There are many misundesrtandings of the personality of God. Many people believe him to be angry. Too many times people choose good lives because they are afraid of a God who will send them into an everlasting pit of fire. We can all agree its good to make good choices. But why should we do them? In a court of law, why don't they take a persons testimony if it was given at gunpoint? If we do something good only because we fear the everlasting pit of fire, then are we really living the truth of who we are?
God is our father, and he loves us very much. Remember that the only thing that God gets in return for all creation is our love for him and the joy he gets from watching us succeed. The only way he could get any joy in doing this is if he loved us. There is nothing but love that is in it for him. Because of this love we need to do all we can to do what he says and to trust in him. We can trust him because he has a purpose behind every commandment. Not just any purpose, it is a love driven purpose. A purpose to help US and not HIM. We can't always see the purpose, but as we look for one he will help us find one.
Prayer is an example of a commandment that is all for us. It is a commandment to pray to our Heavenly Father. To some they see this as its all for God. For us to always praise him. That he just lives off of our praise. I beg to differ. Prayer is not just praise. We should praise him, because we love what he is doing for us. Prayer is a two way communication with God. Its a time to ask for advise. Its a time to receive answers. This is the purpose of prayer. So that we can open a conduit to heaven and allow God to help us in our lives. When we don't pray, we shut out God. Without prayer we will not listen. If we don't listen to God then we won't have his guidance. We will run around lost in life and have no-one else to blame but ourselves.
There are some who will say, Doesn't the Bible say we must Fear God? so how can we do something out of love if we are always in fear? Lets understand now what it truly means to "Fear God". Fear in this sense is a "Godly fear" as found in Hebrews 12:28 "Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear." Already we can see it has a different meaning. It is used along side with reverence. When we find the fear of the lord in the scriptures is is found to be equivalent to reverence, awe, worship. ways we should really act towards such a loving God.
Proverbes 3:7 states that "the fear of the lord is to hate evil" and later in 14:26 it says in the fear of the lord is strong confidence. It also states that the fear of the lord is the beggining of knowledge. If we can master to hate all evil then we can only love all that is good. We can only love God. So fear in this sense is actually a feeling of love.
The fear as we understand fear should not be in our lives. 1 jn 4:18 states that "there is no fear in love, but perfect love casteth out fear." in the same chapter it speaks how God is Love. Look at what the angels always say. When they spoke to Mary the mother of Jesus. "fear not"
Now I know you can't just all of a sudden develop an enormous amount of love for god just from reading what I have to say. I know that God loves you and I know that you also can Love him with more love then you ever have. You first need to get to know God. Get to know what he has truly done for you. I would suggest making a list of all the blessings you have. Read the scriptures and make note of the mercy God has shown to all mankind. I would strongly suggest reading the book of Mormon and think about the mercy that he shows to all mankind throughout the book. Most importantly, talk to God. Don't just give him a speech and leave. Actually have a conversation with God. Speak to him as if he is there face to face with you. Listen carefully to what your heart tells you he is saying back. If you do this you will receive answers to your prayers and begin to realize more powerfully the great love that God has for all mankind.
So we should still keep the commandments, if we aren't we need to show our love and change. We should not follow God in fear, but in faith. We should show God all the reverence we can. Not because we fear him, but because we love him. And we should always understand that God really does love us.
