The only thing that keeps many people in the Christian faith—including Jews—is a fear of hell

Of the thousands of followers of Jesus whom I know around the world—both Jews and Gentiles—I cannot think of one who continues to follow Jesus primarily because of a fear of hell, let alone only because of a fear of hell. We follow him because we love him and recognize him to be our Messiah. Having said this, there is no question that from a biblical perspective (i.e., Torah, Prophets, Writings, New Testament) a healthy fear of the Lord and a recognition that he is the ultimate Judge provides an added incentive to holy living. So our primary motivation for following the Lord is love; a second motivation is to spend eternity with him in his kingdom; a third motivation is to escape the judgment of hell.

The greatest motivation for service is love. Think of how it drives people to sacrifice. A soldier will fight to the death out of love for his country. A mother will run into a burning house to rescue her children. A husband will lay down his life to save his wife from death. Is there anything love will not do? And love produces love! In the context of our discussion here, God’s love for us produces a response of love for him. How could we not love him, serve him, and give our all to him and for him? He gave his Son for us! That’s why John could write, “We love because he first loved us” (1 John 4:19). His love awakened love in us.

The New Testament is clear on this. We love God and we love one another because of the love he has shown us:

Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another.

1 John 4:7–11

This is how we know what love is: Jesus [the Messiah] laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers.

1 John 3:16

[Jesus said:] My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.

John 15:12–13

It is a gospel principle that he who is forgiven much loves much (see Luke 7:36–50). How much, then, should we love God? He has forgiven all our sins through the death of his Son:

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, [Messiah] died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, [Messiah] died for us. Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, when we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life!

Romans 5:6–10

That’s why Peter could write to his fellow believers, “Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy” (1 Peter 1:8). And that’s why Paul could say of his own experience, “But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of [Messiah]. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing [Messiah] Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain [Messiah]” (Phil. 3:7–8).

Jesus likened this experience to “treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field” (Matt. 13:44). He also likened it to “a merchant looking for fine pearls. When he found one of great value, he went away and sold everything he had and bought it” (Matt. 13:45–46). How often do Christians say that Jesus is the pearl of great price?⁴⁴⁸ And how many hymns and choruses sung in churches and by Messianic congregations joyfully proclaim our loving response to God’s grace toward us? I could write about this almost without end.

There is, however, another side to the story, and that is the fear of the Lord. It is also an important theme. A yachtsman goes out in his boat because he loves boating, but he stays in the boat because he doesn’t want to drown. A healthy fear should not be despised. According to the Hebrew Bible, the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom and knowledge (Job 28:28; Ps. 111:10; Prov. 1:7; 9:10), an antidote to sin (Exod. 20:20; Prov. 16:6), the key to long life and blessing (Ps. 34:11–22; Prov. 10:27; 14:27), and a rich treasure (Isa. 33:6). In fact, the author of Ecclesiastes summarized things by saying, “Now all has been heard; here is the conclusion of the matter: Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man” (12:13). Why? “For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil” (Eccles. 12:14).

Similar themes are found in the New Testament as well (see, e.g., Matt. 10:28; Acts 9:31; Heb. 12:28–29; 1 Peter 1:17), and Paul could even say, “Since, then, we know what it is to fear the Lord, we try to persuade men” (2 Cor. 5:11). Why? “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of [Messiah], that each one may receive what is due him for the things done while in the body, whether good or bad” (2 Cor. 5:10). Shades of Ecclesiastes and the Hebrew Scriptures!

You see, it is true that God’s people are primarily motivated to serve him out of love not fear.⁴⁴⁹ But it is also true that he has always warned us of the consequences of disobedience. In fact, the lengthy passages in the Torah warning us of the consequences of breaking the Lord’s covenant (see Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28) are more graphic—not to mention far more comprehensive and detailed—than any warnings found in the New Testament. But the entire Bible contains warnings. Moses warned, the prophets warned, the wisdom writers warned, Yeshua warned, his emissaries warned. What else would we expect? Sometimes we need a sharp word of rebuke. Sometimes we need a spiritual slap in the face. Sometimes we need a divine reminder of the awful consequences of sin. I’m glad Jesus said:

If your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.

Matthew 18:8–9

There are many incentives to holiness. What is wrong with this? It’s a good thing to want to escape hell and damnation.⁴⁵⁰

In all candor, I could lodge this objection against Judaism as well. In fact, I could make a much stronger case for the fear motivation in traditional Judaism as opposed to the fear motivation in Messianic Judaism. The image that is always fresh on the mind of followers of Jesus is that of our Messiah dying on the cross on our behalf, as explained in John 3:16, perhaps the most famous verse in the entire Bible: “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” In contrast with this, the image that most strongly presents itself to the Jewish mind—or at least one of the most common images—is that of God giving the Ten Commandments on Mount Sinai. And according to a well-known midrash, God picked up Mount Sinai and held it threateningly over the head of his people Israel, asking them whether or not they would accept his covenant. Not surprisingly, they replied, “Everything the Lord has said we will do” (Exod. 24:3; see also 24:7).⁴⁵¹ Who then is serving out of love and who is serving out of fear?

