Multiple times today I ran across a situation where I could see someone who was coming from a place of low trust. They were stuck. It wasn’t a good place for them. You felt sorry for them and wanted to see them get unstuck.
It reminded me of a friend who loved a girl. She got so
tired of waiting year after year for him to pull the trigger that she
eventually married another guy. I don’t know if he ever got over that. Trusting again has been hard.
Who knows why a given person ends up that way. But everyone has been burned. It’s normal to have your trust broken. Some move on and some keep looking over their shoulder. The scenes of what happened to hurt them keep playing in their minds. The place of low trust comes to define them.
They come to a conclusion and make a decision.
“Trusting was hard and I got burned. The only way to avoid that kind of pain is to not trust again, so I’m not going to any more.”
Of course Jesus began his ministry with
a discourse on taking the opposite tack. “
If anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well.” His point was to let God sort out the issues of justice and to not be so concerned with broken trust. If you really look at the sermon on the mount, Jesus said some crazy, hard-to-swallow stuff.
I don’t know where you come from, but I’ve taken those situations where I got burned and tried to do what doesn’t come naturally. When I’ve been betrayed, I’ve sought to forgive the person right away. When a big risk blows up in my face, I regroup and find a way to risk again.
The best things in my life have required buckets of trust. My marriage, my friendships, my ministry, my faith. And yes, I’ve been burned. But I’ve also seen miracles! Trusting God when it doesn’t make sense seems to delight him.
How do you do at trusting people? What kind of place do you come from? We all have reasons not to trust, but life is happier when we leave them behind.
Trusting isn’t easy that’s for sure. Been burned badly, forgiving wasn’t easy, letting go even harder. It took a long time, but God was faithful. Healing and moving forward I am blessed beyond my wildest dreams. Doesn’t mean life or trust are easy. Dealing with a lot of trust issues right now. God said, “Trust Me” it took a bit, I’m slow, but I finally did what God told me to do. Then God brought a wonderful man into my life, I had to trust someone human, for me this was terrifying. I wanted assurances that I wouldn’t get hurt. Again God said, “Trust Me”. Now I’m trusting God and trusting God that this man is who he says and that I’m not going to get hurt. Right now this man is in Afghanistan, in the midst of all that turmoil and violence. I get it Lord, I am trusting You, knowing that You are in control. I’m learning, trusting God to work out the details and not stress about things. God said, “Trust Me” I take him at his word.
Thanks Seth…You know that our trust quotient is profoundly affected by the salad bar of situations where trust has been broken. We know for example early childhood abuse creates an organic and synaptic injury which God can heal and yet people often have that as a permanent scar and limp. Some trust violations are like an amputation where one fondly remembers the limb but it is gone and for good. God is a great prosthetic fitter and caring doctor. But it is still a synthetic arm or leg.
Some people are torched so many times it is hard to climb up on the funeral pyres of burning disappointment…again and again.
I know God can soothe those wounds. And I don’t subscribe to a Jay Adams psychological view that essentially says…”Just read the Bible and get over it”. For me these days real health is found in the boundaries I’ll set to avoid people who are serial killers of the heart.
I think that is called wisdom…
Blessings friend…always….By the way Mikia secured her cosmetology license and is settled into a signature salon here in Colorado Springs. I’m encouraging her after a year’s work to move somewhere else. This area is surreal and appeals to shallow people. Just saying…
I needed to be encouraged by this today. Good words.
Working through this issue right now where a trusted relationship has been lost. I am committed to a process of forgiveness, but I find value in not rushing it. It’s a really big hurt, and I think it’s okay to just let myself feel that hurt, lamenting/grieving it if you will. Dr. Townsend’s new book, Beyond Boundaries, has been really good so far at helping me work through it.
I’ve heard that’s a good book, Jen.
Hi Seth,
What would you say to a believer having trouble, not with trusting people again, but God? God has asked big, risky things of me in the past that did not turn out as planned (as I planned). Now that He’s again requiring my faith and obedience to step out and risk again, I just don’t know how to do it.
Of course, my assumptions of how things “should” have turned out is the reason for my disappointment and discouragement and not God’s unfaithfulness.
I know He is faithful and I know He loves me; it feels that this has yet to translate into my circumstances though. I’ve been burned by disappointment so much that now, I feel like I have to compartmentalize things. God is faithful and loves me in one box and things just don’t work out in my life (no matter my faith, obedience, prayers, etc) in the other.
I want to be obedient and trust and even more, have a hopeful expectation as scripture admonishes us. So, any words of wisdom would be hugely appreciated.
Thanks brother!
Natalie,
I can relate to feeling disappointed with God. I’ve been wounded a lot and tempted to chalk it up to God not loving me. Instead I choose to believe that I’ve just not understood what he was trying to tell me.
It sounds like you are there too. You’ve answered your own question: “I know He is faithful and I know He loves me; it feels that this has yet to translate into my circumstances though.”
Maybe it’s a question of timing. Maybe he’s in the process of answering you, but it is just taking him longer for him to do so than you expected.
Best advice I have is to be in community and get others in your community to pray with you about it.
Thanks for writing!
“Trusting God when it doesn’t make sense seems to delight him.” I really believe that statement is true. It is a great way to get his attention. Our way to just touch the hem of his garment.
“Everyone has been burned. It’s normal to have your trust broken.” Agreed, Seth.
But, the adult whose trust was broken in childhood, by the very one/s set in place by God’s natural order to protect and nurture, faces a huge challenge in this area. Logically, the more severely one has been abused the greater the challenge.
No one can truly walk in these shoes unless they wore them as a child.
God can do anything…heal anything…overcome anything.
But, the challenge, sometimes life-long, can not be minimized for such a one.
With love,
Judith