Missy from
It's Almost Naptime wrote
a really convicting article this week.
It made me think about a sermon I once heard on Zachariah. The pastor asked, "How long do you think it had been since Zachariah had prayed for a baby?" Since he was an old guy, I'm guessing it had probably been a long time. The pastor's point was that God's timing and man's timing is sometimes hugely different and we shouldn't be discouraged if it seems like God has forgotten us.
I am very guilty of doing that. A lot of times, when I pray, I expect God to do something NOW. Like Missy said, "I want [things] to come on MY terms, when I determined they should come." I sometimes view God as a giant coke machine - put in your prayer and the result you want will come out.
It's really disrespectful that I would limit my view of God in that way. The all-powerful, everlasting, infallible, amazing God who loves me does not deserve to be seen as a coke machine. As a song I heard said, "God forbid that I find You so familiar that I think of You as less than who You are...God forbid that I should think of You at all without a humble reverence in my heart."
Proverbs 1:7 says that "the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge: but fools despise wisdom and instruction." I looked up Matthew Henry's commentary on that verse and this is what I found:
Solomon, having undertaken to teach a young man knowledge and discretion, here lays down two general rules to be observed in order thereunto, and those are, to fear God and honour his parents, which two fundamental laws of morality. Pythagoras begins his golden verses with, but the former of them in a wretchedly corrupted state. Primum, deos immortales cole, parentesque honora--First worship the immortal gods, and honour your parents. To make young people such as they should be,
I. Let them have regard to God as their supreme.
1. He lays down this truth, that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge (Proverbs 1:7); it is the principal part of knowledge (so the margin); it is the head of knowledge; that is, (1.) Of all things that are to be known this is most evident, that God is to be feared, to be reverenced, served, and worshipped; this is so the beginning of knowledge that those know nothing who do not know this. (2.) In order to the attaining of all useful knowledge this is most necessary, that we fear God; we are not qualified to profit by the instructions that are given us unless our minds be possessed with a holy reverence of God, and every thought within us be brought into obedience to him. If any man will do his will, he shall know of his doctrine, John 7:17. (3.) As all our knowledge must take rise from the fear of God, so it must tend to it as its perfection and centre. Those know enough who know how to fear God, who are careful in every thing to please him and fearful of offending him in any thing; this is the Alpha and Omega of knowledge.
I understand serving and worshiping God. But I think that we/the church has made the message of 'God having a relationship with us' so prevalent that I, at least, forgot He is to be feared/revered as well.
The word
reverence means, "honor or respect felt or shown; deference; especially profound adoring awed respect." So it's similar to worship. The difference is worship is defined as the act of offering reverence to God. How do you show reverence/fear to God in ways other than worship? Is it simply the attitude with which you come before God or is it more than that?
