To Contain or to Exclude

Here is our neighbor's fence:

Our neighbor built this fence because he didn't like the row of shrubs that were along his side of the property line. Mainly, he didn't like the time it took to keep the bushes pruned and neatly trimmed. So, he started pulling up the bushes and building a fence.

Now the purpose of a fence is two-fold. It is either to contain something or to exclude something, or both.

When you think of that in terms of a neighbor, it can sort of hurt your feelings. In fact, when John first put in the fence, I was tempted to have hurt feelings a little bit.

The fence that our neighbor has built is higher closer to the house and then it is lower closer to the street. So it excludes more in some places than in others.

I was looking at this fence today, and thinking about it's purpose, to either keep something or someone out, or to keep something or someone in and how our now shared fence did that more in some places than others. Sometimes that's how we are about the Lord. In some places in our lives, we let the Lord in fully; in some places we have a little fence; in some places we have a tall fence.

I don't think we always know that those fences actually exist, we have built them so slowly and so gradually, but we have some areas of our lives that we want to use that "fence" to exclude the Lord from entering or controlling. There are some things that we still want to be preeminent in, some areas of our lives where we just don't want someone else telling us how to live our lives.

But the Lord is all about helping us to tear down walls and fences and hedges in our hearts. He wants to be a part of every aspect of our lives because He loves us and He cares for us more than we can ever know. May we be open to His working in our lives.

"Search me, O God, and know my heart:
try me, and know my thoughts:
And see if there be any wicked way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting."
Psalm 139: 23,24