Trust. Do you ever struggle with that concept as much as I do? I know some people who never wrestle with things. Their faith is as steadfast as God is true, and I admire that.
But I’m an over-thinker, and maybe a wee bit emotional at times. (My family would tell you more than a wee bit.) And sometimes it’s hard to let go of my emotions and just trust that God truly is Sovereign. He knows the end from the beginning. He knows the questions I’m going to raise and already has the answers – in fact, He has had the answers since before time began.
And actually, I believe He knew I would struggle with trust before I was ever born.
For me it’s not a matter of faith. I think, as I’ve said here before, that faith and trust are different. Faith that God is real has never been in doubt for me. Never. Even though I cannot see Him, I believe He is real, He made the world and me and everything we can see. He made us in His image and gave us the ability to create as He is the Creator.
But trust is something stronger, something deeper. It involves believing that tragedy or heartache has a purpose. It sees hope attached to loss. Trust isn’t a quitter. Trust in God never lets go.
I have that kind of trust – sometimes. My family will also tell you that I’m not a quitter. Waiting twenty years to see a career begin is not in keeping with quitting. But I’ve wanted to give up on a lot of other things in life. I can be stubbornly proactive. And I can fall into a puddle of defeat. Perhaps those are my emotions talking again.
Maybe it’s also the human condition. It’s hard to trust God with our future, isn’t it? The trouble comes in that we can’t SEE God. That’s why so many people put other things in His place. The first of the ten commandments says that we are to have “no other gods before him.”
Why would God command that? Because people want a god they can see, touch, worship with eyes that don’t need the faith that gets tested in the dark times. We want something to cling to in the valley of the shadow, and we want a shepherd with flesh and bone or at least something tangible, don’t we?
But God isn’t tangible. Jesus was tangible when He walked the earth. Creation is tangible. We can touch what God has given, but we were never meant to worship IT. We were made to worship HIM.
A big part of worship though is TRUST. When we trust our Good Shepherd, our Maker…when we really let our hearts rest in the fact that He knows the plans He has for us and they are for our good, to give us a future and a hope, that’s when our minds can have His peace.
We might not trust in a God who is touchable because He is Spirit, but He is also rock-steady and true and the more time we spend in His Word and in prayer and getting to know Him, the easier it is to let our hearts rest assured that hope is coming. He is trustworthy. We don’t have to be afraid. We don’t have to be defeated.
The day is dawning. Hope isn’t hanging by a thread. It is rising from the ashes. God is true. And He is trustworthy. But it takes at least a little faith and a little hope to recognize that truth.
