Blessed [fortunate, prosperous, and favored by God] is the man who makes the Lord his trust.” -Psalm 40:4 AMP
I received The One Year® Walk with God Devotional for a Christmas gift in 2017. It has proven to be one of my favorite devotionals in my library. Although I read today’s devotion last year (February 19th), it was like a flash of light so bright opened my eyes to the truth about my trust in the Lord.
I realized we who profess to have a personal relationship with the Lord and say we trust Him with our whole heart may be falling short in the area of practicing what we say. This calls for personal examination as Paul said in 2 Corinthians 13:5, “Put yourselves to the test and judge yourselves, to find out whether you are living in faith.”
This forces us to earnestly ask the question, “Do I really trust God as my only Source or do I have other sources that I depend on for help?”
Usually we have a combination of sources that we rely on. For example, we trust the Lord and our friends advice. We trust the Lord and our bank statements or financial resources. We trust the Lord and medical/health statistics. We trust the Lord and professional subject matter experts, etc..
We know that all of our help comes from God!
We know it; we say it, but something in our heart keeps us from living it out. Could it be fear? If it is, then it has something to do with our love for God and others or our comprehension of the width, length, depth and height of God’s love for us (Ephesians 3:18). If it is fear, here’s what 1 John 4:18 says, “There is no fear in love [dread does not exist]. But perfect (complete, full-grown) love drives out fear, because fear involves [the expectation of divine] punishment, so the one who is afraid [of God’s judgment] is not perfected in love [has not grown into a sufficient understanding of God’s love].”
According to the psalmist, the person who “makes” the Lord his trust is blessed, utterly happy, fortunate, spiritually prosperous, envied and honored (favored). Keyword: “Makes”, which implies it is a decision on our part to act. So then, if we are afraid that God cannot be trusted, that He will not come through for us and meet our needs, will abandon us or will not keep His Word concerning us, we must act—turn to Him in prayer…
Confess.
Repent.
Ask for forgiveness. Count on His forgiveness and allow the Holy Spirit to control our lives and give us the courage to trust God. Consequently, we will receive the “peace of God” that will guard our heart and mind so that fear does not invade our heart.
After reading and meditating on Psalm 40:4, I turned to Father in prayer and will continue to pray so that my trust is pure and God is not my plan B.
How pure is your trust?
©2019 Queen E. Phillips. All rights reserved. Majestic Worldwide Ministries Inc.