The Test of Trust by Margareth Manning

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight." Proverbs 3:5-6 were some of the first Scripture verses I memorized as a child. For some reason, the words seemed to bounce with joy, energy, and a sense of lightness as I learned them. For me, these were very "happy" verses in Scripture—verses that seemed to indicate God's direct guidance for all his children down happy, straight pathways. I inferred that trusting in God's guidance would be the result of seeing the wonderful, straight pathways laid out before me that I would willingly and gladly walk on towards all my goals, desires, and dreams.
Yet "Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding" took on new meaning in the face of absence, want, and unfulfillment. Have you ever experienced this dissonance that comes from the contradiction of your personal experience and your beliefs? What do you do, for example, when you've believed that God always heals, and yet you watch helplessly as your mother dies of cancer? What do you feel when you've been told that God has a wonderful plan for your life, and yet you can't square that wonderful plan with a series of professional and personal failures?

If you're like me, the fortress of beliefs you thought were impenetrable come crashing down as life experience smashes that fortress like a battering ram. In the aftermath, the alternative shelters of cynical doubt or blind faith beckon you to take your refuge with them. For most of us, we run perilously between both extremes, without the sense of security that the fortress once provided.

While these are still precious Scripture verses to me, I have come to understand them differently as an adult. I recognize now that trusting the Lord was easy when everything was going my way! I didn't rely on my own understanding because I didn't have to! But, when dreams began to die, life-goals went unmet, and desires dried up, I realized the challenge these verses really offer; they offered me the opportunity to learn the real meaning of "trust."

Real trust in the Lord is only forged out of the fires of testing—testing that reveals whether we truly trust in the Lord or in what we want the Lord to give us. In other words, do we trust the Provider, or the Provider's provisions? In my own life, when it seemed that God withdrew the "provisions" and things stopped going my way, my plans failed, or my goals and dreams didn't materialize, I began to realize that my trust was in my own understanding of what was necessary to make my paths straight. So, as God had abandoned my plans, my test of trust began.

A New Perspective
The Bible is replete with stories about individuals who faced the difficult conflict between what they held to be the truth and what they experienced in their lives. Think of the patriarch Joseph. He was told by God through a sequence of dreams that he would be great one day—so great, in fact, that his own brothers would come and bow down in reverence for him. He had been given a glimpse of his destiny, and perhaps he believed his path to that destiny would be paved with gold. Instead, his gilded trip to glory yielded an attempted murder by his own brothers, his enslavement in a foreign land, and much of his life spent in and out of prison falsely accused of various crimes he did not commit. How could this be the path to glory God promised to provide for Joseph?

Joseph's belief in a God who loved him and had compassion on him was now being challenged by God's demonstration of his compassionate care. Sitting in his jail cell, I'm sure Joseph wrestled with his ideas about God's loving care.

Despite the contradiction between his life experience and what he thought he knew about God, Joseph ultimately affirmed that God is good and trustworthy. How did he arrive at this? I would suggest that as Joseph (like his father, Jacob) wrestled with God, God gave him a new perspective and a deeper understanding of his love for him. But that new perspective is not lightly gained, but again, forged out of the fires of testing.

In his book When God Interrupts (InterVarsity, 1996), author and pastor Craig Barnes poignantly describes the emergence of new perspectives as the very process of conversion:

The deep fear behind every loss is that we have been abandoned by the God who should have saved us. The transforming moment in Christian conversion comes when we realize that even God has left us. We then discover it was not God, but our image of God that abandoned us.... Only then is change possible.

Indeed, Joseph reveals his new perspective to his brothers who betrayed him: "As for you, you meant evil against me but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive" (Genesis 50:20). This is no biblical cliché. Joseph did witness God's intervention and love. But not in the way he expected. God has not promised to make our lives go as we plan. Instead, God promises to give us the necessary new perspective to see his goodness and grace in the midst of our abandoned expectations.

C.S. Lewis once wrote in his marvelous book The Screwtape Letters that in order for the believer to gain this new perspective and mature in trust, God must withdraw "all the supports and incentives" and "leave the creature to stand up on its own legs—to carry out from the will alone duties which have lost all relish." He continues this thought through the character of Uncle Screwtape, a senior demon who is coaching his nephew Wormwood on the skills of devilry:

It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He [God] wants it to be…. Our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our Enemy's [God's] will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of Him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.

You see, when our paths are crooked we are tempted to place our trust in the things God provides. As God withdraws those supports we have the challenge of leaning on our own understanding (grasping for things), or allowing true trust in the Lord to develop and bloom (grasping for God). As we trust God even while feeling lost and abandoned to crooked, twisting, and unsafe paths, paths that we thought would lead us to our plans, dreams, and desires, only then can we follow the ever-straightening path to our heart's desire found in God alone.

"Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him and he will make your paths straight." As you find yourself wandering down crooked paths of disappointment, may you find God leading you to place your trust in Him alone. As your trust grows, may you see straight paths of rest and contentment unfold before you. As you release your own understanding, may you find the Lord to be your heart's desire.

