Monday, January 14, 2008 - The Fear of Trusting God
What do you think is the underlying predominant reason that so many Christians today are not living victorious lives, are not effective for Jesus Christ? Why are so many of us consumed with fear and anxiety, with doubt and despair? Think about it for a minute.
As I look back over my life, and observe many others, I've come to this conclusion: The basic problem we Christians have is that we're afraid to trust God. Oh, true, we've accepted Christ and His salvation, but to trust God with every aspect of our lives strikes fear in our hearts. And because of this, we never know the triumphant joy-filled life God has intended for us.
For ten years in my own life, I fought the Lordship of Jesus Christ, ran my own show, and wasted precious opportunities for God because I was consumed by this fear of trusting God. Oh, I didn't recognize it for that at the time, but later I realized that underneath my rebellion against God's control in my life was a basic fear that I couldn't trust Him.
I am more and more convinced that many Christians are right where I was: Scared to death to really totally trust God. We hang on to the controls of our lives as if to say that we think we can engineer the circumstances and events of our lives better than God can.
What I finally had to face was that my fear of trusting God was a result of my misconceptions of God's character and nature and of His intentions and motivation. I was operating under the fear that God would punish me for past failures by depriving me of future happiness, and I was afraid He would direct me in paths that I did not want to take!
I've also come to understand that fear of trusting God is simply sin–the sin of unbelief. There really is no greater sin against the Holy God than to treat Him as though He cannot be trusted.
Through various events God began to break through to me. And in the years since, I've begun to learn to trust God. What changes! What a transformation has occurred in my life.
I look back and say, "Why did I not trust Him sooner?"
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