Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
Parallel translations
- WEB Serve Yahweh with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
- BSB Serve the LORD with fear, and rejoice with trembling.
- NKJV Serve the Lord with fear, And rejoice with trembling.
- NASB Serve the Lord with reverence And rejoice with trembling.
- NLT Serve the Lord with reverent fear, and rejoice with trembling.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Rulers are called to serve the Lord with reverent fear and to rejoice with trembling. Worship rightly combines awe and joy.
Overview
Service to God is to be marked by holy fear, and even joy is to be tempered by trembling reverence before His majesty. This balance guards both against careless familiarity and against joyless dread. In Christ believers draw near with confidence, yet still worship 'with reverence and awe' (Hebrews 12:28).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Phil 2:12Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.
- Heb 12:28–29Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear:
- Heb 12:25See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven:
- Ps 119:119–120Thou puttest away all the wicked of the earth like dross: therefore I love thy testimonies.
- Ps 89:7God is greatly to be feared in the assembly of the saints, and to be had in reverence of all them that are about him.
- Heb 4:1–2Let us therefore fear, lest, a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it.
- Ps 97:1The LORD reigneth; let the earth rejoice; let the multitude of isles be glad thereof.
- Ps 95:1–8O come, let us sing unto the LORD: let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation.
- Ps 99:1The LORD reigneth; let the people tremble: he sitteth between the cherubims; let the earth be moved.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
The Psalms are Christ's own prayer book and a gallery of his portraits — the suffering one of Psalm 22, the risen Lord of Psalm 16, the priest-king of Psalm 110, the Son to whom the nations are given.
How Psalms 2:11 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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