What Do You Trust?

“We do not want you to be uninformed, brothers and sisters, about the troubles we experienced in the province of Asia. We were under great pressure, far beyond our ability to endure, so that we despaired of life itself. Indeed, we felt we had received the sentence of death. But this happened that we might not rely on ourselves but on God, who raises the dead. He has delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us again. On Him we have set our hope that he will continue to deliver us…” ‭‭2 Corinthians‬ ‭1.8-10‬ ‭NIV‬‬

“But this happened so that we would not trust in ourselves…”

God is so good that He will not allow us to live a life that doesn’t need Him. And that’s a great thing because this is not a life that we could live without Him. And thus, it would be cruel to allow us to continue down such a road uncorrected.

He is the God that leaves the 99 sheep for the lost one. He cares. And there is no problem too big or small for Him to care about. As any loving father would, He helps prepare us for the journey ahead.

Troubles aren’t always a bad thing if they point us to and grow us in God. Contrary to natural logic, He gives us space and circumstances in order to build trust in Him. Faith is not built without trust and trust is not formed without introducing an uncertainty that God will prove Himself over — if we allow Him.

Hope must always have a vehicle and a destination. And for believers, that hope is Jesus.

One of the biggest battles that we will encounter is contending with our tendency to trust in ourselves, our talents, wealth, connections, and abilities more than we should; trusting in those more than we do our Father.

God gives us every resource and ability to use for good. So it’s not that they’re bad, but we can never trust more in things that are not God than the Giver of those things. And whenever we trust in ourselves and our things more than our God, reality will eventually and always fail our expectations.

Because God will never allow us to live a life that doesn’t need Him.

He’s still our Source and the one we should depend on beyond our control. A resource is not the source. It is simply repeating or redistributing the source.

When we’re tempted to go it alone or put more hope and trust in our abilities and resources, remember and trust that He is always the Source.

There’s a big difference between trusting that the storms will pass and things will get better, and trusting in Who calms the storms and makes all things good.