I also find it ironic that anti-missionaries claim Messianic Jews won’t deny Jesus because they are afraid they will be sent to hell for denying him, but these same anti-missionaries will then tell Messianic Jews that we are guilty of idolatry and are in danger of falling under the fiery judgment of God. One ultra-Orthodox rabbi whom I met at Stony Brook University in the mid-1980s told me that if he and I were living in biblical times, I would have been brought before the Sanhedrin and burning metal would have been poured down my throat! The bottom line is that I love God far too much to let fear tactics turn me away from serving him and honoring his Messiah with all my heart and soul. I honestly believe that if you knew the Lord the way I know him, you couldn’t help but love him too.

Let me leave you with a personal invitation from Yeshua himself, the Good Shepherd who gave his life for the sheep (John 10:10–15), the Savior of the world who invites us to become his friends (John 15:14–15). Only in him will we find satisfaction and rest.

If anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink. Whoever believes in me, as the Scripture has said, streams of living water will flow from within him.… Whoever drinks the water I give him will never thirst. Indeed, the water I give him will become in him a spring of water welling up to eternal life.… I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.

John 7:37–38; 4:14; 6:35

With all that is within me, I urge you to come home to our Messiah and eat and drink with him. There is still room at his table. And even if following him costs you everything, you will never look back with remorse. As expressed by the saintly Robert Murray M’Cheyne 150 years ago, “There is nothing that you can possibly need but you will find it in Him.” And that is why missionary Henry Martyn, despite losing everything and sacrificing his life to reach the Muslim world with the message of Messiah’s love, could also write, “With Thee, O my God, is no disappointment. I shall never have to regret that I have loved Thee too well.”

⁴⁴⁸ For Christian reflections on this, see the chapter entitled “Jesus, the Pearl of Great Price, the Center of Revival” in my book From Holy Laughter to Holy Fire: America on the Edge of Revival (Shippensburg, Pa.: Destiny Image, 1996), 186–95; for Yeshua’s use of parables as compared with the Rabbinic use of parables, see Brad H. Young, Jesus and His Jewish Parables: Rediscovering the Roots of Jesus’ Teaching (New York: Paulist Press, 1989); Brad H. Young, The Parables: Jewish Tradition and Christian Interpretation (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1998).

⁴⁴⁹ For Talmudic discussion on whether Job (and Abraham) served God out of love or out of fear, see b. Sotah 27b; 31a; cf. further b. Yoma 86a–b; b. Yebamot 48b; b. Sotah 22b; b. Sanhedrin 61b–62a; b. Keritot 3a.

⁴⁵⁰ By the way, as mentioned previously, hell is not just a “Christian” concept! The Hebrew Bible speaks of future damnation—see especially Daniel 12:2—and the Rabbinic writings speak of hell and future punishment; see vol. 1, 219, n. 30; and above, 3.25. Cf. further Moore, Judaism, 2:287–322 (“Retribution after Death”).

⁴⁵¹ See b. Shabbat 88a. Putting several midrashic accounts together in popular form, the following narrative emerges: “When Hashem [the Lord] descended upon Har Sinai [Mount Sinai] in a burst of fire, surrounded by a host of 22,000 angels, the earth quaked and there was thunder and lightning [Exodus Rabbah 29:2; Yalqut Shimoni 1:283]. The Bnai Yisrael [children of Israel] heard the sound of the shofar becoming continually louder, growing in intensity until it reached the greatest volume which the people could possibly bear. The fire of Har Sinai rose up to the very heavens, and the mountain smoked like a furnace [see the Mekhilta]. The people trembled with fear. Then Hashem took Har Sinai and suspended it over the people, indicating to them, ‘If you accept the Torah, good, but if not, you will be buried under this mountain!’ Hashem thereby forced the people to accept the Torah, although they had previously accepted it willingly [b. Shabbat 85a].” See Rabbi Moshe Weisman, The Midrash Says, The Book of Sh’mos (Brooklyn: Bnei Yakov Publications, 1980), 180–81. For a lively study of the very caricature of Christianity that forms the basis of this objection (in this case, Roman Catholicism), cf. Piero Camporesi, The Fear of Hell: Images of Damnation and Salvation in Early Modern Europe, trans. Lucinda Byatt (University Park, Pa.: Penn State, 1991). For additional studies on the history of the doctrine of hell, cf. Alan E. Bernstein, The Formation of Hell: Death and Retribution in the Ancient and Early Christian Worlds (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell, 1993); Alice K. Turner, The History of Hell (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1993).

Brown, M. L. (2000). Answering Jewish objections to Jesus, Volume 2: Theological objections (252). Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Books.

The only thing that keeps many people in the Christian faith—including Jews—is a fear of hell