Consider:
I. The different effects produced by the fear of God and the fear of man in the case of sorrow for sin in ourselves. (1) The fear of man leads directly to concealment, and to all those acts of meanness and falsehood which are practised to escape detection and punishment. (2) The fear of man drives some to feelings of general disgust and hatred towards mankind; others it drives to despair and to thoughts of suicide. (3) The fear of man leads us astray in our treatment of others who have offended.
II. Notice the effect produced by the fear of God. (1) The fear of God brings us to confession, and humiliation, and a grateful hope. (2) It leads us to judge rightly of the comparative guilt of different offences, and to value them, not according to the opinion of men, but according to the word of God. (3) It makes us eager and ready to forgive, even as God, for Christ's sake, has forgiven us.
III. It is remarkable, however, that while the Scripture enforces the most entire indifference to the censure of the world, and condemns so often and so justly the fear of man, yet it teaches us to shock no man's opinion of us arrogantly, and to consider in all trifling matters,as much as we can, how we may please others, not for our sake, but for theirs. The excellence of Christian compliance is that it regards the favour of man, not as an end, but as a means; it does not covet it for its own sake, but that men, by learning to look upon Christians favourably, may be persuaded to become altogether Christians themselves.
T. Arnold, Sermons,vol. i., p. 164.
References: 2 Samuel 24:14. T. Arnold, Sermons,vol. vi., p. 66; J. Baldwin Brown, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xvi., p. 252; J. M Neale, Sermons in Sackville College,vol. ii., p. 85.