Proverbs 3:5-12
Trust God from the bottom of your heart; don’t try to figure out everything on your own. Listen for God’s voice in everything you do, everywhere you go; he’s the one who will keep you on track. Don’t assume that you know it all. Run to God! Run from evil! Your body will glow with health, your very bones will vibrate with life! Honor God with everything you own; give him the first and the best. Your barns will burst, your wine vats will brim over. But don’t, dear friend, resent God’s discipline; don’t sulk under his loving correction. It’s the child he loves that God corrects; a father’s delight is behind all this.
Scripture quotations from The Message. © 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2001, 2002 by Eugene Peterson. Used by permission of NavPress, Colorado Springs, CO. All rights reserved.
I know I use our nephew Timothy as an analogy a lot, but God shows me so much through this little three-year-old. For most of his first three years, it was just us and Timothy. He stayed with us a lot… even after his mom and dad and little sister, Zola, moved to Texas. Then baby brother Nathan joined the family in August. Now the family has moved back to Arkansas, and we see all of them nearly every day. And for the first time, Timmy has to share his grandparents, great-grandparents… and his Uncle Greg and Aunt Debbie. Nearly every time we are together, he asks me, “Are you still my baby?”… and by this he means, is he still MY baby. I assure him that yes, he will ALWAYS be our baby.
Trust is a difficult thing when you are three. And figuring everything out is hard. So there is a lot of “water testing,” more than a few temper tantrums, and even some loving correction – which leads to lots and lots of tears. Timothy is still learning that the adults in his life mean business… and for the moment, know best…and that our gentle correction and “rules” are put in place out of a deep and abiding love.
We are all so much like the three-year-old child. We think we know what is best for our lives…we test the waters to see how much God will let us get by with… and then we pout when He reins us in. We need to recognize that God has our very best interests at heart… we need to trust Him from the bottom of our hearts.
I know! I know… sometimes we want to do it ourselves… our way! We get frustrated and impatient… or we don’t like the direction in which we feel God leading us, and we say, “I’ll take it from here!” What generally results is a huge hot mess! Read this passage again. Don’t you want your bones to vibrate with life? Don’t you want your body to glow with good health? Isn’t it time you ran to God rather than away from Him? Wouldn’t today be a perfect time to begin?
©2012 Debbie Robus
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