Well, the question is where do we get our wisdom? From God or man? As you would suggest, God rules with love, yet the truth would be: God is love and therefore rules. So we need not analyze what love means with human reasoning, applying not to what God tells us. We need to be humble before all things love says, and as it becomes clear - act immediately towards it. we learn from the Master what love means. To learn constitutes a new idea that we behaviorally change in ourselves to apply to.
Are you alive to the doctrine of love or alive in Christ Jesus? 2 Timothy 3:16, tells us there are four issues God interacts with man. Are we to eliminate two of them due to an unevenness in our common sense? Or are we to learn from God, because we have placed our faith in Him, that the only wisdom worthy of listening to is Himself. After all, He is love thus, when He states that the Bible is useful for...Teaching, Rebuke, Correction, and Training, are we to debate God in the areas common sense opposes Him? Do we recalibrate the truth to be more palatable by saying God gives us the right to rebuke and correct others for those not like us - His Children? aiming our righteousness full of pride directly in their sights like a missile? God's Word is clear: Our Lord not only requires chastity of body; He requires chastity of thought. You see wisdom comes from God, and God doesn't need you to agree with it, simply accept it, as you become it. God is love and everything He says is for our best, He is not interested in "our good enough" for this is the Character of love. This is the Character of God.
As strange as it may sound, sin seems to have a will of it's own. Truth be told, sin is a being, and not a noun. Like an addiction, sin takes hold of us and causes us to act in ways we never wanted. I read Paul, and for him the Cross of Jesus deals finally and definitely with the dual reality of sin. Not only are we forgiven of our sins (which I believe you are not contesting); our willful acts of disobedience - but we are also liberated from the power of sin. (To this I ask: "Do you believe that?").
In the incarnation and sacrificial death of Jesus, God is at work to extend salvation to those who fall under sin's addiction. They are liberated from its power, cleansed of its stain. By "God's restorative justice," Paul means first the justice that belongs to God and reflects His Character. God is just, fair, or in a word, righteous. But Character is dynamic, not static. This means that God's justice must express itself in some way. So it is in the nature of God's justice that He acts to restore and repair a world that is not the way it should be. Above all, it is God's saving actions thru Jesus that constitute the gift of God's restorative justice. Thus, faith without (good) works is dead. What you suggest to see as "fear imposed" I see as freedom to offer my life a living sacrifice Holy and acceptable to God. In essence aligning my life with God where God is well-pleased and not grieved.
Grace is no license to sin. As creatures we are made to serve our Creator. In the absence of truth we will serve somebody or something. It's an essential part of our nature. Our only choice is this: Whom will we serve? At one time, we all served sin and grew weak under its deadly power over us. Now, thru God's grace, we have not been freed from serving, but have become servants of obedience that sets us right with God, each other, and ourselves.
We must daily decide whose servant we are and offer Him our hands, our feet, our hearts, our eyes. But, be clear; there is no Spirit of Humanism, this is the subtle lie of Satan accepting you to give God all things save one: the power to rule you. Galatians 2:20 shows us the outcome of a man "IN CHRIST." A man whom is free to walk in the valley of the shadow of death and to fear no evil. God's purposes will be served... are we proud to be apart of His intentions and purposes? Do we love Him whom will share His glory? "If you love Me, you will obey my commandments." Does this sound like a regime of fear? No, God is love; However, does it not also include obligation, The awe of God, and the belief in His Word's that what he says will come to pass?