December
9

“And Fear Fell upon Him”

While he exercised the priest’s office in his daily service before God, according to the custom of the priest’s office, it was his lot° to burn incense when he went into the temple° of the Lord. … And° there appeared to him an angel of the Lord … And Zacharias was disturbed at the sight, and fear fell upon him. And° the angel said to him, Fear not, Zacharias, for thy prayer is heard, and thy wife Elizabeth shall give birth to a son for thee, and thou shalt call his name John. And thou shalt have joy and gladness, and many shall rejoice at his birth. For he shall be great in the sight of the Lord … and he shall be filled with the Holy Spirit, even from his mother’s womb°. … And he shall go before Him … to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and in the prudence of the just to make ready the disobedient, a people prepared for the Lord. (Luke 1:8–17)

“Fear not,” means resuscitation, and then adoration from the deepest humiliation. (Apocalypse Revealed 56)

“Fear” is of two kinds—fear in what is not sacred, and fear in what is sacred. Fear in what is sacred is the fear in which are the good. is called reverential or sacred fear, and it is the result of our wonder at and longing for what is Divine, and also of our love. … The fear of love is a fear of injuring the Lord in any way, or of injuring the neighbor in any way, thus of injuring what is good and true in any way, and consequently of injuring the sacred things of love and faith and the consequent worship. (Arcana Cœlestia 3718)

When the Lord was in the world He was in two states, called the state of exinanition and the state of glorification. The prior state, which was the state of exinanition, is described in the Word in many places …. This same state was His state of humiliation before the Father …. But the state of glorification is also the state of union … when the union was complete, that He had “power over all flesh” (John 17:2), and “all power in heaven and on earth” (TCR 104)

previous		next