You probably know the old saying: “In God we trust, everyone else bring cash”. While it’s a snappy aphorism, and hard to argue with, I have to confess that I’ve never fully understood what it means to trust in God. It’s not that I think God is untrustworthy, it’s just that it’s been hard for me to understand what trusting in God looks like on a day to day basis. Moreover, I see bad things happen to many good people who presumably put their trust in God, so clearly God is not the “fixer in chief”. After all, He did let His only son get crucified. So what does trusting in God really mean?
Back in the 13th century, St Thomas Aquinas said that everything on earth is analogous to God (with the exception of evil). Which makes sense given that God created everything in the first place. So as a starting point, it may be helpful if we look at our human relationships where we have trust in another person such as a spouse, a best friend, even a child with a parent. We trust not because we believe they can fix everything, but because we know they have our best interests at heart. That they will always act out of love for us and do the best they can in any given situation. This description also seems to fit God’s love for us quite well. However, because God loves us so much He gave us total free will. Therefore we are not prevented from harming ourselves through bad choices, or unfortunately, being the victim of other’s poor choices. Hmmm…..
In Jesus ministry it is clear from His teachings and how He lived that He was here to help us get to know His Father, and also to show how we might live a joyful life, if we totally trust in God. In Mark 6 when Jesus sends out the apostles, He instructs them to “take nothing for the journey”. I suspect the power He gave them to cast out demons and perform other miracles would only work if they had total trust in their heavenly Father. And 2000 years later, this is the message for us. That the more we live the gospel, which is essentially Jesus teaching us about His Father’s will, the more at ease we will be. The tricky bit, and the part with which we tend to struggle, is that God’s Will does not necessarily unfold in our lives the way we would like it.
It is said that God draws straight with crooked lines. Meaning we don’t really understand how God works most if not all of the time in our lives. The early 20th century writer C. S. Lewis said that we will likely spend a good bit of our time in eternity thanking God for the prayers He didn’t answer. However, the message of trusting in God is that because God loves us, and that His Will, will indeed be done, we should try and relax and not live in a state of fear or anxiety. Yes, bad things may happen to us, but this is not the end of the story. Jesus death and resurrection are proof of that.
So how might we figure out what is God’s will? For me it always comes back to what I consider the three pillars of our faith practice: Prayer (getting to know God, so we can develop our conscience and a deeper relationship with Him). Good Works (to help us recognize our lives are not all about us). And Self-Sacrifice (so that we might start to break through that “hard shell” of self-centeredness). Yes, I know, it doesn’t sound very appealing or exciting. The thing is, it only makes sense once you do it and discover that we were indeed made for this purpose: oneness with God and our sisters and brothers.
Having said all that, unlike the apostles, you will likely need to bring stuff for the journey, and probably won’t cast out any demons, but you should always keep in mind that you are indeed unconditionally loved by a trustworthy God, and that in the end, all will be well.
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