Margaret Manning is associate writer at Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

Author: Margaret Manning
Margaret Manning earned a degree in Psychology from Agnes Scott College in Decatur, Georgia before going on to earn her Masters of Divinity degree from Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary in South Hamilton, Massachusetts. She has served as an associate pastor for seven years focusing on discipleship, spiritual formation, and pastoral care and counseling. She enjoys reading and studying in many areas including world religions, postmodern philosophy, science and faith, and pastoral ministry. She is currently studying N.T. Wright in addition to reading broadly in theology and New Testament studies. When not reading, teaching, or writing, Margaret enjoys gardening, hiking, biking, walking, and taking care of her two dogs. She also enjoys travel and has visited the United Kingdom, Greece, Turkey and Brazil. She is married to Sonny and they reside in Duluth, Georgia.

From www.rzim.org

Suppressed creativity

Twenty-four hours a day, yes twenty-four hours! Trying to be the person you want to be. Did you ever try to be just the one you are? It’s not ‘just’; it is the toughest thing on earth. How do I move forward when circumstances hold me down? Failing to muse at what I have but starring myself blind at what I don't have.

Why do we instead of turning to God in times of trouble and fault turn away from the graceful Man that calls himself I AM? You know, grace is an unfair principle, hard to grasp. Phillip Yancey writes: “Grace means there is nothing I can do to make God love me more and nothing I can do to make God love me less”. So awfully hard to believe!

What is it that keeps me from growing into that creativity I see in others but myself? Is the creative spirit, the man in me alive? It is, but I need to work hard to be able to see him. To be able to say ‘I am doing my best’ is a task wherein I fail already. I’m so often not doing my best. That’s exactly what suppresses the creativity in me.

“Therefore, strengthen your feeble arms and week knees. Make level paths for your feet, so that the lame may not be disabled, but rather healed.” Said the writer of the book Hebrews. We need to live those words. Strengthen those weaknesses in our lives, falling, failing, learning and standing up again. If we except that process and do the best we can, the creative spirit will live.

Paper Darren

Mutemath

United Nations youth representative

Wouter Thiebou is the new United Nations youth representative on behalf of the Netherlands! Thank you for your votes.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?

The Gulag Archipelago (1973)

Can a man who's warm understand one who's freezing?

The divergent scales of values scream in discordance, they dazzle and daze us, and in order that it might not be painful we steer clear of all other values, as though from insanity, as though from illusion, and we confidently judge the whole world according to our own home values. Which is why we take for the greater, more painful and less bearable disaster not that which is in fact greater, more painful and less bearable, but that which lies closest to us. Everything which is further away, which does not threaten this very day to invade our threshold — with all its groans, its stifled cries, its destroyed lives, even if it involves millions of victims — this we consider on the whole to be perfectly bearable and of tolerable proportions.

Should someone ask me whether I would indicate the West such as it is today as a model to my country(Russia), frankly I would have to answer negatively. No, I could not recommend your society in its present state as an ideal for the transformation of ours.

Magnificent

High King Peter the Magnificent, what a character, what a name. Watching the chronicles of Narnia I do with great pleasure. The movie was on last night so I ‘met Peter’ again. Peters name ‘the Magnificent’ made me think. Magnificent, the dictionary says; ‘of exceptional beauty’, grand or noble in thought or deed. To me it sounds royal, perfect, almost mysterious.
I find myself complaining recently; bad weather, to busy, poor school results, things don’t work the way I would like them to work, I fail. There is nothing that even comes close to ‘magnificence’.
I believe there are options to choose; living and accepting ‘I myself am far from being magnificent’ or…imagine yourself, walking in the royal robes of High King Peter the Magnificent himself. With such name comes great responsibility. God, yourself and others have high expectations. It is frustrating not to meet up with those expectations. You and I know that we can’t. It would give me an inadequate feeling.Do you then act as if you’re magnificent? I and maybe you do so often. Sooner or later the reality comes to the surface. The reality of not meeting the standard of what God, yourself and others expect from you. ‘The Magnificent’ is Peters name; he can’t throw the expectations away, his failures either. We need to have a will to strive for the best but are dependent on the grace from the One who is, magnificent.

Think big, vote Wouter

This week a friend from the Navigators here in Wageningen battles to become youth representative for the United Nations (in Dutch Verenigde Naties). If you don't read Dutch it will be a little hard to find your way on the side dewereldvandevn.nl but you can give it a try. Wouter's subject is clean drinking water. The link below this post gives you an idea of his spearhead action. I think its a cool opportunity to help Wouter, and people with clean drinking water! Voting is possible only this week from Monday 8 until Sunday 14 October.

