Very often, when picking beans or tomatoes in the garden, I work alongside the neighborhood honey bees. They’re busy ransacking the blossoms and thinking about a honey supply for the long Maine winter ahead of us. At the same time, I’m picturing shiny and colorful jars of beans and spaghetti sauce to store on my basement shelves.
The bees’ stamina far exceeds my own. Standing up every so often to rest my back, I realize, too, that they were better designed for garden work. I watch their progress and listen to their busy buzz with a bit of envy because if I don’t stop to rest my back, if I fail to respect my own limitations, I can depend on an injury.
An injury will lead to a few days on an ice pack—or worse! There in the bean patch, I’m learning the goodness and the wisdom of a healthy fear.
Maybe it’s because my reading plan has me deep into Isaiah’s prophecy that this verse came to mind:
Thus says the Lord…this is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.”
Isaiah 66:1-2
God is not looking for the kind of fear that interferes with our relationship. Rather, he is looking for a heart to dwell in, a heart that is tender and broken, the heart of a person who takes his Word seriously. Servile fear, the fear of a slave, leads to dread, but filial fear is borne of love and leads to a healthy reverence like that between a parent and a child.
God looks for a heart to dwell in, the heart of a person who takes his Word seriously with a fear borne of love and reverence. “This is the one to whom I will look: he who is humble and contrite in spirit and trembles at my word.”
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Just as I dread “offending” my back by overworking in the garden, I want to grow in my fear of offending God. Here are a few filtering questions I’m pondering:
- When I sense the Spirit prompting me to write about a topic that will “step on my readers’ toes,” do I obey because I fear disobeying God more than I fear losing my audience?
- Am I willing to keep my mouth shut when God the Spirit convicts me that my joke might hurt someone’s feelings or that my tidbit of news might lead to gossip?
- As I read God’s Word, do I bring to the text an awareness of how short I fall from God’s ideal and how helpless I am to mend my failings in my own strength?
- In prayer, do I flood God with my words, issue a to-do list, and then “hang up the phone”—or do I listen with vulnerability and respect for God to apply His Word to my heart?
Thanks for spending a few moments pondering with me in the garden!
Do these filtering questions strike a responsive chord with you in your own following life?
Holding You in the Light,
Filtering question for writers: When I sense the Spirit prompting me to write about a topic that will “step on my readers’ toes,” do I obey because I fear disobeying God more than I fear losing my audience?
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Living Our Days 
Gardens provide such rich lessons!
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Your filtering questions did make me think about how I live, especially the last one. I am going to change the way I come to prayer and ask God what He wants to tell me before I start my list of needs…ahem, wants. 😉
Thanks for these questions. I do appreciate how you ask things that make one stop and think. I am very guilty of going through my days on auto-pilot and not really living my days. When I read a post from you, I stop and think.
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What a great gift to know that we are thinking together! Blessings to you as you approach prayer in a new way…
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Michele: Thank you for those questions. They make me think about how I can improve myself in relation to others. Especially that last one.
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Isn’t it great to put on the brakes for just a nanosecond and then to take time to process motive and do a little heart check?
Thanks for joining me in the practice.
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That last question tagged with my heart, Michele. As I pray each morning over various needs, people, and ministries, I want to “listen with vulnerability and respect for God to apply His Word to my heart.” I’ve put a Post-It to that effect in my prayer box. Thank you, friend, for urging us step-by-step toward the people we want to be, for our Father’s glory!
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Thank you, Nancy, for responding. I know that I also get “tired of myself,” and often catch myself crashing into the presence of God with my agenda and a red pen, ready to give God my list and then be on my way. Prayer is SO MUCH MORE than this!
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I love what you wrote–that, “God is looking for a heart to dwell in …” And your encouragement to be a better listener during my prayer times. I tend to talk too much!
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And a companion verse might be “For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the contrite ones.” This helped me in the early days of salvation.
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That IS a good verse to keep close!
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I like your explanation of the difference between servile fear and filial fear. And your filtering questions do strike a chord. Sometimes we think of spending time with God as those moments when we’re actively reading the Bible or praying. But we need to walk with Him all through the day, listening for His prompts or checks in our spirit.
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I find that distinction so helpful!
And I’m experimenting right now with distilling my daily Bible reading down to a sentence that I can carry with me, some truth about God that I can bring to my own behavior and mindset for the day. I’m reading through the Bible and 3-4 chapters a day is a lot to process. I want to walk with him, to walk in truth even after I’ve read Truth.
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I’m happy you explained the difference between servile fear and filial fear. I get it now. You know, I’ve asked myself some of those questions. I have a running dialog going in my head with Jesus all day. We talk about everything from light bulbs and tissues to helping me make dinner. Then at bedtime is when I talk about more focused things, and wonderings, it’s then that I talk about specific prayers for those on my list in my journal. I love those garden moments.
Thank you bunches for sharing this with Sweet Tea & Friends this month dear friend.
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