Trusting God: Foundational to our Faith

I’ve become more and more convinced that Trusting God is foundational to my faith.  As I continue to study and use The Peacemaker by Ken Sande with my reconciliation clients and combine it with Trusting God (Even when life hurts) by Jerry Bridges, I have come to believe that we have to understand God before we can trust Him and we have to trust Him in order to really obey Him.  This makes sense when I think about it from a personal perspective.  Those people that I trust in any substantive way are those I know well enough to understand their priorities and values.  Without this level of understanding, I just can’t be comfortable they will protect that with which I entend to entrust them.  We have to understand God the same way before we can really trust Him. 

By trusting God, I mean that we are willing to truly turn over to Him and His care all those people and things that are most important to us.  But even more than that, I mean being willing to truly obey God from our hearts, for it is our hearts that God desires most.  Without trusting God, it is difficult to truly obey Him from our hearts because so often what He calls us to is counterintuitive.  As Isaiah 55:8 states, “…neither are your ways my ways, ” declares the Lord.  The more counterintuitive the direction, the more important our trust in God becomes.  When we truly trust Him, we can follow His direction with confidence regardless of what the world might have to say.  More next time about the understanding that leads us to trust.