To understand the grounds of this context is highly important.  Mistakes here may be fatal.  To assist the inquirer, the characters of conquerors and captives are drawn in the scriptures.  The verse of which the text is a part, mentions several general characters of the latter kind, and determines their future portion—­The fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone; which is the second death.

In the prosecution of our subject, only one of these general characters will be considered—­the fearful.

Who then are intended by the fearful?  And what is the fear which leads to destruction?

Fearful, is a term seldom used to describe sinners.  It occurs, we believe, in no other scripture.  Every kind of fear is not sinful; much less inconsistent with a state of grace.  “The fear of Lord is the beginning of wisdom”—­it disposes the subject of it to mind the things which belong to peace, and flee to the hope set before him in gospel.  The fear of God is often used to describe the good man, and given as a leading trait in his character.  It is noted in favor of Obadiah, the servant of Ahab, that he “feared the Lord greatly.”

To have no fear of God before one’s eyes, is expressive of great obduracy in sin; of the last grade of depravity.  Yet in the text, the fearful, are mentioned as the first rank of those who will have their part in the burning lake!  What then is this fear?

It may be of several kinds; particularly—­that to which precludes trust in God, and reliance on his grace in Christ—­that which operates to explain away the law of God—­that which puts men upon duty in order to atone for sin—­and that which shrinks from the hardships of religion.

I. The fear which leads down to the lake of fire, may be that which precludes trust in God and reliance on his grace in Christ.

Faith in Christ, and reliance on divine grace in him, are conditions of salvation.  Where these are wanting Christ will not profit.  Faith and reliance are united.  The latter is dependant on the former, and riseth out of it.  “He that cometh to God, must believe that he is, and that he is the rewarder of them that diligently seek him.”

The fearful and unbelieving are here set together—­the fearful and unbelieving shall have their part—­Perhaps they are thus joined to intimate that the fear intended precludes the faith to which the promises are made.

The sinner who is the subject of this fear hath so deep a sense of the sinfulness of sin, especially of his own, that he is afraid to make God his hope—­afraid to look up to the throne of grace, or to ask mercy of God.  He would gladly flee the divine presence, like the first guilty pair, when they heard the voice of God walking in the garden after their fall.  When fear hath this effect, it drives the sinner from the mercy which alone can save him.