Trust in the Fall

How often are we told to “Give it to the Lord and trust that He will take care of everything”? How often do we tell ourselves, “I AM giving it to Him!” knowing deep down inside we’re only giving Him what we want to give Him? We can never seem to let go! Why would we?

God is not tangible! I cannot reach out and hand Him my problems. I can’t sit down at a coffee shop and tell Him face-to-face all of the things weighing down on my heart and watch as He thinks of the best advice to give and listen and He says “You know what, never mind! I’ll handle that for you!”. Sometimes talking to the “Big Man upstairs” isn’t cutting it and we give up on trusting in Him and learn to trust in ourselves. Here’s the catch with that… we can’t do everything on our own. We can’t handle life without accepting the fact that sometimes it’s just too much and we need Him to do all of the heavy lifting!

I’m the type of person who always has to be in control. I like to know what I’m going to make for dinner two nights in advance, I like to know how I did on a test right after taking it and I like to know what the next four years of my life are going to look like. I can’t stand not knowing the answer to all of my problems; so learning (and practicing) how to hand everything to the Father was excruciating for me! I had to compare God to my earthly father. I had to think of times where my dad said: “You know what, never mind! I’ll handle that for you!”.

“Jump. He’ll catch you!”

I’ve often thought of this “jump” that God requires us to take as a little girl learning to swim. I don’t know about you, but I remember the fear of jumping from the side of the pool into my dad’s arms! Try as best you can to put yourself there. You’re a little girl. It’s your first time at the “big kid” pool. Your dad climbs in ready to teach you everything he knows. When he looks back, you’re standing on the side shaking... a little because you’re cold, but mostly because there is a “huge” body of water in front of you that you’ve never tip-toed in. He walks back towards you. Now he’s standing about three feet from you. His arms are stretched out and with his gentile, loving voice he is encouraging you to jump. Everyone can see that you’re not that far, and he is your dad... of course he’ll catch you! Now, the first time you muster up the courage you only leap... You reach out to his hands, touching the tips of his fingers and plop into the water. You didn’t really give him the chance to catch you because you didn’t really jump! He lifts you out of the water... acting like it was the most glorious jump he has ever seen and encouraging you to do it again. This time you have even more fears. You know how cold the water is, you know you can’t touch the bottom and you know that with out him you will not come back to the surface... but still he is there... arms stretched to you with encouraging phrases and the promise that he will catch you. So, you do it... you REALLY jump! And he catches you!!! His promise was kept!

So it goes with giving God our burdens. We so often tell ourselves we are giving it to Him, when in reality we are only letting Him have the tips of the struggle. We like to hold onto it... we like our feet to touch the concrete as long as they can. And when we plop into the unknown we become fearful and question why we still have burdens or suffering. It’s not until we REALLY give them to Him that He can REALLY catch us and we can learn to trust Him.

So, when it comes to you giving Him your burdens... are you REALLY giving them to Him, or are you just letting Him touch the tips while you still have “control”?

“Trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.” –Psalm 3:5-6