Trusting God. What a concept. Trusting an invisible God with every bit and breath of my life. I am terrible at it. He wants all of me, yet so often I do not give Him much of me at all.
How do we trust in someone we have never physically seen? Yet we can’t fully trust the humans we are able to see but they are not perfect like God.
Fear, pride, spiritual blindness, laziness, old wounds, perceived lack of time are some things that can block our ability to trust in God.
We “take stuff back”. We trust God for a while but then when things aren’t working out so well or moving fast enough, we stop trusting and return to worry, fretting and trying to fix it ourselves.
I would love to know the future. I can’t stand not knowing. I need to plan ahead and know what I should or shouldn’t do, which is basically impossible, therefore I am often paralyzed when making decisions.
Maybe that’s playing God. Precisely what Lucifer’s fall was and sin entering the world. Wanting to be God or even above God, is a big part of the mess we are in.
It seemed easier for me to trust God when I was younger and perhaps more naïve, like when I was pregnant with triplets.
The whole experience was a wild ride and God stretched me to the limits of trusting Him. There were many, many scary and difficult moments. And, I had no choice, three new lives were at stake and it was mostly out of my control.
Somehow by the grace of God I survived and so did the triplets.
But that experience was a positive life force, so maybe that made it easier. Trusting through sickness, grief, and hardship seems much more difficult if not seemingly impossible. There is not always new life at the end of it.
I am finding the last phase of life completely stressful, unnerving and challenging. There seems to be so much more I have to trust God about.
I thought I got good at trusting 30 years ago, so I was finished.
Lesson learned.
Not quite.
Like a young child trusts their father to take care of them, we need to trust God, our Father, to take care of us. Why is it so hard for us grown-ups? I’m a mother, I should know. But I am more used to mothering than being “mothered”.
We need to surrender to the God who loves us and made us. Who among us wants to willingly surrender? It is against human nature. Would you want to be in a fierce battle and be on the side that surrenders or loses??
We are wired to win.
Surrendering is not easy. It was not easy for Jesus to surrender to his Father in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Surrendering means sometimes things are going to be very, very difficult. That is why it can be so hard to do.
…For we have no power to face this vast army that is attacking us. We do not know what to do, but our eyes are on you. (2 Chronicles 20:12)
I feel like lately I have trouble with trust because I have more years of life experience and am aware of so many more crazy things that can happen to people. There are a lot more stories to tell.
Over time I have also learned that when God wants me to trust and go deeper with Him, there is usually a reason and often one I don’t like. So I know I’m in the fire being refined and OUCH! nobody likes the heat of that.
My life is not my own anyway, as a Christian it is to be lived for Christ. We need to keep the focus on Him rather than ourselves.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. (Proverbs 3:5)
And yet, while looking back, God has come through for me many times in my life already so why don’t I trust Him? How foolish can I be? He has proven His faithfulness many times over. I need to recall these times when I am feeling defeated and doubtful.
This is a lot to swallow in my wretched humanness. It takes me years to learn things, and then I find myself re-learning the same things, over and over and over again. I think all of us have certain issues in our lives that we constantly battle and it takes our whole lives to work on them.
I am a quick learner, but perhaps not when it comes to some spiritual matters. Those go to the very depths of existence. That’s different than knowing the answers on exams or quickly picking up a new hobby or concept.
I will need to surrender and be tested like gold in fire and be beaten and struggle over and over again until I can say, like St. Ignatius of Loyola: YOUR LOVE AND YOUR GRACE ARE ENOUGH FOR ME.
And that, is a life-long journey.
JESUS I TRUST IN YOU! HELP ME TRUST YOU MORE!
PRAYERS FOR TRUST IN GOD:
Litany of Trust (click for prayer) Sisters of Life.org
St. Faustina Litany of Divine Mercy/Trust
Prayer by St. Ignatius of Loyola:
Take O Lord, and receive my entire liberty, my memory, my understanding and my whole will. All that I am and all that I possess You have given me. I surrender it all to You to be disposed of according to Your will. Give me only Your love and Your grace; with these I will be rich enough, and will desire nothing more.
And here’s another great song I used to play a lot at bedtime when I was first saved as a teenager. (Also a song we would play on guitar at Mass.) You can tell I really like this St. Ignatius prayer!
