365 Days with God - Day 70: Untrustworthy

I'm giving myself a challenge. Read the Bible each day for a whole year, following the ESV Study Guide 1-year plan. Each day, I will post whatever God has revealed to me in His Word, and how it is changing me. A friend of mine once said that nothing has changed her life as much as reading the bible each day - and I'm excited for how this will change me. Join me on an adventure into the heart of God - and day by day, we can learn more about who He is and what that means to us!

- Andy Catts

Day 70, February 28, 2014

Readings: Psalm 70, Exodus 15:22-27, Exodus 16:1-36, Ezra 6, Romans 7

When you think of people that you trust, who comes to mind? Your spouse? Friends? Parents? Pastor? What did these people do to earn your trust? What would it take for them to lose it? And once someone has earned your trust, how far will it go? At what point do you stop trusting them?

I encountered the issue of trust in a big way 3 years ago, as Elisha and I were struggling through the fact that we were about to have our first child, Elisha couldn't keep working at a job that kept her out of our home for 12+ hours per day, and we therefore couldn't afford our home. We tried everything. Government programs (a joke), selling, short-selling, massive budget changes, all while spiraling ourselves into debt trying to keep making the payments so that we would be "doing the right thing."

And where was God in all of this? Week after week, I would hit a breaking point where I couldn't take it anymore. Where was God? Why wasn't He helping? Hadn't we been doing the right thing all along? And week after week, my trust in Him eroded, until it was gone. The Israelites experienced this too, after they escaped from Egypt:

And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, and the people of Israel said to them, "Would that we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full, for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger." 
Then the LORD said to Moses, "Behold, I am about to rain bread from heaven for you, and the people shall go out and gather a day's portion every day, that I may test them, whether they will walk in my law or not." (Exodus 16:2-4)

This entire assembly had just seen the Lord do amazing things. They were kept safe from the 10 plagues that fell upon Egypt. They escaped with all the treasures of the Egyptians. They watched as the Red Sea was parted and the enemies of God were drowned before their very eyes. God has done so much to set them free. God has done so much to earn their trust. But instead of believing in Him, they wail like children - as if God would have done all those things just to kill them by starvation! From an outside perspective, their lack of trust in God is ludicrous.

Yet I am guilty of the same. I lost my trust in God despite 26 years of His faithfulness to me. I didn't acknowledge the wonderful family I grew up in, the protection from harm, the freedom to worship God, my wonderful wife, the opportunity to go to college, my job that provided for me, and so much more. God had proved himself over and over again, but in a moment, I was ready to erase all of that.

It wasn't until everything had fallen apart that the pieces began to come back together. Until I found myself leaving a brand new house with all the amenities for a 130 year old farmhouse with none. Until I experienced the freedom of trusting in God because He is faithful rather than disbelieving in Him because I'm not getting what I want. And two years later (it seems like an eternity), I find myself grateful for what He has done. For this farmhouse. For the dramatic change that has been brought about in my life because of everything that I despised before. God knows what He is doing - and I need to trust Him.