Don't Believe The Lie

He's keeping something from me! He doesn't want what's best for me...he's not giving me the best! Yes, he's given me lots of good things, but not the thing I want most.

I would imagine that Eve struggled with all of those thoughts in the Garden before she decided to take matters into her own hands. She began by breaking the first commandment and that was to start loving something more than God. She wanted her own happiness and desires fulfilled more than she loved God and wanted to obey Him. She craved something that wasn't hers. A lie was presented to her and instead of choosing to believe God, who had given her every good thing, she chose to believe the serpent. Eve was content in her fellowship with God and in what He had given her. But than she began to question God's goodness. She began to believe the lie that God didn't have her best interest at heart...that He was withholding something from her.

I don't know why God decided to have one tree in the Garden that was off-limits to Adam and Eve, but God knows. We sometimes imagine that God might eventually "sit us down" and "explain" His mysterious ways to our satisfaction. But being a Christian means getting comfortable with mystery. I read an example once about the possibility of a person never having seen a skyscraper. If we were to to happen upon a fenced in area where there was construction going on. Huge earth movers are at work; hundreds of men in hard hats are busy at mysterious tasks; cranes are being moved into place; truckloads of pipes and cement are being unloaded. What on earth is happening? There is nobody around to answer our questions. If we wait long enough, nobody will need to. When we see the finished building, all the incomprehensible activity becomes comprehensible. "Oh! So this is what that was for." It's the same way with God's plans.

Sometimes, we know exactly what a skyscraper looks like. It's big and beautiful and was made with our own hands. We can't imagine anything making us happier than the dream that lays before us. But God often times has other plans.

"When God shatters dreams, He rebuilds them into something beautiful. Perhaps not beautiful by worldly standards but more akin to what is captured in Isaiah, when God says He will give His people "a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair" (Isaiah 61:3)."- Suzanne Hadley

It's hard to trust that what the Lord chooses to give us or not to give us is His best. It's takes faith and daily surrender. It takes the practice of immersing ourselves in God's word and learning the character of who He is. The character that promises to never leave us, nor forsake us. The character that freely pours out steadfast love and forgiveness. The character that gave us the best gift we could ever imagine...His Son. Faith is holding out your hand to God and saying "I trust You". How comforting to know, we can trust our faithful Father.

"Sometimes when I was a child my mother or father would say, "Shut your eyes and hold out your hand." That was the promise of some lovely surprise. I trusted them, so I shut my eyes instantly and held out my hand. Whatever they were going to give me I was ready to take. So it should be in our trust of our heavenly Father. Faith is the willingness to receive whatever He wants to give, or the willingness not to have what He does not want to give. I am content to be and have what in Thy heart I am meant to be and have. From the greatest of all gifts, salvation in Christ, to the material blessings of any ordinary day (hot water, a pair of legs that work, a cup of coffee, a job to do and strength to do it), every good gift comes down from the Father of Lights. Every one of them is to be received gladly and, like gifts people give us, with thanks. Sometimes we want things we were not meant to have. Because He loves us, the Father says no. Faith trusts that no. Faith is willing not to have what God is not willing to give. Furthermore, faith does not insist upon an explanation. It is enough to know his promise to give what is good--He knows so much more about that than we do." - E.E.