Trusting God

Once in a while I stumble upon an idea that bears further reflection and might warrant sharing. So, here goes…

In a recent preach I touched briefly on the idea that we either trust God, as the psalmists seemed to do, or else we don’t really understand God. If we really believe in the God of the Bible, as personified in Jesus, then we are believing in a God who deliberately made us, who utterly loves us, and whose will for us is “good and pleasing and perfect” (Romans 12:2 NLT).

If that is the God we believe in, then how can we fail to trust Him? By extension, if we don’t trust Him, we either don’t really believe in Him, or we’re somehow misidentifying Him, mistaking His character. If we do that, we are seriously in error – for we are, internally at least, questioning His character.

I think it likely that nobody likes it when their character is questioned!

I’m not suggesting that all will be sweetness and light in our lives, or that all will go as we might want it to. Not at all – we are told by Jesus to expect “many trials and sorrows” in this earthly life (John 16:33 NLT) but that Jesus has overcome the world. I think that means that we have an amazing future ahead of us and that we should utterly trust God for that, despite our current problems!

Let’s face it – life’s hard, and sometimes things happen to us that are unfair, painful, sad, difficult and all the rest. But, if we really believe in God, we cannot fail to trust Him. Quite the challenge, huh?

I think maybe it’s easy to ‘trust’ God when, in fact, we are able to breeze along through life and push through any struggles in our own strength. Perhaps it’s only when we’re really, really stuck and can’t muscle things aside, that we are put to the test – do we really trust God? Ironic, huh? When you can’t do anything, that’s when you have to do the trust thing. And perhaps that’s the point. God’s will for us is good and pleasing and perfect – and maybe He uses our toughest times to teach us to trust Him in that!