Life is good

An Iraqi man approached me at the Amsterdam central station yesterday evening. He looked kind a tired and confused. I both understand, since he didn’t sleep for a few days as he was 'telling' me. He showed me a paper from the foreign police department where he just came from. Dutch for him is what Chinese is for me. The only language he spoke really was Arabic. We continued our conversation with sign language. He linked me with a friend over the telephone. I told his friend that mister Iraqi should travel with me to Wageningen. From there I will ‘tell’ him to step from the train at the next station. The friend, clarified the procedure to his friend in Arabic. How I wish to be able to speak like the guys back in the days did during pentecost. I from the bottom of my heart hate the fact that people cannot communicate with each other in just one language. If you think about it, how would the world look like if we all spoke…for you to fill the gap.

Mister Iraqi couldn’t help falling a sleep during the travel. I looked at him and speculated where the man came from. Would he have a home, or did he lose his house during a bombardment? Did he fight against people that don’t even know his culture and the reason of conflict? It is easy to ask question I found out. It is a ‘bit’ more difficult to realize that some questions will never be answered. Before we met I drank a beer or two, exchanging seaman stories with a friend that sailed on the Doulos years ago. We realized that Doulos experiences almost seem to extreme to comprehend. I mean, a baby lying in the sand in front of a Madagasy bamboo hut with a dirty wound, and you can’t help. ‘Down-hill Europe’ (It might not look like, but its in a terrible bad shape), chaotic-Africa, Arab-land, ‘fast-pace-Asia’. People with endless fear or people with lives like a ride in a ferriswheel.

I think it is good to know a bit of both good and maybe like the man’s home in Iraqi bad sides of life. Being able to see these both sides is a privilege, life is good. I hope for my Iraqi mate as well!

Tribe

An incredible series on BBC2 of Bruce Parry visiting different tribes and indigenous people around the world. Its amazing the way Bruce integrates into the much different cultures, traditions and rituals. He tells us “ The lives of indigenous peoples show us different ways of seeing the world. They can help us look at our own society - the way we live and our relationship to the world around us – in a different and sometimes clearer light”.The TRIBE site is cool; you can watch a behind the scenes download and it contains loads of interesting background information on the tribes.

Leo Tolstoy

John Piper interprets Matthew 7:17 - So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad three bears bad fruit (NASV) - in a refreshing way. I was stunned the first time hearing him speaking on this passage during one of his series on “the greatest of these is love”. He links the message of Matthew 7 with the ‘sermon on the mount’ in Matthew 5. Its pretty frightening to see what Jesus says there about the consequences of ‘whoever looks at a woman with lust, or ‘if your right eye or hand makes you stumble’. Not even mentioning the first ‘blessed are those’ verses in the beginning of the chapter. I wonder how many limbs or blessing I would have left if there wasn’t 'a way out' written somewhere.
Dr. Piper says; it is not written ‘every good fruit bears a good tree’ (every time we resist sin) or the bad fruit (every time we sin) bears bad trees. No this is where grace comes in! By trying to create good fruits meaning, trying not to sin we don’t bear good trees! What he actually says is that we should not focus on our failures or resisting temptations. No, our focus should be on never failing grace and our lives in relation with God.

About Tolstoy, a story on him has been in my drafts since arrival from Russia 5 weeks ago. Pastor Serge in Schekino showed us the Yasnaya Polyana premises. The place Tolstoy lived and rests. He is buried in the most humble tomb I’ve seen. It is not more than a little hill with grass on top in the backyard of His land. Tolstoy does not only have a humble grave, I think he was a humble man. He depended on grace. Also the 'grace' of his second wife. It's written like this:

Behind every act of forgiveness lies a wound of betrayal, and the pain of being betrayed does not easily fade away. Leo Tolstoy thought he was getting his marriage of on the right food when he asked his teenage fiancée to read his diaries, which spelled out in lurid detail all of his sexual dalliances. He wanted to keep no secrets from Sophie, to begin marriage with a clean slate, forgiven. Instead Tolstoy’s confession sowed the seeds for a marriage that would be held together by vines of hatred, not love.
“When he kisses me I’m always thinking, ‘I’m not the first woman he has loved,’” wrote Sophie Tolstoy in her own diary. Some of his adolescent flings she could forgive, but not his affair with Axinya, a peasant who continued on the Tolstoy estate. “One of these days I shall kill myself with jealousy,” Sonya wrote after seeing the three-year-old son of the peasant woman, the spitting image of her husband. “If I could kill him [Tolstoy] and create a new person exactly the same as he is now, I would do so happily.” Another diary entry dates from January 14 1909. “He relishes that peasant wench with her strong female body and her sunburned legs, she allures him just as powerfully now as she did all those years ago…” For half a century jealousy and unforgiveness had blinded her, in the process destroying all love for her husband.

As humble Tolstoy was, his wife didn’t seem to forgive the way we expect God to forgive us. What would Tolstoy have thought of John Pipers message?
Reading his correspondence with Gandhi, the many language he spoke or the numerous ways he helped people, makes him for me a wise man. I would have loved to talk to him on the veranda of his fairytale house, with in the meanwhile eating a Russian Borsj or his favorite fresh fish dish.