Trust...

This morning's devotional by Nicky Gumbel dealt with The Five T's of the Christian Life, which included Trust, Trials, Temptation, Tongue, and Turn. He started out talking about Trust and I was immediately focused on Trust to the point that I wanted to share personal thoughts on Trust alone, even though he made other important points in this devotion as well.

Nicky's first scripture was Psalm 127, which starts out talking about 'unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain...' and later in the Psalm, it reads, 'Children are a heritage from the Lord, offspring a reward from him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are children born in one's youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them...'

Nicky began by stating 'The Christian life is not meant to be one of self-centered toil, but of dependent trust. With trust comes peace and sleep.' Dependent trust means that we aren't going it alone, but rather, we are trying to live a life depending upon God for His guiding and empowering love. We don't always get it right, but we must try to get back in relationship with Him!

Two words jump off of the page for me, which are Trust and Integrity. If we Trust God, and Try to be obedient to His leading, we can become people of integrity and who can be trusted by others. These two words are key to fulfilling my life as a person...a husband, a dad, a grandpa, and soon to be great-grandpa with 5 children, 13 grand-children, and 1 soon-to-be-born, great-grandson! Each of them Blessings from the Lord, which give me so much to be proud of and happy about!

I could go on for hours talking about trying to raise my children to love God and trust Him (often quoting Proverbs 3:5-6, 'Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight.');  to be people of integrity, loving others, quick to listen, slow to speak; trying to make our lives a model of those around us, who we respect, trust, and love! All that said, I have blogged previously about trying to be like my dear and respected friend Dick Kimball, a man who loved God, was a wonderful husband, father, a very hard-working Church member, and a successful executive at Ford Motor Company, who had to strike a balance between the demands of his job and other, more important demands in his life.

I have so often commented to Kathie, my wife, 'we are so blessed!... God has blessed us and our family in ways that we can't even know completely' It's amazing! However, as you think about all of the blessings in your life and family, it is obvious that God is working His Plan! This morning, I Googled the word Trust and guess what quote I came across...Man says "Show me and I'll trust you' … God says, "Trust me and I'll Show you". We have all heard the expression, "Hindsight is 20/20" and I totally agree, because looking back over my life, it is very clear that God has blessed me in ways that I can only be in awe!

It is hard to sort through my thoughts and share my personal beliefs and values without appearing to be somehow bragging, etc. Having said that, please accept my words as wanting to share things, which are so important to life in my view! Nicky quoted Victor Hugo, who wrote 'When you have...accomplished your daily task, go to sleep in peace; God is awake.' The bottom line of trusting God is experiencing a sense of peace, which Hugo is also acknowledging. God's blessings to each of you today, and going forward!