BROKEN TRUST

Trusting God is something I have really struggled with lately. As a child, I was taught that God was the all knowing, loving creator that I could rely on for everything, and my lived experience since then wholesomely supported that, so I didn't learn to trust God, I just did.

In recent years I went through the most difficult time of my life and as I weathered the storm, I felt alone for the first time ever. I felt abandoned by the only one who could instantly change things. In 'Hopelessness', Day 5 of '7 Days of Struggle: A Memoir', I speak of the impact of what I interpreted as continuous silence from God. That silence broke two things in me, 1) the confidence that He would always answer and 2) the fearlessness that came with having the Almighty as my support system.

I’ve come to many spiritual realisations since then, and my perspective and feelings around those experiences have changed, but I realised a couple of months ago that this has done nothing for my level of trust in God. In plain terms - I don’t trust God anymore.

Contrary to popular belief (and many religious leaders 🙃), it is possible have faith and not trust. According to Google:

Faith = A conviction or belief in the unseen, often without proof or evidence.

Trust = A confident action based on that belief, often supported by experience or evidence.

I have always taken confident action based on my faith in God, but my recent experiences became evidence of abandonment and diminished my trust in Him. This impacted how I see the world and how I operate in it; I have become uncharacteristically cautious and I hate it!

Having trust in God is critical to a Christian's faith journey, and I am on a dedicated mission to regain it. I understand that if I want to go back to being my adventurous and fearless self (I liked it over there!), I must trust God again.

" ⁵ Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; ⁶ in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight." Proverbs 3:5-6 (NIV)

As someone who takes things at face value, starting from a place of trust and only becoming distrusting based on negative observations, I have never been intentional about trusting anyone. In order for me to regaining my trust in God, I will have to be intentional about it and my plan is to go back to basics and re-learn why I trusted Him in the first place.

Don't shut down, sleep or force quit - restart.

Along with my usual faith-led musings, I have decided to document and share my journey to regaining my trust in God by returning to the foundations of faith and share all the actionable steps; I'm calling the series "Faith Lessons". I'll also share content on social media, so follow along on @godspacebynrh on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook. The aim of the series is to help those who are at any stage of their faith journey, grow, build and strengthen their faith, one Faith Lesson at a time.