The Issue of Trust
by Paul Black
If you’ve been a follower of Jesus for any length of time, you’ll regularly be challenged with this question, “Do I trust God?” This question goes back to the “Garden of Eden” when the emphasis of Satan’s strategy was to get Eve to question the integrity of God’s word. Since that time, the greatest battle has been to restore man’s trust in God. For the purpose of this devotional, I would like to reverse the question; “Does God trust me?” I’ve been reading a booklet written by Duncan Campbell called “The Price and Power of Revival.” Rev. Duncan Campbell was the minister that God inserted in the 1949 Hebrides Revival. This is the question Rev Campbell poses to all those who would desire a move of the Holy Spirit. Can God trust us if He decides to pour out?” The Psalmist asks this question in Psalm 24:3 (NASB)…
“Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord? And who may stand in His holy place?”
He then answers it in the following verse…
“He who has clean hands and a pure heart, who has not lifted up his soul to falsehood and has not sworn deceitfully.”
God’s move begins with a spiritual hunger for the fire of God. The fire we ask for must burn up everything in our lives that would lead to the worship of self rather than the worship of the Lord. His fire will have to burn up the desire to “control” or use His move to fulfill selfish desires. The prerequisites for a move must involve a laying down of selfish motives and a purification of a desire of anything but to only please Him.
This principle is clearly seen in the life of the patriarch, Abraham. God had promised Abraham that he would become a father of descendants that would outnumber the stars in the universe (Genesis 26:4). Yet the circumstances of his life had proven anything but; he was approximately 100 years old when Isaac was born. God then asks Abraham to sacrifice him. Say what??? Twenty-five years earlier, the scriptures say that Abraham believed God and that it was credited to him as “righteousness” (Genesis 15:6). Abraham was then 75 years old. But now, 25 years after the fact, God still tests Abraham’s loyalty. Why? God understands the effect of sin upon man’s heart (Jer. 7:19). After Abraham passes this test, God makes this statement in Genesis 22:12 (NASB) He said:
“Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”
God wants to pour Himself out but He’s waiting on those who He can trust totally. The first question one must ask is this; “Do I trust God?” The second question is just as crucial; “Can God trust me?”