Are you finding it hard to trust God? (Or Jesus?)
Do you come from a past where trusting people - especially men - lead to pain or betrayal? Does your current understanding of God’s character make you fear Him more than trust Him?
Abusive childhoods, bad relationships, and inaccurate teaching can cause us to have a skewed view of God’s character. Which is precisely why I’m going to help you overcome several of these common misconceptions - so that they no longer limit your relationship with God!
P.S. In case you didn’t get a chance to write it down, the name of the book I mentioned as an additional resource is: One in a Million: Journey to Your Promised Land by Priscilla Shirer.
Show Notes:
Intro
Trusting God. This can often be presented as if it’s an easy thing to do. But our relationship with God is like any other relationship…whatever we’ve experienced in life is going to have some effect on how we view things.
And for those of us coming from highly abusive childhoods, or who have suffered a traumatic event that involved a male, or who have endured years in an abusive or manipulative marriage…or who have endured through some other type of experience…trusting God is not a simple thing.
We’re coming into the relationship with certain perceptions. We’re coming into the relationship with certain expectations - or lack thereof. And this can be magnified because now we’re talking about God who is all-seeing and all-knowing. There’s no running from Him, escaping from Him, or wrestling full control from Him.
And that can be a scary idea when you’ve spent most of your life suffering under those with greater power than yourself. Or those who had beaten you down until you felt powerless. It was tough enough surviving a controlling husband, for example, so what’s it going to be like with God?
Bad teaching can muddy the waters even further. If the religious teaching you’ve been exposed to thus far didn’t present the true character traits of God - that He is loving, patient, kind, etc. - or if they presented Him as a tyrant God to be feared, then of course that’s going to make trusting Him that much harder.
And trust is a fundamental part of our relationship with Him. After all, we enter into a real relationship with Him by believing - or trusting - that Jesus, His only Son, the spotless lamb, died for our sins.
And in order for God to continue to transform us, and heal us, and make us more Christ-like, and love on us, and place us in His calling for us…we need to trust Him. Moving forward with God requires trusting that He has our best interests at heart. That He’s always got our backs. That He wants to care for us and not hurt us. Just to name a few examples.
If we don’t trust someone, then we’re not going to surrender our lives to Him on a daily basis. We’re not going to say, “Your will above mine God.” We’re not going to follow Him into uncomfortable situations that will grow and stretch us and impact others.
Instead, we’re going to cling tightly to control. We’re going to refuse to go where He’s calling us. We’re going to severely limit our growth - spiritually, emotionally, and mentally.
Trust is essential to our walk with God. So, what we need to do is recognize the misconceptions that we have…the things that are coloring our view of God’s character…so that we can see Him for who He truly is. And once we understand who He truly is, we can, with His help, start to slowly open up our hearts to Him and learn how to trust Him.
And God will meet you where you are; He recognizes that this is a process. Meaning, He’s not going to take you from 0 to 60 overnight. He’s not going to take you from where you currently are and ask you to trust Him in a way you’re not ready for - like to go serve in a foreign country.
Everything is a process of small steps that lead to big transformation. So let’s start with the step of calling out some misconceptions.
Misconception #1: God is Distant, Mean, and Only Wants to Manipulate Your Life like a Puppet Master
This type of view of God comes from several places. One, it can come from inaccurate religious teaching. For whatever reason, God is presented as this looming, powerful figure that has no real interest in your well-being. He’s God, you’re not, and it’s your job to try and appease Him the best you can.
Two, this type of belief can also be due to past experiences. If most of the male relationships that you’ve known have been controlling and/or distant, then it’s only natural that you would apply the idea to God as well. Especially if that’s coupled with bad teaching.
The truth, however, is much different.
Firstly, God is not distant. He desperately wants an intimate relationship with you. You’re His creation. You’re His child. His beloved daughter. He sent His only Son to die on the cross to free you from sin and bring you into a closer relationship with Him. That’s not someone who wants to remain distant. That’s someone who’s willing to sacrifice something that’s immensely precious to Him in order to be close to you for eternity.
