Restless til I rest in You

The past few weeks have been crazy with work and projects, I've been cherishing my short time early in the morning when I can sit down and just be with God and I've been blown away by the fact that in Christ we are children of God and have access to His kingdom. WE HAVE ACCESS TO THE KINGDOM OF GOD, and although the gift is free and is given freely- it came at a cost. Jesus came to earth, became a human- something that was completely selfless. Christ probably wasn’t thinking- I’d like to know what it’s like to live in a world full of sin and evil- where people live under the reign of Satan instead of my Father, but He did it for us. We have been given the gift of eternal life through Christ’s sacrificial love for us- so should we desire to live a life of sacrifice in return? A life fully trusting in God, relying on Him for all of our needs and desires, life yearning to please our King is what we were made for.

Over the summer a passage that I continued to look back on was Jeremiah 17, it has become a favorite since then.

“This is what the Lord says: Cursed is the one who trust in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the Lord. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will dwell in the parched places of the desert in a salt land where no one lives.”(Verses 5-6)

How often do we depend on others for our strength- do we run to them for comfort and help? I know that more frequently than not, I seek peoples approval and comfort before I go to God and rest in His arms. There’s a song by Audrey Assad that says “I’m restless until I rest in You,” we were hand created by God, for His glory and purposes and cannot be filled or satisfied by anything or anyone other than him. These verses say that a person who seeks after/depends on humans for strength will live in the wastelands, the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. I picture a tree in the desert with no leaves dry with no supply of water and no way to be nourished.

“But blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, whose confidence is in Him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.” (verses 7-8)

These verses are so full of hope and promise. Those who trust in the Lord, who find their confidence in Him are like a tree who never has to worry about how it will continue to thrive and grow and never fails to bear fruit. If our trust wholly rests in the hands of our creator we have no reason to fear or lack in confidence because the God who made the universe is holding our life. If we live each moment to seek and know Him, to glorify Him in our lives so that He becomes greater we become less we will be like a tree whose roots go down in a stream and always have a source of life.
It’s crazy sometimes how when God’s teaching you something it’s like the repeat button is on everything you hear or say, everything ‘happens’ to have a common theme- I don’t believe it’s a coincidence.

In church the past few weeks the pastor has been going through Proverbs 3, it’s been so cool to see that the whole chapter is really about trust- I’ve grown up knowing the verses 5-6

“Trust in the Lord with all you heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him, and He will make your paths straight.”

Trust means to take refuge, put confidence in, Lean means to rest upon, seek support of, and ‘our own understanding’ means our own skills, intelligence, senses and emotion. On our own, apart from Jesus we can do nothing, as much as we try or think we can, we can’t. Take refuge, put your confidence and trust in the Lord with your whole heart, rest upon, seek support of, rely and lean not on ourselves but on Christ and He will supply me with all that we need and we will have no reason to fear when hard times come because the creator of the world holds us and our confidence is in Him.