KEEP the word flashed in front of my eyes during my prayer time. Of the many words I had written down in my journal to potentially study for a Scripture Printable this year, keep had not been one, and it’s the only word to have flashed in my mind, the rest have come to me slowly as a fascination or impression.
And over the next few days different songs with the word keep floated through my brain. The Lord Bless you and keep you, make His face shine upon you and be gracious to you, the Lord turn His face toward you and give you peace… Amen, Amen, Amen, He is for you, He is for you, He is for you.
Way Maker, Miracle worker, promise keeper, light in the darkness, my God that is who you are.
And Scripture….The Lord will keep in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Him. Isaiah 26:3
Such phrases as ‘keep going’, ‘just keep swimming’, ‘keep it up’, and even ‘keep out’ (a boundary to the enemy) came through my brain before I finally started looking up the keep words on Bible Gateway.
The first mention of the word keep is in Gen 2:15, and it is the word shamar Strong’s h8104. A few of the meanings for that word are to observe, watchman, wait, heed, beware.
Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. Gen 2:15
If we look it up in the dictionary we can see that keep is both a noun and a verb.
These are a few of the definitions from the Meriam Webster, but please look it up yourself and have a look. I thought I knew what it meant and then clicked on the link, and it’s opened up a whole new thought process, which I will explore with you below, but first let’s have a good look at what it means.
KEEP: noun,
: the means or provisions by which one is kept
Earned his keep. one that keeps or protects: such as a fortress or castle. One whose job it is to keep or tend.
Maintenance, custody or charge.
To retain in one’s custody or charge, to refrain from gifting, giving or allowing. To have in control; eg keep your temper.
To be faithful to, to conform to in habits or conduct, to stay in accord with; eg to keep time. To preserve or maintain, to tend, to watch over or protect.
keep, retain, detain, withhold, reserve mean to hold in one’s possession or under one’s control. keep may suggest a holding securely in one’s possession, custody, or control.
We also have the word keep used in these stories: Abel was a keeper of sheep. Cain asking am I my brother’s keeper? And Noah being told to keep the animals alive on the ark.
The first mention of keeping a covenant is in Genesis 17:9 (shamar again)
And God said to Abraham: “As for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations. Gen 17:9
Behold, I am with you and will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land; for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you.” Gen 28:15
As we start going through Exodus, we have God giving the Israelites instructions to keep His commandments, to keep the Sabbath, and we also have God establishing himself as the healer.
and said, “If you diligently heed the voice of the Lord your God and do what is right in His sight, give ear to His commandments and keep all His statutes, I will put none of the diseases on you which I have brought on the Egyptians. For I am the Lord who heals you.” Ex 15:26
We can see here, a synergism, as I wrote about in my blog post Power Scripture Study Free Printable , God has almighty power and we see that throughout creation and His miracles, but particularly in the new Testament he begins to endow that upon us, sending us out with authority, to heal the sick, cleanse the leper, raise the dead.
In a similar way He is promising to keep us but he’s also asking us to do some keeping ourselves, keep to his ways, give ear to his commands.
We have Jabez in 1 Chron 4:10 asking God to keep him from evil and to enlarge his territory. We have David asking God to keep him as the apple of his eye, and to keep him back from presumptuous sins.
1 Chron 4:10
And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, “Oh, that You would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!” So God granted him what he requested.
Here shamar changes to asa for the word keep. H6213 and it covers Thou wouldst keep me. It means to do, make, wrought, deal, commit, offer, execute, keep etc.
Psalm 17:8
Keep (shamar) me as the [b]apple of Your eye;
Hide me under the shadow of Your wings,
Here keep back changes to hasak H2820 : spare, keep back, withhold, refrain,
Psalm 19:13
Keep back Your servant also from presumptuous sins; Let them not have dominion over me. Then I shall be blameless, And I shall be innocent of great transgression.
Psalm 25:10
All the paths of the Lord are mercy and truth, To such as keep Strong’s H5341 – nāṣar(keep/preserve) His covenant and His testimonies.
Psalm 34: 19-20 KJV
19 Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the Lord delivereth him out of them all.
20 He keepeth (shamar) all his bones: not one of them is broken.
Psalm 37:34
Wait on the Lord, And keep His way, And He shall exalt you to inherit the land; When the wicked are cut off, you shall see it.
Psalm 66:9
Who keeps our soul among the living, And does not allow our feet to be moved.
Psalm 91:11
For He shall give His angels charge over you, To keep you in all your ways.
Psalm 121:5
The Lord is your keeper; The Lord is your shade at your right hand.
