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[Or whom do you trust? … but I like the way ‘who’ sounds!]
One of the key aspects of the Genesis 3 story is the way human beings learn to distrust God.
Not only is doubt sown about what God said—“Did God really say?”—but doubt is also sown about God’s motivations—“For God knows that when you eat of it, you will be like God.”
Right then and there, the woman and the man distrust God’s plans and purposes in favor of their own.
And indeed, all of history could be told as the story of human beings trusting their own plans over and above God’s plans.
Left to our devices, our default way of being includes trusting in ourselves over and above God. It’s not that we spend a lot of energy actively defying God. It’s more that actively trust in ourselves.
That may not be a good plan, you know? We are imperfect, fallen, & created. God is the perfect, loving, creator.
We ought to trust God. By being sons of Adam and daughters of Eve, we don’t naturally trust God. That’s the reason Proverbs 3 urges us to trust God so strongly.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. Proverbs 3:5-6
Those verses are popular for good reason! We have trust issues and need to be encouraged to trust God. We need to be assured of the opposite of what the serpent said—namely, that we when we trust God, things will work out … he will make our paths straight.
Yet, here’s an important insight: In order to trust God, we don’t simply pray for more trust. We pray for God to prune the distrust. We pray for God to prune the way we lean only on our own understanding. We pray for a reversal of what took place in the garden. Yet again, it’s addition via subtraction.
TODAY’s ACTION: Try to notice how many of your decisions are made without ever consulting God. What would it look like for God to prune a little bit of trust in yourself?
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