If you’re a new Christian, or you’re someone who hasn’t had a lot of close relationships in life (including with your father), then it’s only natural that God might feel distant. Especially if you’re coming into your relationship with Him with baggage and misconceptions. But God knows and understands this. In fact, He might have led you to this very podcast episode to provide help in this area.
But even if God feels distant, know that He’s not. Joshua 1:9 says, “Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”
God is always with us. And secondly, He’s not someone we need to fear. This verse tells us not to be frightened or dismayed because God is with us wherever we go.
Also, 1 John 4:16 says, “We know how much God loves us because we have felt his love and because we believe him when he tells us that he loves us dearly. God is love, and anyone who lives in love is living with God and God is living in him.”
God is love. Not meanness. He doesn’t want to be appeased or to control things without your best interests at heart. God is love.
And for those of us coming from tough lives, understanding what love is - especially perfect love which is what God is - can be very difficult to understand. When you don’t have a lot of good examples of human love, understanding God’s love can seem impossible. (Especially if you haven’t been exposed to a lot of teaching regarding God’s love. Or how both Old and New Testament God is the same God, and everything is about Jesus.)
But I can tell you from personal experience that it is possible. Again, God knows where you are now and what you need in order to grow in this area. And because He is love, He’s going to do it in a loving way.
But the vital steps you need to take here are:
One, accept that your understanding of God’s character is inaccurate.
Two, open yourself up to accurate Biblical teaching. (And if you need a resource to help with that, I highly recommend listening to the sermons from my church, Heart City. You can find out more at heartcity.church.)
And three, asking God to show you His true character. And to trust Him enough to do so.
And if this sounds frightening, keep 1 John 4:18 handy as a reminder not to fear. It says, “Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced his perfect love.”
So instead of continuing to see God as distant, mean, and arranging your life at whim, choose to start diving into understanding His love. It’s like no other love you will ever experience.
Misconception #2: God Won’t Come Through for Me or Be There When I Need Him
This relates to what we’ve just discussed - the idea that God is distant or mean and where that can come from - but it also involves something else.
Because here’s the thing…. A lot of us have lived in survival mode for a long time. Years - even decades. We’ve shouldered massive loads or suffered in silence without help or support. We’ve lived our lives on shifting sands, never knowing when our life was going to be upended due to the actions of someone else.
Coming from that mind of background, it’s not easy to go from those types of experiences to fully trusting that God will be there. And it’s not even just about correctly understanding God’s character, to be honest.
It’s about life wiring us to constantly expect the worse to happen or the bottom to fall out. And to depend on ourselves.
This was totally true for me. I had an abusive childhood and a manipulative, emotionally abusive marriage. From my earliest memories to my 30s, I had learned to expect the unexpected. With my father’s abuse, it was walking on eggshells and wondering what was coming next and when. With my ex-husband, who loved to create chaos, it was trying to keep up with the constant instability and counter-acting it the best that I could.
But when God Saved me two years into my marriage, I didn’t automatically understand how to trust Him. It took Him giving me the gift of Faith, Him purposefully showing me that He had certain situations, and Him putting me through a couple wilderness seasons - along with all the other work He was doing in me - to get me to that point.
And when I say “wilderness season,” that means a season where God is teaching you to depend on Him. Which can also include weeding out things that need to go - such as mindsets, idols, etc.
We call it a wilderness season because of the story of the Israelites coming out of Egypt. Instead of taking them on a direct route from Egypt to the Promised Land, God took them through the wilderness so that He could remove Egypt from inside them. So they would get to know God, and trust His provision, before entering the Promised Land where they would need to fight giants to claim the land.
Sometimes, in order for God to show us just how trustworthy He is, He’ll put us in situations where we have no choice but to trust that He’ll come through for us.
Sometimes, but not always. Wilderness seasons are not a frequent occurrence. But they are a tool that God uses.
