Trust is an Action Word
Good Morning,
A father stands in the shallow end of a pool as his young son or daughter stands on the edge looking at him. Dad says something like, “Go ahead, jump in. I will catch you.” Perhaps you experienced a situation like this as a child. It is at once a great opportunity to learn something new and exciting and a fearful proposition with an unknown outcome. Sounds a lot like many of the situations we face in life.
I have been thinking a lot about our call to trust God and the war that fear wages against it. It is an ongoing battle that ultimately won’t end until heaven, However, fear does not have to defeat us or paralyze us. We have a choice in the outcome. We can choose fear, or we can choose to trust. Those are in fact, the only two options. In my pondering I have concluded something that while simple, may not be obvious. It certainly won’t always be easy. My conclusion is this. The only way to really learn to trust God is to actually trust God.
Christians, especially North American Christion’s can be all about studying. We study the bible, memorize scripture, have small groups that meet to learn about the character and faithfulness of God. We gather on Sundays to hear of Jesus’ love and grace. We tell our children stories about how God did miracles when people trusted Him in difficult spots. But here is the deal. You cannot learn to trust by studying about trust. The only way to fully grasp the fact that God can be trusted in every situation is to step into those places of trust via action.
It is then that trust begins to go from a fantastic intellectual truth to something that we can build our life on. It goes from our head to our hands, feet, and our will. To our wallet, calendar, career, and every other area of life. There are no shortcuts to learning trust. Trust is an action word.
To be clear, I do not always default to trust without some wrestling with fear and “my own understanding”. However, what I do have, after saying yes to trusting God many times, is an undeniable track record of God’s trustworthiness. A track record based not on studying or thinking about trust but based on jumping into my Father’s arms when He says “Jump. I’ll catch you.”
How about you this morning? Are you building your own undeniable record of God being trustworthy in your life? If not, it is time to start regularly jumping in the pool instead of thinking about jumping into the pool. He will catch you – always!
Questions to ponder this week:
1. Is God calling you to trust Him in some area of your life?
2. What would keep you from saying yes, and jumping into His arms?
Live on purpose, Ron Klopfenstein, CPLC
