Can God Be Trusted?
Scripture Reading — Psalm 13
But I trust in your unfailing love; my heart rejoices in your salvation. I will sing the LORD’s praise, for he has been good to me.
—Psalm 13:5-6
In his book How Can It Be All Right When Everything Is All Wrong? Lewis Smedes tells about a visit to a dying friend. When leaving the hospital room, he heard his friend say, “It’s going to be all right.” It was his friend’s way of saying, “I’m trusting in God. He knows what he is doing.”
But sometimes trusting God is easier said than done. When your health is failing, or you lose someone you love, or your job is on the line, or something happens to your child, it’s not always easy to say, “But I trust in your unfailing love.” When life becomes a valley, it can be a challenge to “sing the LORD’s praise.”
And yet the only way to live is by trusting the Lord. You can’t trust your health or your investments because they can fail you at any time. You can’t bank on your government because its power is quite limited. The only one we can really trust is the Lord. He never fails us.
Some years ago a friend gave me a lesson in trust. She had been told that she had only six months to live. I expected her to be devastated. Instead, she read Psalm 13:5-6 to me. It was God’s grace that enabled her to say, “I will sing the LORD’s praise, for he has been good to me.”
Ask the Lord for his grace to trust him in this coming year.
Lord, our God, please give us the grace we need to trust you. You know exactly what we need. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
About the author — Arthur J. Schoonveld
Rev. Art Schoonveld is a retired minister in the Christian Reformed Church. Before retiring in 2001, he served churches in California, Illinois, and Michigan. Since his retirement he has worked part-time for the denomination and has served as an interim pastor. Art and his wife, Anita, have four children and nine grandchildren.
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