I have been thinking a lot lately about trusting God. I guess when you are in transition or difficulty, it often comes to mind. I realized that for the most part I don’t trust Him. I only trust me. I think that I have a better grasp on my problems than He does, that I know what the best solutions are and that He probably won’t do what I want Him to anyway. These realizations were not pleasant to me.Perhaps I don’t trust him because I haven’t got enough personal experience to draw from? I know the Bible stories and the accounts of His faithfulness to others, but why can’t I remember much of this when it is my own personal difficulty? I think there are two reasons.
The first is a lack of remembering. I am not alone in this habit. The Israelites were notoriously bad at remembering what God had done for them. They even built altars of rock (at God’s instruction) to help them better remember the great works He had done on their behalf. I am a sloppy rememberer. I know God has done lots of things for me, that He has shown His faithfulness over and over again, but do I have an altar of rocks to remember it by? No, not even a pebble. I used to write down my prayer requests and try to go back and look at them to see what God had done. It was a great exercise, but I still forget to do it.
Perhaps I should take a lesson from the Israelites. I could write things down, plant a tree or even start a rock collection! Maybe I need a “touchstone” to remind me of what I fail to remember on my own.
If I want to build my faith and trust in God, I need to need Him. I must recognize my lack of resources, my inability to fix things and the inferiority of my predictable solutions. When I allow Him to rescue me from myself, I learn that I can trust Him.
Thanks for sharing! I have found that I also struggle the most with the second part. I'm always finding ways to fix problems, both my own and others! I also prevent myself from getting into situations where I can't get myself out. I stay away from situations where I'm not enough to get me through. I think that also prevents me from realizing the full provision and protection of God.
ReplyDeleteAn example that comes to mind is playing electric guitar at church. So far in the past I've played relatively quietly so no one in church could hear me. Three weeks ago our worship leader asked the sound guy to turn me up... and he did! This was in some ways my worst fear because people could hear me and judge me. This was definitely a point where I was in deeper than I wanted. I guess I had a choice then to not play or play on. It was a hard but great moment where I had to shuffle off the fear of what people thought of me and trust that God had orchestrated that moment. Had that happened a year ago I probably would have melted into a puddle on stage. I decided to play on and risk my pride for the sake of what had been put before me to do. It's amazing that the thing I thought would cause me to drown instead caused me to shine so much more than I ever thought possible. I'm so thankful for all that I've been through in the past year to get me to this point. It's been a year filled with revelation and sight that I've never had before in my life. I hope to allow myself to get in deep water situations again so I can see and experience God's love.
Am dealing with some anger issues within the congregation and how we were treated, still very angry and hurt and not sure how to "get over it"
ReplyDeletechurch life can be very painful.....