Determined to Trust

No matter how hard I practice trusting God and resting in Him, my natural bent is to worry and be anxious. This means that if I’m going to rest and trust that God has everything handled, then I have to be determined in myself to lay my whole heart before Him and let Him lead.

It took me many years to learn to put myself aside and be vulnerable before the Lord. But I learned that He wants it that way because that’s what real trust looks like. He will settle for nothing less, and neither should we.

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make straight your paths.

Proverbs 3:5-6

I can handle myself and I’m strong, emotionally and physically.  I like carrying the weight of a big project.  I like the challenge of being in over my head.  It’s exciting to begin something that seems like it’s too much for me to handle.  Those challenges allow me to feel the strength of the work God has done in my character, especially during the last decade of my life.  

It feels wonderful to be able to flex those work muscles and see what I can do now that God has rebuilt my foundation. 

The truth of the matter is that I know God is constantly by my side and that is where the real strength comes from.  Before I was confident in Him, I had no confidence or strength in myself.  

Although I am strong, the downside to being a natural worrier becomes clearly evident when I feel weaker than normal in an area that carries wounds or damage from the past.  In these certain few areas, it is a lot more difficult to gain any ground.

When I start to worry, my natural desire is to dig in and fix things, but in these damaged areas, all of my human efforts fail.  I become over-focused on my weakness, and then I become plagued by fear of pain, fear of failure, and the fear of people’s thoughts about me.  It makes me want to quit… Makes me want to turn and run… Makes me want to cower in fear.  

It’s so frustrating because I want to overcome this just like I have overcome so many other things!  This cowardly person is not who God made me to be. 

Unfortunately, because I am a fixer, it can sometimes take me too long to run to God and renew my trust in Him when I am feeling spiritually and emotionally weak in these wounded and damaged areas.  

• Feeling weak because the job is too big or too scary?  I run to God!
  
• Feeling nervous because I have to get outside my comfort zone?  I run to God!
  
• BUT, feeling insecure in a damaged area of my heart?  I want to bury my head in the sand and plug my ears until it goes away.  

Not a healthy way to live.

A few months ago, after having just struggled through another bout of these unfounded fears, and after having finally reached my limit of just how much I will allow myself to literally suffer in this area before I run to God… I did run to Him… 

I ran to Him with all my angst and my “I’m-so-done” grief, with all of my struggles and complaints about my situation, with all my self-deprecation for having had this struggle with fear once again, and with all of my doubts about how a perfect God like Him could remain in relationship with an imperfect, doubting, and fearful person like me.

I cried it out, journaled it out, and laid everything on the table before God. I did so in the most complete, honest, and messy, but still respectful, way I could achieve…  (Being respectfully messy on purpose can achieve great vulnerability!)

Then I asked Him, “Lord, what would You have me do?” and this is what He said to me… 

So quietly, so simply, and so peacefully that it caught me off guard… 

“Come into Believing again.”  

Four little words, that exact phrase, with a capital B for Believing.  It reminded me of the words of Jesus in Mark 5:36 – “Be not afraid; only believe.” I wrote it down and planted it in my heart.

And just like that, with a deep breath of complete peace, God stepped in and shut down all my angst with a simple reminder to “Only Believe.”  He didn’t storm down.  He didn’t condemn me or slap some sense into me.  I asked for His help, and He gave me His simple, practical, honest answer. 

“Come into Believing again.”  

In that evening with the Lord, after picking myself up and deciding to renew my faith and trust in God once again, He met me there and reminded me of these simple truths: 

1. We were not created to carry burdens.  The Bible says to “Cast every care upon the Lord, for He cares for you,” (1 Peter 5:7). In my mind, “He cares for you” means God is my caretaker.  He doesn’t just love me, He takes care of me.  In fact, Psalm 138:8 says, “the Lord will perfect that which concerns me: Your mercy endures forever!”  God reminded me that I am free to Believe that He will carry every burden on my behalf if I will let Him.  I can rest assured that He will do it… even in those areas in which I am still in need of healing.
2. We can’t do it by ourselves.  No matter how self-sufficient we believe we are, we cannot be truly free without the Lord.  We cannot come to Him unless He comes to us first (John 6:44).  We cannot pray or worship God fully without the help of His Spirit.  We cannot fix or heal ourselves, no matter how hard we try. 
   
   Those who have tried and failed, and tried again and failed, just like me, will hear me well on this matter.
   
   With this simple truth, the Lord reminded me that there is rest in the knowledge that I am completely undone without Him.  If I will let go and rest my imperfections in His hands once more, He will heal me and set me free in His own good timing.
3. We must be determined to get free and stay free. “For freedom Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery,” Galatians 5:1.
   
   I have determined within myself that no matter what happens in my life, I will not turn away from the Lord. If I fail, or if the world fails me, I want to remember His kindness and sweetness to me so greatly and so deeply that I will always run to Him. It may take me a minute to get my mind straightened out, but I want it to be fully ingrained in me to always go back to Him.
   
   But we cannot “go back” if we were never there in the first place.

Whatever your struggles are today, choose to Believe God. Every answer you need is in His Word, and He will give you His wisdom if you submit yourself to Him. All you have to do is pray something like, “God, I can’t do this by myself. I need Your help. Please show me the right way to go.” Then start searching the Word for His truth… Seek out wise counsel from trusted Believers… Be determined to find the Lord and develop a real, honest, and vulnerable relationship with Him.

It will change your life completely, just like it changed mine.

But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.

Hebrews 11:6