opinion, then you will be condemned. I believe that everyone, no matter their religion, has a right to their individual beliefs and that as long as you believe in your heart, you will be ok. So I will say to you, live your life with high morals, love in your heart and leave the judgement to God. If we do that then what is there to fear?

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