Fear and Abiding Prayer

Second in Five Part Series

When bullet-prayers shooting toward heaven in the middle of each encountered crisis are the only form of prayer coming out of someone, this actually reflects a low interest in nurturing a relationship with God. Remember, it is in relationship, also described as "abiding" (John 15:4) that we receive spiritual life and mature into people who can love and serve without demanding others outside of God to meet our needs or come up to our standards.

In seasons of prayer we can be reminded of the day we will stand before him and look into real eyes that right now we see only in our imagination. God will speak to us real words, words full of deep understanding of who we are, what we have done and what we most care about.

We should therefore take seriously (and fear is a serious emotion) the thought that we might hear that we had trouble letting go, trouble with trusting him in the midst of our life's battles -- and the reason we did was due to the fact we feared life's problems more than we feared and worshiped God.