Early this semester I accomplished a long-standing bucket list goal in respect to my bus driving adventures! That goal was to successfully drive all the bus routes in our school district without the assistance of a student passenger providing directions. Prior to this there was always a turn or two, I’d need to just get that little bit of solace and confirmation from one of my early morning or evening commuters that I truly was going the right way!
Let me share that nothing will test your level of trust greater than knowing that the six year old knows where to go better than you as the substitute bus driver…it is humbling getting the directions of our path in that manner. See, trust is a tricky matter.
It is shared often that trust is EARNED…yet when should one give another their trust?
Or in another way, when is trust earned?
Do you ever give someone your trust prior to it being earned?
Or how can someone earn your trust without you first granting them trust to determine their worth in trusting?
See how quickly convoluted a simple phrase as, “Trust is earned,” can become vastly muddied? Again, trust is tricky and so often in life we are hesitant to release trust because it removes our control from us.
As a child growing up, my mother shared that if anything were to happen in a family emergency and someone we did not recognize came to us and said, “God is Good”, that was our family password that indicated they were safe and from our parents. As silly as that may have sounded it gave me and my siblings assurance that we had a way to quickly test the trust of someone claiming to be our helper.
In our lives we must test the waters of trust with others, because there is certain truth in that phrase: Trust is Earned. Yet, too often we cower behind that phrase not with the intention of letting our trust be earned, but in giving ourselves permission to retain control over ourselves and our little corner of the world. Here’s the problem…our nature of retaining control comes head to head with the plans of the one who made us.
I’ve heard asked (let’s be real…I’ve asked), God why are you deserving of my trust? How have you earned my trust today? As I reflect back on those times I was in deep struggles of letting go of the “perfect plans” I had erected for my life. By the age of thirty I was “supposed” to be happily married, having at least three or four kids, living on a farm, and being the ag teacher of my hometown chapter. I made those plans when I was twenty years old, two years before graduating college. It is certainly not how life panned out over the next ten years, but I’d also not trade where I am now and where God has set the trajectory of my life.
It took God tearing those idol dreams I had created for my life down into unrecognizable pieces that I saw the only thing left in my life that had any solid foundation was my faith and trust in God. I am thankful everyday that God’s love, grace, and patience is of such abundance because without it I have no idea where I would be today.
Proverbs 16 is packed with reminders of why God’s plans are worth trusting:
16:3 – Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established.
16:9 – The heart of man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.
16:20 – Whoever gives thought to the word will discover good, and blessed is he who trusts in the Lord.
16:25 – There is a way that seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death.
And that is only from one chapter in a Bible packed with thousands of reminders in why our Lord is worthy of our trust!
Before we get behind the wheel of our life’s bus today; let us quickly realize that if we take the helm, we are only a substitute (and a poor one at that)…let today be the day we surrender the driver’s seat to our true driver who knows our life’s route well.
May the Lord bless and guide each of our steps and our daily purpose; thank you for reading my friends and have a wonderful rest of the week!
Perennial Educator 