"Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not unto your own understanding. In all of your ways acknowledge Him and He will direct your paths." This has always been one of my favorite passages of Scripture, but in all honesty it has also been one of the most difficult for me to follow. It has been my M.O. to try to maintain control of my life and all situations. Fortunately that has worked well most of my life (at least for me - those around me may not feel the same), but I feel like I have missed some direction from God and some blessings because of this. Then with my surgery, I completely lost control of my life and I was forced to re-examine my way of doing things.
The other day I was driving back from the lakehouse with my mother who is now very confused. She was not sure where she was or what was going to happen to her and after answering many questions, I finally said that she just needs to trust me. Her response was "What else can I do?" It really got me to thinking that that was what God is trying to say to us. He just wants us to trust Him. There are times when we do not know where He is leading and events in our life just do not make sense. At that point we just need to trust Him. But for me the bigger problem is that I don't realize that I am confused. I go through life trying to control it and thinking that I know where I am going, while in reality I am lost. The first step in trusting is to realize you are confused. We often call this humility. We all need a good dose of it.
When I asked my mother if she thought she could trust me, she responded that she knew me and that I was trustworthy. In the same way we can trust God because we know His character. We know that He is good and that He is powerful, and therefore He can take care of us and do what He says He will do. And that is the gist of it. We have to admit that we do not know it all and turn to One who does. Of course trust is earned and it starts out small and grows as the One we trust shows His trustworthiness. I have a lot to learn in this area. But if God can speak through a donkey, surely He can speak through a confused old lady. We just need to be listening.
4 comments:
good word dad! we do need to walk in more trust and less of what we can "control." we were talking about this at lifegroup last week that any control that we think that we have really is just a figment of our imagination - because we really don't have it anyway. it really struck me - liking the control!
love you and thank you for sharing!
Thanks. I needed to hear it again since I am going through a period of confusion since losing my job, being forced to retire when Whitney is still at Baylor. I am freelancing now, which is not something I would have chosen for myself, but obviously God has a purpose in it and I just have to trust and obey through this period. The good thing is we grow spiritually from it as we personally experience His trustworthiness.
that is so good dad...thanks for sharing that.
Thanks for reminding me, Artie.
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