He will also, however, move in other ways to build that trust between you. And, you can actually facilitate this by asking God to show you His provision. Our relationship with God is two-sided. He’s not a distant God, remember? He wants a real, true relationship with you. He loves you more than anyone else ever will. So don’t be afraid to ask Him for real life examples. Ask Him to supply a need that you have and see what happens.
The other important action to take to make progress in this area is to dig deeper into Scripture regarding God’s provision. For example, Matthew 6:30-34 says:
30-33 “If God gives such attention to the appearance of wildflowers—most of which are never even seen—don’t you think he’ll attend to you, take pride in you, do his best for you? What I’m trying to do here is to get you to relax, to not be so preoccupied with getting, so you can respond to God’s giving. People who don’t know God and the way he works fuss over these things, but you know both God and how he works. Steep your life in God-reality, God-initiative, God-provisions. Don’t worry about missing out. You’ll find all your everyday human concerns will be met.
34 “Give your entire attention to what God is doing right now, and don’t get worked up about what may or may not happen tomorrow. God will help you deal with whatever hard things come up when the time comes.Luke 12:24 says, “24 Look at the ravens—they don’t plant or harvest or have barns to store away their food, and yet they get along all right—for God feeds them. And you are far more valuable to him than any birds!”
In addition to verses like these, I encourage you to dig into the journey of the Israelites from Egypt to the Promised Land. If you want some helpful material, I highly recommend the book One in a Million: Journey to Your Promised Land by Priscilla Shirer.
God has used this book in my own life to help me not just trust in His basic provision, but to expect even more. You can’t read this book and not be transformed; I highly recommend it!
Wrap-up
Alright, sister…as we wind down here, I want to reiterate a few things. And touch on some key steps I want you to take.
Firstly, I want you to know that I have walked what I’ve talked about today. I’ve been in two major seasons where I had to rely on God to provide for me. The first was when my marriage fell apart, and I started my life over with a degree but no job; a few thousand dollars; my former dog; and what possessions fit into my CR-V.
The other was more recently, when I had drifted from God and made a bunch of bad decisions that would have led to me basically being penniless and homeless if God hadn’t intervened. And then He put me in a wilderness season to get me back into relationship with Him as well as learn how to depend on Him again. Now He’s teaching me to dream big and think big. To have big expectations so He can do big things through me.
I’ve also experienced poor teaching. Prior to coming to Ohio, the churches I had physically attended did not offer a lot in the way of either Biblically accurate teaching or they offered the equivalent of baby food instead of steak. It’s only because God directed me to the podcast of a church across the country that I got legit, accurate teaching.
And, as I shared a few minutes ago, I obviously have a past that, without God’s help, didn’t easily lend itself to trust.
All that to say, I understand where you’re coming from. And you’re not alone. And if you want or need further support, go to my website RelateEscape.com and join my online community. You can connect with other women just like yourself and get direct access to me.Secondly, I want you to be proactive in this area. I don’t want you to turn off this episode and for nothing to have changed. So I want you to:
Join my online community for support. There’s a link in the show notes to get access.
If you need legit, steak-like teaching about God and Jesus and the Bible, go to heartcity.church. This is my church and I can 100% vouch for the insane wisdom and Biblical insights of Pastor Jake and his wife Pastor Katie. (That’s right! They both preach!)
Dig into God’s character in the Bible. Find a resource to help you if you’re unsure where to start. Again, Priscilla’s book is fabulous…I’ll put the title in the show notes.
And lastly, talk to God about these specific issues. Just be honest with Him and tell Him how you feel, why you’re struggling, and ask Him to give you real-life examples of His love and provision. And when He responds, allow those experiences to open your heart and build trust with Him.
Sister, God loves you so, so much. He is patient, He is kind, and He will work at the pace you need in order for that bond of trust to develop. But take action, friend. Be bold. Be empowered. And be amazed at the results. Cheers!