I saw a quote recently (I think it was on Pinterest) that said, “Cookies with raisins in them are the reason I have trust issues.”
I laughed. Because it’s true. There’s been times where I was overjoyed to chomp down on a warm, soft chocolate chip cookie only to have my heart shatter in a million tiny pieces when I realized that those dark brown spots were not in fact bits of heaven in milk chocolate form, but rather dried fruit.
And I am only being SLIGHTLY mellow dramatic here.
But honestly, I have trust issues that go deeper than the age-old chocolate chip vs. raisin debacle.
Even after all this time, I STILL have trust issues with God. They have gradually improved, but when the going gets tough, my first instinct is to freak out.
Enter stage left, our Hidden Ah-Ha for the week:
“Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid.” ~Isaiah 12:2
Powerful words. Easy to read, hard to practice. (At least for this stumbling gal.)
Before we get too far into this, let’s take a few moments for some self-evaluation. Please answer the following question:
When things get really hard and I am facing a huge challenge or unknown circumstance, I…
A) Grab my pair of boxing gloves and start swinging– I got this.
B) Curl up in the fetal position in a corner and woof down an entire bag of Dove Chocolate.
C) Throw up.
D) B then C
E) Calmly take a deep breath and gently reply with a smile that you will react once you have prayed and consulted God.
Ideally, we would all like to react with Option E– cool, calm and collected, knowing that God has got our backs, and we just keep on trucking.
But friends, I am not there yet. Emotions can be powerful. And from my personal experience, it takes quite a bit of practice for our hearts/minds to immediately go to God when things start to fall apart or when life is kicking us square in the pants.
So how do we take this Bible verse “Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid” from being a Bible verse we read and change to a Bible verse we LIVE?
Step 1. Throw out all of your raisin cookies. (That actually has nothing to do with this verse. I just think it is a necessary cleansing step for every household.)
Step 2. Get into the habit of finding Jesus in the everyday. We can do this by establishing a daily quiet time, counting our blessings (and writing them down!), attending church, praying without ceasing (aka talking to God all day every day), hearing His voice, surrounding ourselves with other believers etc. There are a lot of ways to start the process.
Step 3. Keep at it. Again, trusting God is a process. When we trust, we have peace. Seek it.
Step 4. Reflect. Take a few moments to look back at other hard life experiences and see if you can identify when/how God helped you through it. Why would this time be any different?
Step 5. Cling to the fact that God loves you. God is Love (1 John 4:16) and Love always trusts (1 Corinthians 13:7.) Therefore, we can always trust God.
See? When we follow these five steps (and repeat them throughout our lives,) we develop a deep love relationship with God. The more we love Him, the more we can trust Him. And at that point, we no longer need to be afraid, because we are confident that He is our salvation. Don’t be afraid… Just Trust.
Trusting Him,
“Yes, indeed—God is my salvation. I trust, I won’t be afraid.” ~Isaiah 12:2 MSG
PS: I actually have nothing against cookies with raisins in them. If you bake me some, I will eat them. Just let me know they are raisins first.
