Blog
What does is it mean to truly trust?
Those of us who are believers talk about faith a lot. We hear sermons on faith very regularly. We speak of living by faith and walking by faith almost as if it’s second nature to us. We know the definition of faith and claim to know the practicalities of faith personally. Yet do our lives echo real faith – real trust?
When I say the word trust, my mind goes back to my early childhood when my dad was teaching me how to swim. One of the first elements of learning to swim in “Buddy Martin’s School of Swimming” was to become more comfortable with the water. He would have me stand on the side of the pool and jump into his arms out in the water. At first there was an extreme hesitancy, especially since I liked to err on the side of caution as a young guy. (That’s a nice way to say I was a “scaredy cat.”)
Nevertheless, the day came when I took the plunge – I bailed off the safety of the deck into the safety of my daddy’s arms. He caught me and I was fine. As a matter of fact, there wasn’t a single time I can remember that he told me to jump but didn’t catch me.
I became so comfortable, as a matter of fact, that one time I jumped off a platform at Indian Lake without telling him I was going to. He had told me to stay put, actually, so he wasn’t there to catch me. I sank (fast) until I was retrieved on my quick descent by a neighbor who just happened to see where I went in.
You see, I believe there are some important similarities between my dad’s swimming lessons for me and our walk with Christ. First of all is the track record: My dad always caught me, so jumping became more justified in my mind.
Did you know that God has a 100% perfect track record of “catching” all those who jump at His command? He’s never let anyone down yet, and He’ll never start. It’s simply not in His character.
And then there’s the issue of His command. You see, I got into trouble once when I jumped without my dad telling me to. I believe sometimes we get ourselves in over our heads when we bail off into something before God says to.
Maybe what we want to do is a good thing, but if we’d waited for God’s timing it would have been a perfect thing! The good news is that if we do jump too soon, God won’t let us drown. He’s faithful and just to pick us up, set our feet back on the rock, and prepare us for the next time He’ll say, “Jump!”
So today, there’s a simple question for us all:
Do we really understand trust?
Do we really understand what kind of faith God wants for us?
He tells us, after all, that “the just will live by faith.” If we know Him, we can know He’ll care for us and hold us up. We can trust God – we can have total confidence in Him.
We can truly trust God.
Copyright © 2021 by https://pastorblakeman.wordpress.com/2012/01/09/truly-trust/. All rights reserved. No part of this article may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from Lifeword.org