Psalm 141:3
Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; Keep watch over the door of my lips.
And then we have the word kept: Psalm 30:3 O Lord, You brought my soul up from the grave; You have kept me alive, that I should not go down to the pit.
Psalm 56:13
For You have delivered my soul from death. Have You not kept my feet from falling, That I may walk before God In the light of the living?
Some friends and I just did an online study on the book of Proverbs, one chapter a day and I was astonished at how many times the word keep presented itself.
Proverbs 2:11 , 20
Discretion will preserve you; Understanding will keep you….
So you may walk in the way of goodness, And keep to the paths of righteousness.
Prov 3:26
For the Lord will be your confidence, And will keep your foot from being caught.
Prov 4:13
Prov 4:23
Keep your heart with all diligence, For out of it spring the issues of life.
When you roam they will lead you, when you sleep they will KEEP you, and when you awake they will speak with you. For the commandment is a lamp, and the law a light; reproofs of instruction are the way of LIFE. Proverbs 6: 22-23
Proverbs 6 is leading directly into a reproof against adultery but I’ve found it fascinating how many times we are told to keep these things in front of us. As Christians we think we know them BUT, like keeping healing in front of us, by reading the Gospels, or identity in front of us by reading Paul, we need to keep wisdom in front of us by reading over and over and digging deeper and asking God what more is there here. The Word of God is alive and active and we must expect it to do a work in our lives.
Prov 10:17
He who keeps instruction is in the way of life, But he who refuses correction goes astray.
Prov 15:3
The eyes of the Lord are in every place, Keeping watch on the evil and the good.
Proverbs 16:17
This Scripture is a fascinating one that also featured in my very first printable on the topic of Joy that I made 12 years ago.
Ecc 5: 20
For he will not dwell unduly on the days of his life, because God keeps him busy with the joy of his heart.
There are some denominations or branches within the body of Christ that keep you looking backwards, do you have any unforgiveness, any sin in your past, etc. Not just a sit and pray to God and wait for him to bring something to mind, but combing back through conversations and situations in your mind, forgiving people just in case etc. You’re so busy looking inward and back all the time you can’t look out to what God’s doing now.
We are called to look back at God’s faithfulness, like the Israelites had memorial stones to remember the good things God had done in the past and like David on the day when all his men’s wives and children were taken from him, he stopped and strengthened himself in the Lord, he remembered the good things God had done in the past and the words God had spoken about his future and then he went to God for future strategy.
Our little chuihaha, Burrito, has reminded me of this in a way. She can jump onto our beds, but sometimes she forgets and she’ll sit there in her little roo pose like a circus dog like pick me up, pick me up and if we always pick her up she won’t jump. If I stand there and go come on, you can do this, you’ve done this before, jump, she will psych herself up, stir herself up and she will jump, even if she tumbles off the first time she will eventually jump.
And it reminded me of so often we have seen God move in our lives before, we’ve ‘jumped with God’ so to speak, but sometimes we forget, and it’s like waaaah pick me up, and God is saying ‘but remember, you’ve seen me do this before, forget not all my benefits like Psalm 103 says.’ I had a dream last year of using the Name of Jesus in a storm and how also in the dream were these two fridges one that was recently stocked and one that was 15 years old but still miraculously good to eat from and I felt it was God saying, yes there is fresh revelation, but remember what I showed you, what I did in the past!
I think of a story from a friend of ours Ps Abby, who was inspired after she met Burrito to buy her own little chuihaha and prior to that she’d only had huskies. Her chuihaha is at home with her cats all day while they are at work and the teens are at school, and the cats have taught this little chuihaha how to jump around on all the furniture and that spoke to me of how Burrito is a little land lubber because she doesn’t have anyone showing her how to go to higher places and that our influences matter. If you’ve got people in your life who are walking in faith, they are going to stir you up to keep jumping with God
Isaiah 26:3
You will keep him in perfect peace, Whose mind is stayed on You, Because he trusts in You.
I remember someone giving me this Scripture when I was quite sick after a miscarriage in 2019, and I remember thinking, ‘you’re telling me to think about God more or pray more? Thanks very much that’s all I’m doing, tell me something useful.’
Thank God that He continues to unravel the deeper meaning of truth to us even when our first reaction is less than spiritual. Over the next few months I stumbled across a number of sermons on this Scripture.
This word mind is the Hebrew word yester which is the word for imagination.
Strongs: H3336 yêtser
From H3335; a form; figuratively conception (that is, purpose): – frame, thing framed, imagination, mind, work.
