"In Thee, Oh Lord, do I Put my Trust"

Psalm 31

"1In thee, O LORD, do I put my trust; let me never be ashamed: deliver me in thy righteousness.

2Bow down thine ear to me; deliver me speedily:

be thou my strong rock, for an house of defence to save me.

3For thou art my rock and my fortress;

therefore for thy name's sake lead me, and guide me."

Often times, when we are going through turmoil and bad seasons in our lives, we tend to forget all the marvelous things the LORD has done for us. We become completely absorbed and lose focus of God. We pray over our situation and after a while when we do not see results, we end up feeling God is not listening to our prayers and begin to believe that He has turned His back on us. If you believe this, then my friend you have fallen for the deception of Satan.

God does listen to our prayers and our cries and if you are walking with Him, He will never turn His back on you because He hurts with us and for us, and loves us very much. We may not see an immediate answer to our prayers and sometimes we may not get what we pray for, but if we were God for just a moment and had the ability to see what's ahead you may understand why sometimes we do not get what we ask for. God sees how answering our prayers will affect us further down and even how it will affect other people and events; there are other things involved in God’s plan as well.

During our lifetime, many things will happen. Sometimes good things will happen and sometimes very bad things will happen. However, I cannot remember a time when God has not been in my life in all situations, even in the very worst of times.

I, myself, have been guilty of forgetting all of His marvelous deeds in my life especially when going through storms. However, this has only happened when I have lost focus of Him. It has happened when I have strayed away from His Word. As soon as I remember to open my bible and read His promises, and begin to focus on Him and not on my circumstances, an overwhelming sense of peace enters my life. I look around me and see chaos and problems mounting but I have an enormous indescribable sense of peace in the midst of everything that I cannot express in words.

Suddenly all the problems seem small and do not affect my state of being anymore: emotionally, spiritually, or physically. I begin to see God working in my life and things begin to get clearer. Then hope returns and a sense that everything will pass takes over and I begin to feel... no, I KNOW that I will come out a better person, a stronger and more mature person in the end. Moreover, I know that one day I will look back and know why God did not answer my prayers when I so badly needed them answered, and I will learn to trust Him, no matter how bad the situation seems at the time.

God will always show Himself on time, in ways you would never guess, and sometimes He will even use strangers to help you.

There was a time in my life when I found myself with no job, no home, no husband, and a small child to take care of. As I look back, I remember it being as one of the darkest seasons of my life; things could not get worse for me. During that agonizing time of my life, I had only one thought in my mind— my child. I remember getting myself back up, dusting myself off and making a bold move. I packed my belongings into my old car and traveled over two hundred miles to a relative’s house hoping to start a new life with my son.

Two months into this move, things got even worse. I could not find a job; no one seemed to be hiring! My relative, who had a drinking problem then, suddenly in a drunken stupor, decided they did not want me staying with them anymore and I was kicked out of their house in the middle of the night with a small child. I remember feeling defeated and rejected with no one to help me. I cried out to God and surrendered my problem to Him. Now it was God’s turn to act because I had placed my trust in Him and allowed Him to take over.

Not knowing where to go or what to do next, the following day I went to a nearby church and told them what had happened and God reached in and spun my life around. In the two weeks that followed, Godly men placed me and my son temporarily in a motel. I also found help in my son’s kindergarten teacher who offered to babysit while I searched incessantly for work, for money, and an apartment. In two weeks time, I found a job, an apartment and the money for the deposit required!

This was a humbling experience; a season that I will never ever forget. Did I forgive my relative for the wrong they did, you betcha!! It took some help from the Holy Spirit and much prayer, but I did forgive. During this season there was a whole lot of forgiving I had to do and the lessons I learned took me into a different level with God (you may want to read my other hub on forgiveness). One of those important lessons I learned was to trust in Him.

Whatever your circumstances are, trust in the LORD.

“Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart, all ye that hope in the LORD.” Ps 31:24