Tuesday, August 2, 2022 Some material taken from Finding Good Advice
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 your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6
Acknowledging Him In All Our Ways - "In all your ways acknowledge Him..."
When we have a relationship built on trust, we know that it is something we can believe in. When a person has earned our trust or proven they are trustworthy, we can rest in that relationship, and we hand things off to them and share with them without worry. In fact, worry goes away when real trust is involved.
We can have this kind of trust relationship with God, but if we want it, we have to be all in. "In all your ways acknowledge Him..." means that God deserves and wants to be a part of every area of our lives. We cannot pick and choose what we want Him to be a part of and what we don’t. We trust Him in all things, and in all our ways, or we don’t trust Him at all. When we are that close with the Lord – where He is involved in everything, in all our ways – we get to see how He works in our lives. We will find Him trustworthy, and we can have that worry free relationship with Him. We can hand all things over to Him and trust Him with it all.
The Arena of Proper Trust is "all your ways". This is a command to guard against only acknowledging God in times of trouble and acts of worship. The area where God is screened out is generally the place of our greatest defeat. To "acknowledge" God in a situation is to open the door for His intervention, support, and His direction. Van Houser
We don’t have to be ashamed with God. He wants it all from us – the good, the worship and adoration, and the bad times too. He wants our failures. He wants our burdens. He wants every part of us.
What happens when we acknowledge Him in all our ways? "…and He will make your paths straight.”
Some people believe that God wants them to be happy. The truth is that God wants us to be holy more than He wants us to be happy. He does love us and want good things for us. He gives us good things and works things out for our good and His glory, but His desires for our hearts go way beyond mere happiness.
He knows that when we are in fellowship with Him, and we are working to build godly character, purity, and to be more like Him, that we will find true happiness – joy in Him. I am not talking about the world’s definition of happiness. I am talking about the deep-down unshakable joy we feel when we are one with the Lord. This relationship with Him will take us through anything and will not be destroyed by any outward circumstances or difficult situations. It is in this relationship with Him that we will find guidance and direction and peace that comes with it. This is where He will make our paths straight. Without a relationship with Him, we won’t even be able to hear which way to go.
We will still have difficult times, because that is a promise of life on earth. We may also feel “unhappy” often. The paths He leads us on will even be difficult at times, but there is a purpose for the bumpy road. These times tend to make us who we are, building strength and character.
If your path is hard and you question the trustworthiness of God, remember that straight paths might not always feel right, but where our Shepherd leads us is always right. God never wastes anything, and He always sends us down paths that teach us and bring us closer to Him.
