Prov. 3:5-6 Trust in the Lord with all thy heart…and lean not to thine own understanding. In ALL thy ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct thy paths.
I have read and quoted this verse probably hundreds of times, but lately I’ve been captivated by the last four words of that phrase.
What does it mean to Trust in the Lord “with all your heart”?
When you think about it, it’s easy to say, “I trust You Lord”; but, if you add “with all my heart”, it suddenly takes you to a whole new level of ponderance.
To trust God about something with ALL our heart means:
- We can no longer worry about the issue
- We must not continue to reason it out on our own
- We must let God have it and handle it – SURRENDER it to Him!
- We must stay out of it, unless God reveals something we need to do
- We must not continue to let that thing dominate our thoughts (it’s now God’s, remember? HE’s taking care of it.)
- We must not continue to feel discouraged and down about it
When we have prayed it into God’s hands and given it into His care:
- We must get on with living and enjoying our lives
- Act and live like we believe it’s all taken care of
- Refuse to think about or carry that care anymore
- Expect, believe and look for good things to happen
- Trust His SUPERNATURAL intervention regarding the issue you’ve prayed about
I’ve heard it said, “When we work (trying to figure things out or fix our own problems) God rests; but when we rest (surrendering the issue to Him) then God works. (He goes to work on it when He sees us resting it in His care.)
The most important thing we can learn about having a victorious Christian walk is that “WE” are helpless to bring about any real change – all we CAN do is rely on Him!
Why? Because even if we COULD do something, He won’t allow us to live a life of partial dependence on Him. We must recognize our TOTAL dependence on Him – this is where He wants us to be and He will never bless our self-reliant efforts. Nor will He bless the solutions we may come up with in our own carnal wisdom. He wants us to become completely dependent on Him and He wants us to seek HIS wisdom, rather than trying to figure things out for ourselves (even if we could).
Notice that the second part of the verse in Proverbs 3 says, “and lean not to thine own understanding.”
God will never bless (or allow) our human reasonings to solve the problems that HE wants us to trust Him for.
He wants us to LIVE by faith… not by our own wisdom and understanding. And this means completely depending on Him and resting from our own works (reasonings, worrying, fretting, etc.).
So, give it up… and give it to God…and get back to living!
“Stop trying and start trusting!”
There is another “ALL” in these passages (besides the first one – “trust God with ALL your heart). Verse 6 says, “Acknowledge Him in ALL thy ways and He will direct your paths.”
There is NOTHING that He won’t help us with. Trust Him with ALL your troubles, heartaches, relationships – EVERYTHING!
There’s nothing too big or too small…He cares about it ALL!
But remember, He will only go to work on what You bring to Him, trusting Him with your ALL (not half-heartedly) – no back up plans, trusting Him with that issue in the SAME way that you trusted Him for salvation, knowing that He’s your only Hope.
Amen, God bless you!
