Where is my Trust?

Trusting in God is a difficult thing to do. At a workshop a couple of years ago, the speaker said the most important question is “Do you trust God with your life?” A quick response might be “yes, of course,” but I think the question is much deeper. A quick response does not really honor the magnitude of the question.

I hesitate to answer the question with a confident yes, because when I look at my life, there is evidence aplenty that shows I don’t really trust God with my life. I trust God with bits and pieces of it, but not my whole life. My economic position gets some of my trust. My physical condition and health gets some of my trust. My ability to earn income gets some of my trust. Yet none of these are guaranteed. I can’t rely on my physical condition to remain good, no matter how healthy my eating and exercise habits. I can’t rely on financial or economic conditions to always sustain me. Jobs go away, bank accounts dwindle, investments fail. Putting my trust in any of these is a losing proposition. We don’t always realize that these are shaky sources of trust until we actually lose these things. We worry and fret until we hopefully, reach a point where we recognize that we can do nothing about these, and that the only constant is God.

Trusting God with my life doesn’t mean that suffering will go away. It does mean, however, that even in the midst of suffering, I can be at peace because I am trusting in the only constant, the Source and Giver of life. If I can trust God with my life, I can see that all the other is shifting sand, and I cannot stand on it with confidence. It will be like being at the beach and feeling the sand wash out from under your feet as you stand at the edge of the water.

This morning I was reading the parable about the tenant farmers in Luke 20:9-19. I spent some time with the way Jesus identified them as tenants. A tenant has temporary custody of a place. He does not own it. I was reminded that I don’t own anything either. It has been entrusted to me to use to glorify God. When I put my trust in the gift instead of the Giver, I put myself in a place of uncertainty. Trusting God with my life means that I look to the Giver, and with my vision full of the Light, I know I have already received all the Gift I could ever need.