Monday, August 1, 2022
Trust in the LORD with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. Proverbs 3:5
Why Trust God?
Let’s admit it – most of us think we can figure things out on our own, and we are not quick to give anyone control over our lives and decisions. In Proverbs 3:5 we are given some advice about not trusting ourselves more than we trust God.
Coming before God with open hands and releasing it to Him is an offering on our part of letting go and trusting God. We want to be in control, and we have a very hard time letting go and letting God work in our lives. We are not equipped to solve our own problems, but God gives us the wisdom and guidance we need. He wants us to yield to Him and let Him have control.
There are many reasons why we should trust Him over our own understanding:
We don’t know the future.
We don’t know the future and often we create the future in our heads. This can cause us many problems because we may make a decision based on what we think will happen in the future or what we are afraid about happening in the future. We should prepare wisely and do things like save money, etc. but in a difficult situation where we are trying to make a decision, we cannot trust what we do not know. God knows the future and we can trust Him.
Myth: God wants us to know everything about the future. God knows that we do not need to know the future. If we knew everything about the future, we would have no need for faith. Why would we need to trust God if we knew everything that was going to happen in our lives? God wants us to have faith and trust Him with the future.
Our minds are limited by scope and corrupted by sin.
We are human and the temptation of the flesh is a constant battle. The power of human desire is strong, and Satan uses our fleshly desires against us. Part of our battle over the flesh is the desire to be in control and to know things. In the Garden of Eden, Eve was tempted by Satan to disobey God and eat the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Eve fell for the temptation of wisdom greater than hers:
For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil. When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. Genesis 3:5-6a
Because we are susceptible to our emotions.
Emotions can get us in a lot of trouble. When we make decisions based on our emotions it is usually not a good thing. Emotions are strong and can cause us to not be able to see or think clearly or make the best decision. All emotions - good and bad - can cause us to make wrong decisions. Fear, anger, worry, and other negative decisions can cause us to make wrong decisions because we make decisions hastily when emotions get in the way. Emotions can also keep us from letting go and stepping out in faith when God tells us to go.
Because there are things in life that we will never understand.
Some questions will never be answered this side of heaven. Many things in life will never make sense to us and that is why we do not need to know everything that God knows. When something doesn’t make sense to us, we will struggle to make a good decision.
The important thing to remember is that our ways are not like His ways and our thoughts are not like His thoughts. When we lean on our own understanding, we oftentimes are trying to tell God how we think it should go. Surrender your offering of trust to Him and lean into Him to find the direction He wants you to go.
