Trusting God When We Can’t See What He’s Doing
If you’ve ever participated in a team-building event, I suspect you have joined, or at least witnessed, the “trust fall” exercise. Participants stand on a platform, facing away from their peers, and are encouraged to perform “an act of faith”: They must fall backward into the waiting arms of peers they cannot see, trusting that they will be caught lest they incur injury. The lesson: Relationships of all kinds come with risks and elements beyond our immediate control. Sometimes this demands putting ourselves in the hands of others, figuratively speaking. Does our relationship with our heavenly Father demand this same type of trust when we cannot see what He is doing?
Our trust in God does not court the same risks or uncertainties as the “trust fall.” Thankfully, Scripture offers greater ground and certainty for trust in God. On the one hand, the knowledge of a good and orderly plan for all of creation remains on display generally for all His creatures. Paul, addressing the Athenian Areopagus—a pagan council dedicated to the discussion of ethical, cultural, and religious matters—reveals that the God they worship in ignorance is not distant or needy, but the self-sufficient source of life itself:
The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything. (Acts 17:24–25)
Through the prophet Isaiah, the Lord of the universe affirms not merely His role as Creator, but also as transcendent Designer and Director:
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven
and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it. (Isa. 55:8–11)
The Westminster Confession of Faith summarizes this doctrine of providence as follows:
God the great Creator of all things does uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least, by his most wise and holy providence, according to his infallible foreknowledge, and the free and immutable counsel of his own will, to the praise of the glory of his wisdom, power, justice, goodness, and mercy. (WCF 5.1)
These things alone encourage trust in a wise, powerful, just, good, and merciful God, especially when we don’t see, know, or understand the circumstances and events surrounding us.
We know the character of the hands that hold us—wise, powerful, just, good, and merciful—and we know we are beloved children, not strangers.
Yet it is not in these qualities alone that Christians place their faith and confidence in God. Rather, it is on account of God’s loving fatherhood, made possible through His eternal Son, Jesus:
To all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God, who were born, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh nor of the will of man, but of God. (John 1:12–13)
Now, as “sons of God, through faith” (Gal. 3:26), we can put aside anxiety about “‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’” for our “heavenly Father knows that [we] need them all” (Matt. 6:31–32). And with regard to both our immediate and eternal purpose and destiny, we can know that:
For those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose. For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. And those whom he predestined he also called, and those whom he called he also justified, and those whom he justified he also glorified. (Rom. 8:28–30)
All of this leaves us in a much better place than the individual in the “trust fall” exercise. But how does the Christian truly benefit from knowing this? How does our trust, our confidence, our certainty, help us? The words of the Heidelberg Catechism offer perspective:
We can be patient in adversity,
thankful in prosperity,
and for the future we can have
good confidence in our faithful God and Father
that no creature will separate us from his love.
For all creatures are so in his hand
that without his will
they can neither move nor be moved. (Q&A 28)
Unlike the person on the platform, we are not falling blind. We know the character of the hands that hold us—wise, powerful, just, good, and merciful—and we know we are beloved children, not strangers.
