O for grace to trust Him more

Feeling discouraged, many months into the support-raising journey ten or twelve years ago, I sat one summer morning at the kitchen table of the home I was staying in hundreds of miles away. The homeowners were out of town, but had graciously told me where to find the key.

The quiet moments led to introspection and to analyzing how I was handling the unknowns. How long would it take to raise support? When would I ever get back to Japan? Was I really called?

As I wrote a support-raising report to my team leader, I ended by saying, "O for grace to trust Him more."

That refrain runs through my head a lot.

But not always through my heart.

HMA (a year of Home Ministry Assignment) is always an unsettling time for me. The year leading up to this HMA was a painful and sometimes dark time for me.

But numerous times on this HMA, as I see people I hadn't seen in four or five years, they say with amazement in their voice, "You are much more relaxed!" or "You seem so much more peaceful!"

It is a miracle wrought by God, and I am thankful to be experiencing in new ways the peace that passes understanding.

Yet, just last week, as the new year dawned, new questions of uncertainty popped up, new "opportunities" to fret, worry, and be anxious, and I could feel the peace dissipating.

More introspection. More analyzing. And a new realization of an old truth.

If I could trust God in the first several months of HMA, can I not also trust Him in these next several months?

By definition, the Christian life is one of faith.

“Behold, his soul is puffed up; it is not upright within him,
but the righteous shall live by his faith.

And, by definition, faith means trusting God when we cannot see the future.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.

Why would I think that I would reach a point this side of heaven where I do not need to live by faith? Why would I think that I would reach a point this side of heaven where there would be no more unknowns in my life???

O for grace to trust Him more!

(Listen to the hymn here.)