In its June edition, Reader’s Digest published the results of a poll they conducted presenting “The 100 Most Trusted People in America Today.” According to the report, the “results were fun—and fascinating.”
I have no intention of critiquing the results or the process of the poll. But this got me to thinking about the nature of trust. Not so much how we come to trust someone or something (though that is worth thinking about too), but how real our declared trust is as evidenced by our actions and behavior. This is of special interest to me because trust is a major factor in Christian living. More specifically, the Bible calls for absolute trust in God. For example, many are familiar and have even memorized, Proverbs 3.5-6: “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.”
One definition of trust is the “firm belief in the reliability, truth, ability, or strength of someone or something.” But how does that “firm belief” show itself in relation to God? The quotation from Proverbs asserts that trust is manifested in submission to God, even when we do not understand everything that he asks of us. The level of our trust, then, is proven in how much we are willing to defer all our preferences, conveniences, relationships, even logic, to the revealed will and purposes of God. If we firmly believe that God is absolutely trustworthy, then we will follow his guidance wholeheartedly trusting that where he leads us will always be in the right paths. If we hold back from submitting to God in any area of our lives, that simply exposes how much our trust is lacking.
I just wonder how much of the supposed trust given to the persons listed in the Reader’s Digest poll would actually result in action or behavior that is in keeping with what the “trusted people” say. I suspect that what we may profess as “trust” may often be nothing more than “like.” It is so easy to like something, as easy as clicking the “like” button in Facebook. But liking a person and/or their opinions is quite a long way from trusting them. And liking what the Lord says through his Word, and even agreeing with what he says, does not amount to trust. Trust is most evident when we choose to submit to his leadership, and find joy in doing so.
—Keith Y. Jainga