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Trust is one of those issues that invades our lives quite often. It’s one of the excuses that prisoners often use to rationalize their bad behavior. It’s an excuse for the demise of marriages. It’s an excuse for people to separate themselves from relationships. “I’ve been hurt so many times, I just can’t trust anymore.” But maybe we’re looking at trust the wrong way.
Webster’s defines trust in part as: “reliance on the integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., of a person or thing, confidence. . . confident expectation of something; hope . . . one upon which a person relies: God is my trust.” A perusal of the word “trust” in my bible concordance yielded an interesting tidbit: I cannot find a reference where the bible tells me to put my trust in anything but God!
The bible gives me warnings to put my trust in nothing but God. And yet, God created us for relationships. How can we have relationships without trust?
The reality of trust is that while we need to strive to be trustworthy ourselves, we should place our trust in no one but God. While we can have “integrity, strength, ability, surety, etc., . . .,” it is wrong to have confidence in those abilities in others, or even in ourselves. Our confidence belongs only in the Lord God. Why? Because everyone else is fallible, He alone remains perfect, unchanging and unchangeable.
So, are we supposed to have relationships without trust? Not at all. We just have to put trust in its proper perspective. If we “trust in the Lord with all our heart, and lean not on our own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5), we have the freedom to trust in relationships. And if we carefully examine the bible, we will see that whether or not our trust will be violated isn’t the issue. It’s what we allow God to do with our lives after the violation that matters.
Take Joseph for example. His trust was violated by his brothers, by Potiphar and his wife, and by the chief cupbearer. But he remained faithful to God, and God used him mightily. Take David for example. Saul tried repeatedly to kill him, but David remained faithful to God, and God used him mightily. Take Jesus for example. When do you think he “figured out” that Judas would betray him? Before or after he made him treasurer? Didn’t Jesus know before he ever called Judas that he would be the one to take the thirty pieces of silver? And yet he gave Judas a position of trust in his fellowship.
In my own life, I’ve experienced enough reasons to distrust men. My father, my step-father, my high school sweetheart, my first two husbands, and a few minor characters all violated my trust in one way or another. When I finally learned that I needed to distrust my own judgment and place my trust only in the Lord, I was blessed with the most wonderful marriage to an awesome man of God. When he died two days before our second anniversary, I was angry with God for a short time. But my head overruled my heart and I trusted in God even though I didn’t feel like it. God gave me another wonderful, godly husband and the ability to love him with great joy.
Has your trust been violated? Then put it where it belongs, squarely in the hands of God. Strive to be trustworthy, but understand you will fail as will everyone else. Except the Lord. He alone is worthy of trust. Go where he leads. Live life to its fullest. Don’t shy away from hurt. Grow through the pain. God’s blessings are on the other side. |
