1 John 4:18

Verse 18. Fear is not in charity, and so forth By the fear, which a perfect charity and love of God excludes, we may understand a fear of temporal losses in this world, of the loss of goods, of banishment, of torments, of death itself, which the love of God made so many glorious martyrs contemn; or an anxious servile fear of punishment in the next world, for the more perfect charity and the love of God is, so much the more doth it banish this imperfect and servile fear; but as perfect charity does not exclude a love, and constant desire of loving God as our last end, for whose enjoyment we were created, so it does not exclude a fear of displeasing, offending, and losing him by sin. Witham.—Perfect charity, or love, banisheth human fear, that is, the fear of men; as also all perplexing fear, which makes men mistrust or despair of God’s mercy; and that kind of servile fear, which makes them fear the punishment of sin more than the offence offered to God. But it no way excludes the wholesome fear of God’s judgments, so often recommended in holy writ, nor that fear and trembling with which we are told to work out our salvation. Philippians 2:12. Challoner.