I don’t know about you, but it seems to me that when problems show up in my life, the first thing I do is to begin thinking of solutions to them. Now this is typical I think of most people, and it was the instruction that God gave to Adam in the Garden, “Take care of it.” (Dave’s paraphrase.) But how often do I run off fixing things, only after the fact realizing that I never once included God in on the process?
I do believe that as Christians we are called to be problem solvers, but as I look at Proverbs 3:5 – 6 I see that I am supposed to trust in the Lord with “ALL” my heart, lean not to my own understanding, acknowledge Him in all my ways and then He will direct my paths. That does not look to me like we should rush off to fix things until we've first consulted the Lord. This is something that I know I have been negligent about, and that concerns me greatly.
Trust in the Lord with all my heart. What exactly does that mean, to trust with all of your heart? Well first off to trust with all your heart is a spiritual thing, and not a mental one. Scripture doesn’t tell us to trust in the Lord with all of our reasoning; it says to trust with all our heart. The heart is the most central part of who we are, and don’t forget Scripture also states that out of it (The heart.) flow ALL the issues of life. (Proverbs 4:23)
The first thing to do so you can trust the Lord with all of your heart is to get your mind out of the way. Now I don’t mean to empty your mind like a lot of Eastern religions encourage, no that can lead to you being led by the enemy, what I’m talking about is putting your reasoning aside so that your heart (Which is the core part of who you are.) can do what it does, believe what God’s Word says.
Scripture tells us that in order to appropriate any of the things that God has for us, we have to first believe, second confess what we believe and then we’ll see the manifestation of it. (Romans 10:9 – 10 / Mark 11:23 – 24) This is how everything works in the Kingdom of God, and if we expect that we will see any of the promises of God come in any other way, then we are going to be disappointed in life.
God tells us that we have not, because we ask not. (James 4:2b) Basically that means that if we don’t ask, God can't work on our behalf. I know what you are thinking though, He’s God, and He can do anything that He wants to do. That’s not exactly true. He cannot do anything on planet Earth unless we ask Him. Once we’ve asked Him according to His Word, and this is the essential part here, He will move Heaven and Earth to see to it that we have what we’ve asked for. But don’t think if you just ask anything it will be answered, it has to be according to His Word and you have to ask in faith. Remember, He said that He watches over His Word to perform it, not our wishes.
If God was moved because we had needs in our lives, then there would never be any needs in the world. God is not moved because you or I have a need, He is moved by faith. We have to operate in faith in order for God to move on our behalf. This is not because He is unjust, mean or wants to teach us a lesson. It is a legal situation, plain and simple. If we never ask, He will never answer. My friend Joe McGee says it this way, “You stare at God, and He’ll stare right back at you. But if you draw near to Him, He’ll draw near to you.” (James 4:8)
It’s all in our perception of things. What are we looking at, what are we seeing? If our heart is the central thing, and we are instructed to trust God with our whole heart, then perhaps we aren’t seeing things correctly when we look through the eyes of reason. After all the realm of reason is where the enemy lurks. We are instructed to take every thought captive, (2 Corinthians 10:5) thoughts happen in your own understanding. Remember God speaks to us through our hearts, not our heads.
So when things show up in your life, instead of just rushing off to figure out the solutions, let's take a few minutes, bow our heads and talk to the Father of all creation and get His idea for how to handle things. This is something that I am getting to learn daily right now, and while it at times seems overwhelming to me, I know that God has my best interest at heart, as long as I take the time to find out what that is.
Strength and honor for the Kingdom and the King!
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