Taking God at His word…

My last post got my sister and I talking, and we both agreed that our conversation would make a good blog entry… to see how many other people are realizing the same things we are.

As she wrote in her comment, “I have been impressed recently as to the fact that insecurity and lack of faith are both off shoots of pride. Ouch. Both are not taking the Lord at His word. One as to ourselves, and the other as to Him. Thanks for being honest.”

I wrote back and agreed. I started getting impressed by this a year or two ago… I started realizing that many of us (Christians as a whole) should be ashamed of the prayers that we pray. I think it was after one of my kids had asked me if I would get them lunch or something. Of course, I told them yes, but it wasn’t lunch time yet, and still they continued to ask me if I would take care of it. I got frustrated… “I already told you I would… why do you keep asking?” I remember saying, “I’ve already answered you, I’m not going to again, even if you ask again. You need to trust that I’m going to do what I said I would do.”

Then I realized how often we do that to God. We get into a tight financial situation and we start praying that He will provide… that’s the most common one by far. But that very request proves how little we take Him at His word. I mean… He already said He would provide for us… and we’re still asking? It would be far better if, instead, we asked Him to show us how to follow His leading better… or to help our unbelief… or even if we just changed our begging to praising and thanking Him for whichever promise contains His answer.

Of course… that leads to the whole issue of “what about those times that God DIDN’T provide?” I know that there are people who have been in circumstances where they feel this has happened. All I can say to that is the same thing I remind myself of when I am tempted to think this. First… whom am I to say that I know what I need more than God does? Do I really dare to trust my own judgment on what I need in my life more than God’s… even to the point of claiming that God has lied? I don’t dare do that! And then the other answer comes to me when I think of children who are given the vegetables that they need to stay healthy, but who refuse them and rant and scream because they aren’t getting the pizza and ice cream they want. I think we do that to God more than we realize… He’s got what we need and has placed it right in front of us, but it’s not what we want, or what we’re expecting, so we refuse it. If we go hungry in any way because we have refused the provision that God has supplied… that doesn’t mean He didn’t provide it!

But I’m grateful that even when we miss His provision the first time around, He still, so often, gives us another chance, and yet another, because of His unending grace and mercy.

Apparently this struck a chord in my sister. Here was her reply… “Somehow I think more needs to be said in churches about taking the Lord at His word. How many times did God say, ‘Have I not said?’ and ‘God is not a man, that He should lie … has He not spoken, and will He not do it?’ and in the wilderness, Jesus’ fighting faith was what God said. Very powerful, this. We assume He’s like us and says ‘oh, I’ll do that’ at a whim when really what we mean is, ‘I’ll try to remember to do that when I have time,’ or ‘if I feel like it and its a good enough reason.’ We don’t assume we’re calling Him a liar if we believe anything less than what He said. But that’s really what it is. If reality were known … if the foundation could be laid bare for what it is … we don’t think He’s really good for His word. A man says of another, ‘Well, I loaned him 50 bucks, but he’ll pay me back. I know he’s good for it.’ And most of the time that’s more trust than we give the God of the universe.”

So what do you think?