January 19

“Trust firmly in God with all your heart but do not trust in your own wisdom” (Proverbs 3:5).

So says the Preacher. But this offers a conundrum to the believer; what does it mean to trust?

Literally, trust is a firm belief in the reliability of something or someone; thus we have trustees of deceased estates, trust companies managing and maintaining investments for beneficiaries, and persons occupying positions of trust, such as Board members, judges, government officers etc. So says the world.

But what does it mean to trust God?

Typically, believers trust God for things that they cannot provide for themselves; resurrection from the dead, salvation and eternal life are examples of such trust, but in reality, does little honour to God. In a sense, it is a sort of religious fatalism, for these things are beyond our own reach and so we must rely upon God to provide them, if we are to have them. If we add faith that God will do these things that He undertakes in certain circumstances, then it can be said that we trust God for them. But this is hardly Biblical trust.

Just as typically, believers trust God for things that they want and that they hope for, such as a spouse, children, job, home and other things that we would like but cannot be sure of obtaining without God’s help. We pray to God that these things might be given to us and, if they are, we are grateful to God; if they are not, we accept that they were not meant to be. Although this is exercising faith and trusting God’s providence, it is still not what is meant by Biblical trust.

Biblical trust is trusting God for that which we don’t need to trust Him; it is seeking Him and His will for things about which we can please ourselves whether we do them or not; the means are at our disposal and it is well within our capabilities to do whatever it is that we want to do.

These are the things that we don’t often trust God for; for that which He wants our lives to be, as opposed to what we might want them to be; to be made like Christ, carrying our cross and doing only those things that are pleasing to God. Such trust means that first we must resolve to be His in every respect, eschewing the world and its distractions, and the things we most cherish, including “ministries”, family, jobs, status, homes and friends. We cannot truly trust God if we refuse to empty our hearts of any desire for all else.

A heart that is thus emptied of every desire other than to know Him, is the only heart that He can fill, for God will not be One among many, but the only One.