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Sep 25, 2024 06:00am

Choosing Trust

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This is hard.

This is real.

This…

It had been days since he had acknowledged us. Weeks since he was able to speak to us. His breath was ragged as he struggled to get air in. A deep rattle came from within every time he breathed.

For months, we had treated bed sores that wouldn’t heal, gave medicine every 4 hours, and gave him round-the-clock care and attention.

But more than all these things, we had prayed.

When we first got the news of his cancer a year and a half before, we began praying. We reached out to every believer we knew and asked them to pray, too. He even asked the church to pray over him for healing.

Even though we had surgery to remove it, there was still a possibility that the one area the surgeon couldn’t reach would be cancerous.

And it was.

Month after month, we saw the cancer take over. We called hospice in April for extra help – but he was still living life as best possible. Feeding the fish, walking to the porch, going to church. By November, he was bedridden and required 24-hour care.

He passed in the middle of the night, his wife and my husband by his side.

Weary and broken, there were raw moments of grief and questions.

Why?

Hadn’t we prayed enough? Hadn’t he served the Lord with all he had for years?

And then the question came – why would God choose to heal another person and not him?

No matter how strong your faith, deep belief, and trust in God, some moments in life shake you to the core, and you just don’t understand why.

Questions come, and sometimes, there are no answers.

But at that moment, we had to choose if we would still trust the Lord and His goodness. Or would we turn away because of our unanswered questions?

We chose to trust Him.

Even though we didn’t understand.

Even though we still had questions.

Even though it felt unfair.

Even though…

Acts 12:1-11
“It was about this time that King Herod arrested some who belonged to the church, intending to persecute them.
2 He had James, the brother of John, put to death with the sword.
3 When he saw that this met with approval among the Jews, he proceeded to seize Peter also. This happened during the Festival of Unleavened Bread.
4 After arresting him, he put him in prison, handing him over to be guarded by four squads of four soldiers each. Herod intended to bring him out for public trial after the Passover.
5 So Peter was kept in prison, but the church was earnestly praying to God for him.
6 The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance.
7 Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. “Quick, get up!” he said, and the chains fell off Peter’s wrists.
8 Then the angel said to him, “Put on your clothes and sandals.” And Peter did so. “Wrap your cloak around you and follow me,” the angel told him.
9 Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea that what the angel was doing was really happening; he thought he was seeing a vision.
10 They passed the first and second guards and came to the iron gate leading to the city. It opened for them by itself, and they went through it. When they had walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.
11 Then Peter came to himself and said, “Now I know without a doubt that the Lord has sent his angel and rescued me from Herod’s clutches and from everything the Jewish people were hoping would happen.”

James, John, and Peter. All part of the original 12 disciples Jesus had called to follow Him.

James and John were brothers, the sons of Zebedee, the Sons of Thunder, as they were known.

Herod Agrippa 1, the grandson of Herod the Great, was the brother to Herodias, the one who had requested the head of John the Baptist. He was ruling over the area and wanted to impress the Roman leaders, so he chose a time when the city would be full of Jewish people to begin persecuting the Christians once again. It was Passover.

He ordered for James to be killed.

When he saw how this pleased the Jews (not followers of Jesus), he went after Peter.

As I read this story, the whys came back to my mind. I’m asking the questions any of you might ask – Why did God allow James to be killed but sent an angel to save Peter? Did Peter pray more? Was he more worthy than James?

But the truth is, we could make our proclamations and theories, but all would fall short of reality.

We cannot possibly answer questions like these in this life with mortal minds. We do not see all that God does, we don’t know all He does, and we certainly don’t know His plan.

But when this happens in life – just as it did for the believers and friends of James and Peter – just as it did for us as our loved one died from a horrible disease – just as it will with you at some point – we have to make a choice.

Will we choose to turn from God?

Or will we still choose to trust Him no matter what?

Jesus, God’s only Son, wasn’t spared. His prayer to the Father was, “Let this cup pass from me.” If there is any other way, let it be! He knew what was ahead.

And yet He still chose to trust the Father – “not my will but thine.”

Will we?

Following Jesus does not mean we will be free from pain, suffering, persecution, or slander. In fact, Christ told His followers that just the opposite was true. If they followed Him, these things would surely come just as they had for Jesus.

Are we still willing to follow Him? Will we trust Him?

Here’s why our answer was yes:

Because we know the beautiful end to the story.

We know that Larry’s death here simply ushered him into heaven.

We know that he no longer suffers. He has been healed completely.

We know he sees the Lord with new eyes and walks with the Lord daily.

We know we will see him again when we go to our eternal home in heaven.

How?

Because God has told us so in His holy Word. The unfailing, unchanging, infallible Word of God – the Holy Bible. Because of His words to us, we know that when we accept Jesus as our Savior and trust in Him, we receive a beautiful hope. A reassurance from God Himself that no matter what happens on this earth, it’s not the end.

My friend, I don’t know what you’re going through today, but I know the fears, the questions, the thoughts that have gone through your mind. And so does God. No matter what you face, you can trust Him.

He is worthy. He is faithful. He is God.