In Him we Trust

Proverbs 3:5-6 “Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your way acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths”.

In times of struggle, in the times when things get tough most advice given to us is “trust in God”. These words seem so simple and easy yet it can be the hardest thing to do. There are many times when I have overlooked my trust in God and had trust in my own abilities and strength rather than God’s and surprisingly enough, I was wrong. Trusting in God isn’t a “one time thing” or a” when we want him for something we will trust” but a day to day, 24 hour must.

The times that we don’t trust in God are when we are feeling anxious and don’t give God our worries, when we want to be control and won’t allow God to take the lead and when we suffer we find it hard to go to a God when we are in pain. So how can we trust in God? Well in proverbs 3:5 it says that we should trust in the Lord with all our heart and not to lean on what we know. We shouldn’t trust in ourselves or experiences in the past but trust in God who knows the next step. The best illustration is when we find times in life where we are walking down a path but can’t see round the bend, we don’t know what is going to happen next. Instead of giving our worries to God and taking control we can’t get round the bend. But when we give the worries to God he lays our path out straight in front of us and the bend is no longer there. We trust in God because we know that he knows the path that is laid before us.

Sometimes there are paths that seem impossible to go down, when someone in the family is sick or feelings of anxiety and depression overwhelm you. It’s easy not to admit we have a problem but that leads us to pride. We are too proud to admit that there is a problem and that we need God.

Philippians 4:13 says “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me”. We need to learn that we can’t do things in our own strength but we can do though Christ’s strength. Philippians 4:5-6 tells us that “The Lord is at hand; do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God”. God is longing for us to talk to him, he is longing for us to give us our battles. He already knows what is in our hearts; he knows the struggles that we will face so we need to turn to him. God will free us from fear, anxieties, and worries if we just trust in him.

The hardest time to trust in God is when something is happening to us that we can’t control and have no understanding as to why it is happening. When negative emotions take over, when past experiences catch up with us, when past emotions keep being brought up... where is our trust in him then? Remembering that we are living in a spiritual battle and this is a battle. When we are weak the Devil loves to try and get in and put a foothold over us, weather that is anxiety, fear, insecurities or anything. When the Devil does we feel more negative and insecure and forget to pray, we forget to ask God for help and try to fix the problem ourselves. Going to God and admitting we need help is hard but is humble. We know we can’t do things in our own strength and we know that God is in control, so why don’t we let him in?

Even though we can pray and give our worries to God, it may not mean that later these worries and struggles won’t appear again. It’s important that we learn to work through these worries, having a discipler can help go through these problems. When going through the steps to freedom on the “freedom in Christ” course, there was a chapter on anxiety. It is helpful to write down all the worries and feelings that you are going through at the moment. Then in the next column write down who is in control of these fears, worries or situations. Then finally write down what you have assumed, is it the worst case scenario and have you included God in it. I found that all of my worries were assumed and actually didn’t happen therefore I should have gone to God and not worried at all.
God is there and God is listening.

God in the Small Things

A fantastic and inspirational new blog from Helen Rambaut... enjoy

All The Small Things.

I love the small things. Those moments that make you smile, the ones where you laugh nonstop about something stupid and the ones where you just feel happy spending time with someone. It is so easy to take those things for granted when life becomes stressful/difficult. It is so easy to say that there is nothing to look forward to or that nothing positive happened in the day. Did you forget when your friend made you laugh by passing notes during a lecture (yes that doesn’t change at uni!)? Did you forget when you were told you looked nice today? All these things lift my mood considerably, yet when it comes down to it, I spend so much time focussing on the criticisms and general stress of life that I forget about the small pleasures. I was reminded of that today when my flatmate and I made rice crispy cakes together. Just being in the kitchen with good music, good company and delicious food was brilliant. It is moments like that I treasure. Simple moments where the stress of life is momentarily forgotten.

My walk with God has been a similar story recently. I had spent so much time looking for a life changing, heart stopping moment that I had stopped seeing him at all. I was annoyed that he wasn’t shouting at me or skywriting something. But then I was reminded of an image from fireworks night.

I was watching the fireworks display, and there were the huge spectacular fireworks which leapt several feet into the sky, sparkling in the chilly air, splintering into a hundred directions and then fading into the darkness. Then, there were smaller fireworks, they didn’t leap as high, and my view was obscured by the silhouettes of the trees against the night sky. I began to become frustrated, I didn’t want to change position or perspective so I could see them. But once I did it was so worth it. Although they didn’t have the same height , they shone all the same, and their glow lit the skyline once again.

This is like our lives. We can spend months or even years searching for the next huge “God moment” when actually it may have been right in front of us, but because of our short sightedness and stubbornness we don’t see them. We don’t hear God. He doesn’t always move with a shout, but often with merely a whisper. So, just because you haven’t had God skywrite your name or had a heart stopping vision... it doesn’t mean he isn’t working in your life, or that he doesn’t have a plan for you. He is there in everything, whether it’s a word of encouragement or simply a talk that relates to you, God is working. He is always working. I have looked back countless times, only to realise God has always been there and I know that He will forever be there.

This is why I love Jesus: He is there, even in the small things.

Truth To Takeaway

The Bible says:

Acts 1:8

“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the Earth.”

To bear witness: testify, give evidence, confirm, support, be evidence of, bear out, speak for, display, manifest, declare

To witness: see, observe, notice, view, watch, experience
Reflections

There is no reason to think that this verse applies only to the first disciples! Throughout the book of Acts, the Holy Spirit comes on many people and all have the experience of being filled with power to witness! My own experience is that the Spirit came on me and I received a greater level of confidence in sharing my faith.

If you are a Christian who has been filled with the Spirit then you are a Spirit empowered witness of Christ. God has chosen you to speak about His Son! The heavens might display and declare God’s majesty, but it is people who speak about His Son. Not merely ‘people’ but you and your friends; the Church. No one else in all of society can be a witness like we can as the Church; like I can as a Spirit empowered individual, like you can as a Spirit saturated believer!

You are a witness, which means, firstly, that you've seen something. Someone can only witness/tell about that they know/have seen/about what they've, heard and lived out. You may not have been standing there when Jesus was crucified; you may not have placed your fingers on the nail marks on His hands; you may not have eaten with Him; spoke to Him; travelled with Him – but you are still a witness! You are a witness to the transforming, life-changing power of His love and forgiveness. You are a witness to the joy and peace that comes from knowing His presence in your life; a witness to change, and save those around you; to set people free from addiction and slavery to sin.

You are also ‘Spirit-empowered’. His spirit lives in you, has strengthened you and filled you with a new power; a power to witness, and to declare boldly, what you have seen, heard and experienced!

This is the promise that you can live in – that you need not fear or shrink back, since you have the Spirit of power inside of you.

So here are two great truths for you read out allowed:
1. My life is significant. I am a Spirit-empowered witness for the Son of God; the most glorious person in the universe.
2. I have received the Spirit and have power to witness based on God’s strength and power; not simply on my levels of energy or enthusiasm. There should be, and is, a decreasing level of fear and timidity in my life as I allow the Spirit of God to change me and fill more areas of my life.

This week live with this verse and these truths resonating in you, do not shrink back, stand, speak, witness.