We can be praying for healing, praying healing Scriptures etc and still imagining ourselves sick in a months time, years time etc. We need to change our mindsets and starting aligning our imaginations with God’s Word.
A question God posed to me at this time was, ‘what does it look like to rewrite this situation from victory?’ I literally wrote out what my life would look like if I were healed, compared to what it looked like at that present moment and very quickly my situation actually started to turn around.
A great book on this topic is by Andrew Wommack about the Power of Imagination
So I was thinking about the word keep again earlier this week and I suddenly had this sense to look at it as a noun not a verb.
So when I looked up a keep on google, it is the inner fortified tower in a castle, a place to retreat to in times of attack, but also a place where they would have a fancy living room to show others.
For out of the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks. 35The good man brings good things out of his good store of treasure, and the evil man brings evil things out of his evil store of treasure. 36But I tell you that men will give an account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken.… Matthew 12:35-36
Let us be people that bring forth good things, God stories.
When God speaks to us, it is for direction, but sometimes its also to fight enemy with when your circumstances are the opposite of what God has spoken to you.
1 Tim 1:18 Timothy, my son, I am giving you this command in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by recalling them you may fight the battle well,
Even with Joseph in the pit, he’d had these wild dreams prior to his brothers throwing him in there
Psalm 105:18 Until the time came to fulfill his dreams, the LORD tested Joseph’s character. NIV
…18They bruised his feet with shackles and placed his neck in irons, 19until his prediction came true and the word of the LORD proved him right. 20The king sent and released him; the ruler of peoples set him free.… Berean standard Bible
While a keep isn’t specifically mentioned in the Bible, that word came about later, we do have a reference to His Name being a strong tower.
The name of the Lord is a strong tower;
The righteous run to it and are [a]safe. Proverbs 18:10
So the name of the Lord can be a strong tower in circumstantial attacks, health attacks, etc and also in physical attacks. My husband actually saw this in Israel. He had been there on a mission trip and gone for a bike ride at ten pm at night around Tel Aviv with a mate to pray, when suddenly up roared two guys on a motorbike. They grabbed his mate and were about to punch him, when the mate said, “In Yeshua’s Name, leave me alone.” That guy said to his mate in Hebrew what my husband later learned was, “Grab the knife.” But that guy also froze and it was a Mexican stand off so Stephen and his friend high tailed it out of their down the hill on their push bikes, and I’ve heard many similar stories.
Psalm 91 has so many promises about attacks of every sort and us being spared as we say and pray them. I will say of the Lord He is my refuge, my fortress, my God in whom I trust.
Psalm 34:17
The righteous cry out, and the Lord hears them;
he delivers them from all their troubles.
18 The Lord is close to the brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
19 The righteous person may have many troubles,
but the Lord delivers him from them all;
20 he keepeth all his bones,
not one of them will be broken.
So, along with being an innermost part of a castle, keeps were also towers sprinkled around in strategic locations often near a bridge or a place where one could keep watch, and another meaning of the word Keep: is the division of watches on a ship where during that time period you are in charge of keeping watch on the weather, your surroundings, for attack etc and alerting others if something is coming.
Sometimes God will alert us through dreams or a sense that someone needs prayer for a situation they are going through or an attack of the enemy. I have a blog post where I have written about this kind of prayer and intercession.
New Testament
Let’s move over to the New Testament now. Is this an exhaustive list? No. Was my Old Testament list an exhaustive list? No. I run the word keep through Bible Gateway usually set on the NKJV option and pick through the Scriptures. Some words I’ve run through have 37 options, other have 370.
Luke 8:15 But the ones that fell on the good ground are those who, having heard the word with a noble and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with patience.
Ask and keep asking,
Jon 12:25 He who loves his life will lose it, and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
John 14:15 “If you love Me, keep My commandments.
John 15:10
If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and abide in His love.
John 17:11 , 15
Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are.
I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one.
2 with all lowliness and gentleness, with longsuffering, bearing with one another in love, 3 endeavoring to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. Eph 4;2,3
2 Tim 1:12
For this reason I also suffer these things; nevertheless I am not ashamed, for I know whom I have believed and am persuaded that He is able to keep what I have committed to Him until that Day.
2 Tim 4:7
I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith.
20 But you, beloved, building yourselves up on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Spirit, 21 keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. Jude 1:20
Now to Him who is able to keep [m]you from stumbling,
And to present you faultless
Before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy,
25 To [n]God our Savior,
[o]Who alone is wise,
Be glory and majesty,
Dominion and [p]power,
Both now and forever.
Amen. Jude 1:24,225
