“But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.” (Phil. 4:19) I would ask that you pick up a pen, find a piece of paper and write down all your cares, worries and concerns on it, all those items that come into your mind on a fairly regular basis that give you cause to doubt and mistrust, and then put this verse at the bottom of the page. Now look at that list and try to rationalize those items with this promise from the Scriptures, try to explain to yourself why you feel the way you do about these things in relation to just this one promise from He who is faithful, and then find a just cause for your emotional state towards them.
There is a peace that passeth all understanding, (Phil. 4:7) for the man or woman of God who can come to the knowledge of the truths in the Scriptures, the absolute verification that you will be provided for, you will be protected, you will not know need for the rest of your existence on this planet. “I have been young, and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.” (Psalm 37:25) Worrying about the future is such a limited view for mankind, but it is more than that for the believer in Christ, it is a sin, and this sin nearly always is covered with excuses, with the cloud of human perspectives and rationalizations, it is a rare thing to find a brother or sister in Christ who does not doubt His care for us though. By doubting, what we are doing is telling the Lord that we do not trust Him, we find an urgency within us when we look towards that limited future, whether it be ten minutes or ten years from now, when we my friends do not even know if we will be alive in ten minutes.
We do all that we can to control our own destiny, striving every day to ensure that there will be enough for tomorrow, a tomorrow that you have no guarantee about. Oh, to be able to live in the moment, to leave the past behind, to leave the future to God, to live where Jesus is, right here, right now. But alas, we feel this compelling need to plan for the future, and those plans bring with them worries, and worries lead to doubt and dependence on self. “Go to now, ye that say, Today or tomorrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.” (James 4:13-14) You my friends are not going to get out of bed tomorrow much less find strength in your God given abilities unless the Lord wills it, we have an extremely limited ability to perform any task in the here and now much less those of tomorrow.
Praise God the refrigerator is full, praise God I received a piece of bread from a stranger today, praise God my health is good, praise God I have terminal cancer. Far too many Christians believe the opening verse in this letter to you means health, wealth, and a happy life, that your needs are what you think they are, and not what the Lord knows them to be, far too many doubt when times are difficult this verse of promise. Read here with me Prov. 3:5-6, “Trust in the LORD with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” Trust in Christ results in your path being directed, not in you making a path, not in the ideas of what your path should be or where you decide it should go, but where He directs it to be. The point is, will you follow that path, will you in trust go in the direction that He is leading you without question, blind to the future, praising His name along the way.
There is an exceptionally fine line between the Christian who reads these words and the one that believes them. How many of the prophets or apostles stopped what they were doing for a while, and went back home to check up on their livestock, their fields, their folks, how many checked at the bank to see how much interest they were earning, to make sure their retirement plans were still viable. Our Lord can and many times does change our plans for the future, what you have to ask yourself is are you going to worry in those moments, are doubts going to creep in about the amount of His riches in glory, or are you going to trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do you know what one of the best things about trusting Christ is my friends, you have absolutely no more long-term concerns, none, and even the momentary ones become laughable, they become ridiculous in our eyes.
You must have not only a rock-solid trust in Christ to achieve this emotional state, but you must have an eternal view, you must see yourself in the promised land, in the kingdom of heaven, death must be seen as nothing more than a minor inconvenience between the here and now and the forever. Our doubts come only because of our inability to trust the path of our lives to the Lord God, we fear the unknown, change is a misunderstood concept, we think we know better than Christ as to what He would have us to become. You can rationalize it all you want, but the Christian who cannot trust Christ no matter the circumstances He has allowed to enter into their lives, will trust Him only in times of plenty, in times of peace, in times of emotional stability. “For God hath not given to us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.” (2 Tim. 1:7)
Fear means lack of trust, there is no two ways about it, we have been promise, promised by Almighty God Himself, the Sovereign Lord of all creation that all of our needs will be met, and to worry and doubt is to deny the promises of the most Holy One. Makes you feel kind of bad inside, doesn’t it, well, it should, the question is now, what are you going to do about it, make another false promise to do better next time, and then fall right back into the same pattern, the same habit of doubt, sit on the sofa and worry, trying to convince yourself everything will get better. If you say you trust Christ, then start trusting, if you desire your path to be directed by the Lord, then stop trying to figure everything out for yourself, stop leaning on your very own limited human understanding, stop talking about trusting and start doing it.
You must ask yourself this question, what are you afraid of, the possible inconvenience to your life, pain, persecution, I thought you understood that those things were promised to those who are truly saved, I thought you knew that this is what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ. If you cannot trust Him with every aspect of your life, if you are not willing to walk in humility and boldness on the path that He has set before you, then you will be of little value to the kingdom of heaven. You are loved, but you are not profitable. His riches are never going to run out, you simply must decide whether or not you believe that verse. You were not meant to carry your doubts with you, they should have all been left at the foot of the cross when you started following Him.
