I was speaking to a retired Principal of our local elementary school once and she relayed a story to me. She said that 20 years ago or so it was decided to close some of the smaller schools and merge them with others. This meant that our school was going to be receiving a lot of kids from other schools. She and the assistant principal (one of the nicest men that I have ever met) were discussing it because they did not know how these children would behave. She instructed the assistant principal to just walk the halls with a wooden paddle. She said just carried it around with you. He expressed to her that he couldn’t spank the kids without written permission from the parents. She said that she didn’t want him to spank them, but put the fear of it in them. Well it worked very well and he didn’t have to carry it very long. The funny thing about this story is that I was visiting the school recently and the kindergartners had drawn pictures of the staff and the teacher would write what they wanted to say about them on it. Repeatedly they had drawn the assistant principal, who still worked there, and had written that he has the paddle. Notice that I made the point to talk about how nice the assistant principal was. I did this because I wanted to make the point that he had a reputation that didn’t match his personality.
I feel like we have this mentality that God is like the assistant principal at our school. Like He is walking around with a big stick waiting to get us if we do wrong. God is not sitting there waiting for you to mess up so He can punish you. You realize it says that God is for us in Romans 8:31. He is not waiting for you to mess up, but rather he is rooting you on. He wants you to succeed. Remember that the LORD is gracious, and full of compassion; slow to anger, and of great mercy (Psalm 145:8 KJV). That doesn’t sound like a God that is wanting to beat you up over your failures. He will correct you and lead you to repentance, not in anger but in love.
Stop walking around in fear that God is waiting to get you for messing up. Rejoice in the love that He has for you. Walk in this love because perfect love casteth out fear (1 John 4:18).
Psalm 103:10-13 KJV 10 He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. 11 For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. 12 As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us. 13 Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.
Jeremiah 29:11 KJV For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.