I taught a Sunday school lesson a couple months ago that asked, "did you check the chair you're sitting in this morning before you sat down?" If you are sitting down while you are reading this, I ask you the same thing. Did you turn the chair over and check all the screws to make sure there were none loose? Or did you wiggle the chair to make sure the legs weren't broken? Did you shake the back to make sure the back of the chair wouldn't fall off when you leaned back? Most likely, you answered no to those questions. When we sit down we don't check the chair every time. We just have confidence that it is a chair, it was made for sitting in, and it will hold us.
Psalm 118:8-9 says, "It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man. It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in princes." The writer doesn't just say it is better to put your trust in the Lord than just a regular, ole' man, but that it is better than even putting trust in a prince/ruler. Even the ruler is going to have limitations. The Lord is the only one that can help us through whatever we may face. Proverbs 25:19 even compares it to a toothache and a sprained ankle..."Confidence in an unfaithful man in time of trouble is like a bad tooth and a foot out of joint". The Bible makes it very clear that we are not to trust in man, but we are to put our trust, our confidence, in Christ. Not just a one time thing, as in our salvation, but constantly.
Where are you putting your confidence in today? Are you putting it in your husband/wife? In your children? In a friend? In a co-worker? In yourself?
The days I think I can do it all on my own are the days that usually end up not going in any way that I planned and may even end up being a "bad" day. When I put my confidence in Christ and what He is going to do with our day, it tends to go much better. I am not disappointed with my husband, children, friends, or myself when I have my confidence in God providing what I need for the day.
Have you ever watched from the sidelines as a Christian friend went through a hard time? How did they handle the situation? In thinking about confidence in Christ I thought of 3 different families that really showed this or are showing this now as they go through struggles. I watched as my sister-in-law's marriage fell apart. At first, I will admit, I thought she was in denial. She was handling it so well and really relying on God and what He wanted for her life. I just kept thinking, "one day, it's going to hit her and she is going to break down....reality will set in". Now, I'm not saying she didn't struggle or have tough days, but what I witnessed was her confidence in knowing God was going to provide for her and that one day her husband would be judged...God would take care of him, she didn't have to. Then I watched from the sidelines as a friend and fellow pastor's wife was told that the child she was pregnant with had something wrong and may not live through the pregnancy or would die shortly after. Of course, the doctors offered to terminate the pregnancy, but my friend declined. She would love that baby no matter what. Again, I'm not saying she didn't have difficult days, but she carried the baby all the way and he was born alive. They have changed the diagnosis so many times and I'm not sure that the doctors actually know what it is, but that baby just celebrated his 2nd birthday! I'm sure my friend still has hard days, trying to take care of this little boy plus her other 6 children, and homeschool, and is still a pastor's (and military) wife. Again, what I have witnessed from the sidelines is her confidence is in the Lord. She looks for opportunities to witness when they are at the hospital and uses their life to show others what Christ has done for them. Then most recently, as I have mentioned them before, our friends that we met in Pennsylvania are now in Florida and their son was in a tubing accident. As he is still recovering and continuing to gain strength through physical therapy, we have continued to see their confidence in what God is doing with him and through him. So many people have been touched by this young man and the determination he has to get better. Even in him I see the confidence he has in the Lord and praise God that he is able to have that confidence as he fights. Again, I'm sure they have had tough days as the dad is still pastoring, and they have two other boys, and all the traveling they have to do back and forth to take care of everything, but what I have seen is confidence in the Lord. Each time they give an update on their son, the end of the update will say "God is God, and He is good!"
When I think about each of these situations I realize how easily they could have fallen into depression or other feelings that the world would say was ok in their situation. Instead they showed that their confidence was already in the Lord and not in their husband or children or themselves.
I have seen the following verses in a couple different places this week. I thought I would share them because they show what we are not when we have our confidence in the right place.
We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed:
we are perplexed, but not in despair;
persecuted, but not forsaken;
struck down, but not destroyed --
always carrying about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus,
that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body.
2 Corinthians 4:8-9
