Do We Really Trust Him?

"And he sent them to preach the kingdom of God, and to heal the sick.  And he said unto them, Take nothing for your journey, neither staves, nor scrip, neither bread, neither money; neither have two coats apiece." - Luke 9:2-3



Most of us at some time or another have made the statement "I am trusting the Lord."  It seems to me that we make that statement flippantly, without giving it a whole lot of thought as to the gravity of what it actually means to trust the Lord.  My question for us is, do we really trust Him?

Notice that as Jesus sends out His twelve disciples He tells them to take nothing with them - no staff, no bread, no money, and no extra coat.  How many of us would be willing to take a trip like that?  Do you trust Christ enough to do that?  Modern day "American Christianity" would say that it is ridiculous to take the words of Christ so literally, but is it really?

We are left with the question of why Jesus would require this of His disciples, why would He not simply let them go home first and pick up a few things to take with them?  The answer is simple, Jesus was forcing His disciples to trust Him.  Christ would have to come through for them because they had nothing else to fall back on.  Unfortunately, "American Christianity" knows nothing of this kind of trust.  We have it burned into our minds from the time we are children that we need to have something to fall back on in case it doesn't work out. Now please don't misunderstand me, there is a fine line between faith and stupidity.

I want to share with you a quote from Francis Chan's book Crazy Love:  "This place of trust isn't a comfortable place to be; in fact, it flies in the face of everything we've been taught about proper planning.  We like finding refuge in what we already have rather than in what we hope God will provide.  But when Christ says to count the cost of following Him, it means we must surrender everything.  It means being willing to go without an extra tunic or a place to sleep at night, and sometimes without knowing where we are going."

Again, modern day "American Christianity" knows nothing of that kind of trust.  We all have way too much in the way of material possessions and we all spend way too much money on things that have no eternal significance.  How many of us are willing to downsize our incomes and our lifestyles to get to the point where we have nothing to fall back on except Christ Himself?  Would you be willing to give up some of your luxuries and conveniences so that you might give more money to missions or so that you might be able to help the poor in your community?  One of the things that our family gave up was our satellite television.  We were spending about $90 per month on satellite.  We decided that it was more important to take that money and invest it in eternity by using it to support missionaries financially each month.  Now I am not saying that you have to do exactly what we did, but I would ask you to pray and ask God what you could surrender to Him so that you might invest in eternity.

I pray that you will allow God to speak to your heart about surrendering ALL to Him and coming to the place where you have nothing else to fall back on but Jesus Christ.  Are you willing to come to the place of total trust in Christ?  Do you really trust Him?

Prayer For Today:

Heavenly Father, help me to come to the place of complete and total dependence on You for my needs.  May I not trust in my abundance or what I have to fall back on, but may I come to the place where You are the only One I have to fall back on!  Help me to be willing to surrender everything to you!  In Jesus name, Amen!