I’m not down with the view that ‘fear of God’ in the Holy Bible really means ‘respect.’ He has put fear in our hearts so we don’t turn away from him. Then he makes us an everlasting covenant. I don’t think doing it our own way, with respect, and then hoping for the best, makes any sense at all.

Jeremiah 32:39-41 - 

 I will give them one heart and one way, that they may fear me forever, for their own good and the good of their children after them.

I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to them. And I will put the fear of me in their hearts, that they may not turn from me. I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will plant them in this land in faithfulness, with all my heart and all my soul.

Jeremiah 32:39-41 Bible Gateway link (ESV)

Perfect patience is precisely what I need and have needed all my life. When I hit bottom and salvation hit me, nothing but the “perfect patience” of Christ could have kept me on the right path. He is in my heart, growing there every day. I am grateful beyond measure.

 1 Timothy 1:16-17 -  

But I received mercy for this reason, that in me, as the foremost, Jesus Christ might display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life. To the King of the ages, immortal, invisible, the only God, be honor and glory forever and ever. Amen.

1 Timothy 1:16-17 (ESV) Bible Gateway link

Jeremiah 29:11-13 -  

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the Lord, plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope. Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart.

https://www.biblegateway.com/passage?search=Jeremiah%2029:11-13&version=ESV

Marriage is fraught with what I call the spouse frequency. Even if we hear perfectly well, when the spouse talks it sounds like “wha-wha-wah.” I think our world is suffering from the God frequency, we listen to everyone except Him. Of all people, I should listen to my husband, as a country and a people we would do well to listen to God.

 Jeremiah 25:4-7 - 

You have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear, although
the Lord  persistently sent to you all his servants the prophets, saying,

‘Turn now, every one of you, from his evil way and evil deeds, and dwell upon the land that the Lord has given to you and your fathers from of old and forever. Do not go after other gods to serve and worship them, or provoke me to anger with the work of your hands. Then I will do you no harm.’ Yet you have not listened to me, declares the Lord, that you might provoke me to anger with the work of your hands to your own harm.

Jeremiah 25:4-7 (ESV) Bible Gateway link

We have a country full of people with false gods, or we would not be behaving as we are. I’m not a prophet, but if we keep this up, I can imagine the horror and hear the hissing.

 Jeremiah 18:15-16  

But my people have forgotten me; they make offerings to false gods; they made them stumble in their ways, in the ancient roads, and to walk into side roads, not the highway, making their land a horror, a thing to be hissed at forever. Everyone who passes by it is horrified and shakes his head.

Jeremiah 18:15-16 (ESV) Bible Gateway link

At a dark point in my in my early life, I was headed backwards. I abused nearly every substance and many, many people. Then I took this to heart: “Obey my voice and I will be your God...” I read God’s word, I listen to him now. I’m not perfect but all is well with me as long as I don’t try to run my own life.

Jeremiah 7:23-24 - 

But this command I gave them: ‘Obey my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people. And walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’ But they did not obey or incline their ear, but walked in their own counsels and the stubbornness of their evil hearts, and went backward and not forward.

Jeremiah 7:23-24 (ESV) Bible Gateway link