The Colossal and Audacious Decision to Trust

 

 

Author: Stacy Hildebrand

Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God.  Not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God,  who has made us sufficient to be ministers of a new covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. For the letter kills, but the Spirit gives life.  2 Corinthians 3:4-6

In the state of Arkansas there is a small town called Prescott in its southwestern region.  There I spent most of my formative years learning how to read, add and bail hay.  I was in the 4H club, on the baseball team and a member of the high school marching band.  Trust came easily to me.  My parents took me to church pretty much every Sunday morning, Sunday evening and Wednesday evening.  When I was older I drove myself.  The farm I grew up on was well over 100 acres and I roamed it freely.  In the winter I helped my dad cut and store firewood.  In the summer we took care of our five acre garden.  My uncle taught me to play the guitar and Mrs. Cannon taught me piano.  Trust came easily to me.  My first girlfriend was Monica in the fourth grade and we “went together” (where – I have no idea) for the better part of two years.  I learned to sing listening to singers like Sting, Billy Joel, Kenny Rogers, Don Henley, Phil Collins and Richard Marx.  I learned that if I played my piano and sang “Right Here Waiting” girls would pay attention.  And through all of this rather arbitrary-ness, trust came easily to me.  Trust came ridiculously easily to me.  Gullible, might be a better way to describe the “me” of back then. 

All of that changed when I entered college.  I had freedom there that could cause a five year old to salivate.  I could stay up as late as I wanted, go wherever I wanted – whenever I wanted.  It’s when you have this kind of freedom that you begin to question the things that are foundational to you.  It was then that I challenged the tenets I had been taught all my life.  The word “trust” became dubious.  Is God really listening?  Is God really even there?  These were questions that I never entertained before.  Now I heard them regularly from my peers and mentors alike.  I found myself asking them more and more often.  I lost sleep puzzling over all these truths that had been laid before me in years passed.  So, I made the decision that I would not simply “go with the flow”.  I decided that I would not merely fall in line with the teachings of those who taught me.  I would decide for myself what was true and live by whatever rules resulted.  At first this newfound liberty was akin to old, heavy, rusty shackles being removed from my heart and soul.  I could think my own thoughts.  I could do whatever I wanted.  The next couple of years were full of what I now refer to as foolish trial and error.  I sometimes went to worship (in the traditional sense) but often I would simply worship from Bedside Baptist.  God played almost no part in my decisions, at least from my perspective.  You might say I was in a place where I had given up on him.  I didn’t trust him or really anyone else.  I trusted only me.  But there was a problem.  With all this new freedom I wasn’t really happy.  In fact, I was most certainly unhappy!  I didn’t enjoy the life I was living.  I didn’t enjoy it, and I couldn’t figure out why.  Every character I watched on television and in film who existed in the manner I was attempting to exist was content.  Yet I was far from content.  I was empty. 

I had a best friend at the time who was journeying similarly and we had both agreed that the puerile belief systems of our childhood were beneath us.   When throwing off the contrivances of your youth it is essential to have a person in your life to give you courage.  Let’s call my friend Emil, because I have never personally known anyone with this name.  Emil would encourage me in my agnostic quest when I doubted my own resolve and I did the same for him.  But I reiterate, I wasn’t happy.  No matter how I tried to like this new life, I didn’t.  I couldn’t!  I felt hollow, transparent.  I was in a terrible dating relationship with a girl we’ll call Veronica, because I’ve never personally known anyone by that name.  My grades weren’t going all that well and I generally had no real direction for my life.  I was at a crisis point.

That’s about the time I realized that the real problem with the worldview I was ascribing to was where I placed my trust.  I was trusting. . . (pause for effect). . . ME!  However, I was finding that in spite of my extensive twenty something years I was hilariously unequipped to lead myself.  I began revisiting the ideals and beliefs of my past.  I thought back to the open fields of Nevada county (pronounced Neh-VAY-duh).  I remembered the old hymns of the Bluff City Church of Christ where I began leading worship when I was thirteen.  And something I didn’t expect happened.  I began to long for that time period again.  I began to crave the innocence and naiveté of my youth.  I hungered after the time when trust came easily to me.  I began desperately pouring over the Scriptures I had once been force-fed. But one very disheartening truth became more and more apparent.  As much as I wanted, I couldn’t go back to the innocence of the past.  The thing about innocence is that once it’s gone you can’t get it back.  I prayed to my God, “Please God, show me a sign.”  “I need to be able to trust you as I did before.”  “I need my life to have meaning!”  His answer came gradually.  He sent me a new set of friends who wanted to live a life of meaning just as much as I.  He sent people who also realized that that meaning could not be found within ourselves.  He also sent me a companion who would become the most important person in my life.  We’ll call this person Jennifer, because that is her actual name.  We all enjoyed lengthy spiritual discussions.  We celebrated the word of God in dialogue that challenged and grew us.  It was during this time period that I realized I no longer longed for the “me” of the past.  I was reading the words of Solomon and how he had tried out all the temptations of the world and found them wanting.  I saw a lot of myself in him – minus all the wisdom.  I also read Jesus’ words about taking care of all our needs giving the birds of the air and the lilies of the field as example.  I marveled that he contrasted the splendor of Solomon with the provision God provided.  And then it happened.

I made the colossal and audacious decision to trust my God. 

The man in me would love to say that I found the courage to make this decision completely within myself.  However, I know that isn’t true.  I was humbled by the fact that, in spite of myself, I had been led into the decision to trust.  I would never have gotten there by myself.  There was nothing within me that could have ever gotten me there.  And in this realization I found that I was better here than I had ever been in my childhood.  That isn’t to say that I no longer appreciated the innocence of the past, I just now realized that my God didn’t want me to blindly believe out of ignorance.  He wanted and still wants me to have a deeper appreciation for him.  He allowed my straying (without approving of it) because he had a better plan for me and had already decided to preserve me through that desert period.  My understanding of that made my trust all the more sweet.

Trust is ultimately a decision.  It’s an audacious decision because it laughs in the face of human reasoning.  It’s a colossal decision because everything depends upon it.  Yet this is where I, you, WE all need to be.  My God pursued this farm boy from Arkansas when there was absolutely NO good reason to do so. 

He is pursuing you as well.

Father, help me to trust you today, tomorrow and every day after that.  I know that I am a fool to the world.  Help me be even more foolish before them as I increase in faith in you.  Draw me ever closer to you and forgive me for straining against my yoke.  Thank you for your patience and grace.  It is in Christ I pray,  Amen.