Von Balthasar warns us against thinking that scholars somehow have a more correct idea of scripture than persons who simply read the plain meaning of the text. But God's word is simple, lucid; we must not let the notion that scholarship has an entirely different (and far more correct) view of a particular text than we have, distract us from direct and docile contact with the word, without inhibitions, reservations and anxious second thoughts. If we listen obediently, we shall hear what the word wishes to say to us, and whatever else it may contain, it at least contains that. If the scholars are right (and how often the work of one biblical scholar has cancelled out that of others over the course of time!) they can only reveal more in the text than the simple, praying believer has already discovered there.

Theologian Von Balthasar also warns against avoiding the application of the Word of God to our own lives. His contemplation can range over matters of universally valid significance, and he may discover much that is both profitable and correct; he may even come across things, in his contemplation, which God had intended for him. But if he undertakes these wide-ranging flights in order to avoid the demanding face-to-face encounter with the word, his contemplation will be tainted with disobedience and he will not gather the intended fruit. He must look the word in the eyes, the Word who is Christ, who is addressing him (and who also speaks to him through the words of the Old Covenant and of the apostles). God allows us great freedom in prayer, but our spirit's gaze, our reason's reflections and the movements of our will must not deviate from the axis of obedience, even if we find it searingly and unbearably painful. The admonition of the Sermon on the Mount applies here, that before we go to pray, we must forgive our neighbor if we want to receive God's forgiveness (Mk 11:25; Mt 5:23-24). This "having something against" someone is the obstacle that the word must burn away if it is to be a reality in the soul. We may have "something" against our neighbor, against a particular brother or against our fellow men in general, but very often it can be something "against" God himself. It may be a grudge, a reservation, a withdrawal of confidence, a hidden resistance, and now, in this very contemplation, it is to be brought to light by the this very contemplation, it is to be brought to light by the word of God.

The Word of God does make specific moral demands on us.  The teachings of many modern theologians make it possible to avoid the demands the Word makes upon us.  Von Balthasar explains how we must approach the moral demands of the Word.  Nowadays there is a lot of talk of situation ethics. There is no better way of seeing how serious we are about this than in the contemplative encounter with God's word. Here it is not primarily a question of ethical demands (although they do apply) but rather of a right attitude to Christ, of being docile and allowing ourselves to be convinced by him, for, under the forms of the sacred word, it is he who stands before us, offers himself to us and desires us for himself. 

Precisely because it has to do with the very core of the person, contemplation must not get stuck at the peripheral level of mere moral considerations and decisions. We would be doomed to continual frustration and despair, for, with regard to the word, any "progress" we make is always overbalanced by a far greater weight of omission and failure. While the word in contemplation continually demands very definite and concrete life-decisions from us, such demands do not exhaust the confrontation. If this were the case, the man who had displayed an observable ethical obedience would be in a position to control his relationship with the word of God on the basis of "works". Ultimately, however, it is not a matter of isolated works but of a serious surrender of the person. It is a matter of love, which gives itself and gives up all calculation, and yet, precisely because it is in earnest, is very serious about putting it into practice. Kneeling and praying here, I am meant to feel the summons addressed to my love, not to some kind of moral accounting system. It is only in Person-to-person love, the love of the divine Person (i.e., a judging love) for the human, sinful and hence 'judged" person, that man can really submit to the judgment of the word. In this unique relationship between two unique, irreplaceable persons - man cannot take refuge in general abstractions and validities. The Lord wants “everything” from us.  No matter how much we obey Him, we can always obey Him more. 

While we need to repent of our sins, Von Balthasar distinguishes between “godly” and “worldly” grief.  We must carefully distinguish the two forms of "grief", the "godly" and the "worldly": godly grief "produces a repentance that leads to salvation and brings no regret" whereas worldly grief brings only "death". Such "death" is dangerously close in those who, confronted with the judging word, manifest a dejected resignation, accepting condemnation passively without courage. Its opposite, the proper response, is a form of love, however it may express itself: "For see what earnestness this godly grief has produced in you, what eagerness to clear yourselves, what indignation, what alarm, what longing, what zeal, what punishment!" (2 Cor 7:9-11).

Von Balthasar explains how we should have fear.  We do not fear the Lord as an arbitrary tyrant, but as one whom we fear to offend since He has loved us to the fullest on the cross. The lover will know best of all that, if he looks at himself, if he examines himself by the pure light of the Beloved, he has every reason to fear. The lover will not indulge in theoretical speculations about the fiducia contained in faith; he will not discourse upon God's grace which outweighs his sin and thus renders real fear superfluous. Love will discern in the cross the exact reflection of his vast and terrible guilt: "My flesh trembles for fear of thee" (Ps 118:120). ……. Thus the fact that I "have nothing to accuse myself of" can be ambivalent: it may indicate that my conscience judges things by very crude and even imperceptibly falsified standards, compared with God's word. If this is how things stand, is it not natural that man should yearn for true judgment, a final and correct judgment by the word of God - hoping all the time that he may survive this judgment, yet by the Lord's mercy and not through his own deserving?

We need to let the Word of God draw us away from our own worldly evaluation of morality.  Von Balthasar gives us some examples of how the Word of God does this. For example, he comes across the passage in which Paul urges the Philippians to bear with one another and to renounce quarreling and ambition, and humbly to esteem others more highly than themselves. Any sage might have said as much. But Paul goes on to show the link between this attitude of mind and God's emptying himself unto death on the cross, and he challenges each individual to "have this same mind" (Phil 2). Or there is the teaching of John the Disciple, for instance, who says that we should love the brotherhood: this too can be seen to be rooted in man's nature and conscience. But the very next sentence says that the man who hates his brother is a murderer like Cain, and that if a man loves his brother, he knows God, for God is love: here again the exalted, consuming element is brought out. This, then, is how the word of God draws a man into the truth: it opens up to him a world of love in which he feels at ease, which he is bound to acknowledge to be utterly right and suitable, to be most desirable. If he desires to stay there, however, his heart will be swept and purged to its innermost core.  – Jim Nugent, CFP