I Will Trust You

I Will Trust You

I will trust You when the future looks uncertain.
I will trust You when logic tells me I shouldn’t.
I will trust You even if I don’t get what I want.

I will trust You to give me what brings me close to You.
I will trust You to lead me to places I never dreamed.
I will trust You to provide enough, even if it’s not in the way I thought best.

I will trust You when I am surrounded by darkness.
I will trust You when the worries want to choke me.
I will trust You even when I can’t see a clear path ahead.

Choosing Busy or Rest

Choosing Busy or Rest

Have you asked someone how they are doing and had the common response “busy”? I know I’ve given it myself, and it’s supposed to imply that you are important and productive. Except we forget that just because we are busy doesn’t mean we are doing what God has called us to do. That’s a tough one to admit sometimes. In the North American culture, we equate busyness with productivity and worth. It’s not the same, though, and really hinders many of us from entering God’s rest and understanding our worth as defined by Him.

I have learned that when I am getting overwhelmed or stressed because my life is too full, I need to stop and ask a few questions:

1. Am I called to do this? Of course, I am called to Jesus first, not to a task. But from there, sometimes God calls us to do something, and sometimes He doesn’t. When we assume that everything that’s in front of us is a calling, we can tend to get overcommitted and overwhelmed. First, we stop, slow down and really question God on whether or not this task or commitment is something He has for us, or if we are taking it on to try to prove worth or meaning.

The Sacrifice of Praise

The Sacrifice of Praise

I don’t often equate the idea of praise with sacrifice. I think more of singing worship music or thanking God when things go the way I wanted them to. I can praise Him often that way. But this isn’t what Hebrews 13 is talking about when it says God doesn’t want you to keep sacrificing lambs (as in the old sacrificial system) but rather to offer sacrifices of praise.

We offer a sacrifice of praise when we thank God for what He is doing even when we don’t get the answer we want, or when we don’t yet see the ending of the difficult circumstance. We praise Him because we know He is steadfast and will never abandon us in the middle. It is a sacrifice to praise God when we don’t yet have a reason to do so, but we are borrowing hope from what we cannot see to stand in thankfulness now.

I think it’s sometimes helpful to see it as a sacrifice, rather than just something that is easy or a natural outcome of the situation in which we find ourselves. I don’t want to give thanks or remember God’s goodness when I’m focused on a situation that is difficult. I want to complain, and wallow in my misery. But as I offer a sacrifice of praise, proclaiming what Jesus has done for us and who He continues to be in us, I am changing something in me. I am no longer focused on the situation, but on God who holds the situation.