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# Four Weeks of Waiting on the Lord
- URL: https://blog.makeprayerbeautiful.com/four-weeks-of-waiting-on-the-lord/
- Published: 2026-09-01T18:19:05.000Z
- Updated: 2026-09-01T18:19:05.000Z
- Description: Then the fear of the Lord came, and it was clean.
- Author: Amy Lykosh
- Tags: Hearing God

I once heard Sherrie Moore, founder of Richmond House of Prayer, speak on two kinds of fear. 

There’s the 1 John 4:18 kind: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love.” 

But there’s also the Psalm 19:9 kind: “The fear of the Lord is clean.”

So in one verse, it sounds like we shouldn’t fear, but in the other verse it sounds like we should want fear. 

What is going on here?

Sherrie ran the Richmond International House of Prayer, and God told her to take the fourth watch, from 3-6am, to pray. She said, “It’s *painful*.”

And God said, “No noise. Don’t arrange your emotions with songs.”

So she and a small group got up well before 3am, arrived at the appointed time, and took a spot in a corner in silence. 

They gathered in the center of the room at 5:40am to debrief. “What are you hearing from God?”

The first week, they were all hearing different things. That was fine. 

During the second week they all started hearing the same things.

They kept going. They would invite others to join them, but no one wanted to come. “It was painful, awful, not pretty. Getting up that early, going off to our jobs. Do not think that there was anything special about this. It was more like a dogged determination.”

Then one morning during the fourth week, the fear of the Lord came. “And it was clean. There was no torment, but we knew who God was. I wanted to get rid of *everything* that got in the way of that fear. I wanted *nothing* to cause God to pull away!”

This fear wasn’t a bondage. She was glad to yield to this clean fear. 

The standard 5:40am rolled around, and no one moved. Six o’clock came, and still no one moved. 

Eventually people trickled out to go to their jobs and about their lives. But they couldn’t speak, because the presence of God was so palpable. 

The next day they arrived at 3am, and the fear of the Lord was still there.

It was there every morning for two weeks. 

“It was so safe! So different than fear in the flesh.”

So, yes, the fear of the LORD is clean. And, yes, perfect love casts out fear. 

But those two fears are very different fears.

*Lord, in Psalm 34:11, you say, “Come, ye children, hearken unto me: I will teach you the fear of the LORD.” Lord, we want to know that fear. Teach us, Lord. We want to be clean in your presence.* 

Now to him who is able to establish you in accordance with the gospel,

Amy Joy

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