God Never Runs
Out of Stuff
Carolyn
and I love having our kids and grandkids over for breakfast. The usual breakfast fixings include scrambled
eggs, bacon and pancakes. Like most
kids, my grandkids devour the pancakes.
They
never question if we’ll have enough.
They never question the cost of the flour and eggs to make the
pancakes. They never worry about the
electricity to heat the burners on the stove to cook the pancakes. They just eat the pancakes.
They
trust that the pancakes will be there because that is what we’ve
promised and that is what they expect. They
trust.
Let
that sink in for a moment.
They TRUST!
What
is missing here?
Worry
Fret
Anxiety over not having enough
Our
grandkids don’t try to act especially nice so they get plenty of pancakes. They just trust Papa and Nanny that there
will be pancakes.
Oh,
to trust God in that way. And we’re not
really talking about pancakes.
We’re
talking about a God who says what He says and does what He says He’ll do and
you can trust His word.
“Trust is our gift back to God” – so says Brennan Manning
in Ruthless Trust.
Brennan
also says this:
“The splendor of the human
heart which trusts that it is loved gives God more pleasure than Westminster
Cathedral, the Sistine Chapel, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Van Gogh’s
Sunflowers, the sight of ten thousand butterflies in flight, or the scent of a
million orchids in bloom.”
Remember
that phrase in that song?
“Oh, for grace to trust
Him more.”
In
case you ever wondered, God will never run out of pancakes, or anything else
you need.
This
book I mentioned – Ruthless Trust, is one of my favorites, And what an interesting juxtaposition.
Ruthless: Action that is without pity.
By
calling us to “ruthless trust”, Brennan is standing against all the “self-pity”
that plagues modern culture. He is
calling us to a trust that stoutly refuses to regard self-interest as the
highest good in life.
He
is calling us to a trust that stoutly refuses to regard self-interest as the
highest good in life. This book is a
frontal attack on all the egocentrics, hyphenated self-sins of our day.
Self-indulgence
Self-will
Self-service
Self-aggrandizement
Self-gratification
Self-righteousness
Self-sufficiency
How
does one dare to propose the way of trust in the face off raw, undifferentiated
heartache, cosmic disorder and the terror of history, past and present?
Christ
came into this world to save sinners.
I Timothy 1:15
15Here is a trustworthy saying that
deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of
whom I am the worst.
“If the Lord Jesus Christ has washed me in his own blood and forgiven
all my sins,” the ragamuffin whispers to herself, “I cannot and must not refuse to forgive
myself.”
2 Timothy 1:12
12 That is why I am suffering as I
am. Yet this is no cause for shame, because
I know whom I have believed, and am convinced that he is able to guard what I have entrusted to him until
that day.
My
heart resonates with this idea: “I know who it is that I have put my trust
in.”
After
stumbling and falling, the ragamuffin does not sink into despondency and
endless self-recrimination; she quickly repents, offers the broken moment to
the Lord, and renews her trust in the Messiah of sinners. She knows that Jesus is comfortable with
broken people who remember how to love.
Ruthless
trust is the way for all ragamuffins. If
it be your way, the sign you can trust will be the slow, steady, and miraculous
transformation from self-rejection to self-acceptance rooted in the acceptance
of Jesus Christ.
P Michael Biggs
Hope Encouragement Inspiration
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