Victoria Advocate, A Different Perspective
I love my car. It gets me where I need to go, and it’s hard to picture life without it. However, as much as I enjoy my car, I’m clueless about what goes on under the hood—with no desire to learn. That job belongs to someone else. I keep fuel in it, run it through the car wash, and get the oil changed when my husband reminds me—if he doesn’t do it first.
During a recent cold snap, a tiny picture of my car appeared front and center of the dashboard, and orangish-red images flashed. All the bells and whistles showed one tire had low air pressure. However, the air pressure fluctuated with all the tires, and the “low” tire was a single-digit difference. I crept home, afraid I’d do something terrible to the car if I drove too fast. But when I consulted my husband, he just shrugged and said the cold weather made that happen. When he saw the dashboard, he looked at the tire. “It’s not low, and the car is safe to drive. The cold weather is throwing the sensor off.”
At that point, I had to make a choice. Did I believe him or what my eyes told me every time I got in the car? Fortunately, it was an easy decision because he has an excellent track record as far as mechanical issues go. So when he gave me the freedom not to react to what my eyes saw on the dashboard, I trusted his judgment.
Daily, we’re bombarded with what we see. Frankly, most of it isn’t good, but it is loud, relentless, and ongoing. Here again, we choose what to believe. Sometimes, our choice is so fast and automatic we don’t know it’s happened. But do we believe what we see, or do we go deeper? Do we listen to all the bad news that’s spewed forth on a systematic, ongoing basis, or do we choose to trust God for an entirely different outcome?
I trusted my husband about the dashboard warning, not only because of his knowledge but because he loves me. No matter how important my errand, he’s not going to let me drive my beloved car if there’s a serious problem.
It matters what we believe. Nevertheless, all of us have pockets of doubt. We may find it easy to trust God for some things, but other areas of our lives? Not so much. In such cases, trust usually becomes an issue because we have the wrong perception of God. One common misconception is that God stays mad all the time, but this is not the God of the Bible. The true character of God embodies all the marvelous attributes of life. He’s loving, kind, patient, just…the list goes on. Scripture compares him to a good shepherd who watches over us with care. (Psalm 23) We doubt God’s goodness because we don’t really know him, but he’s the deeper thing we need.
I believe my tire is fine even when the dashboard signals me otherwise. Likewise, even in hard circumstances, I choose to believe God because his track record is perfect. He’s all-knowing, all-seeing, and omnipresent. The longer I study my Bible, the more convinced I am of this truth: “… that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other created thing, will able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38-39)