Those who know you, LORD, will trust you;
I have noticed the more our new rescue dog, Willow, hangs out with us the more she trusts us. But it isn’t just that. The more she hangs out with our old dog Renly, the better they get on with each other. We are all getting to know each other and learning to trust each other.
With Willow too, the more often we go round the park the more she gets to know it and the regular people and dogs who walk there and so the more she is comfortable and trusting there. There is also the thing that the more she trusts me on a walk the more she trusts where I take her.
It is the same with God. The more we hang out with God the more we learn to trust God and the safer we are. I can’t remember who it was, maybe Henri Nouwen, who said that we need to get to know God in the calm times of our lives then we can trust God in the rough times.
Fourteen years ago now we went through a very tempestuous time and I know if I hadn’t built up my hanging out time with God before then, spent time devouring my Bible, praying, worshiping, reading about God, then I know I would not have been able to trust God during that time. Like Willow I build up my “hanging out getting to know God” time and knew then that I was safe with God wherever.
Again it is not about throwing requests at God, not about being busy doing things with God, but it is hanging out with God and just “doing life” with God, which is how the trust is built up.
[Though back on the Willow front – it is now 4.30pm and she still doesn’t quite trust that I will remember to feed her and Renly, which just goes to show we all need to work on trust 🙂 ]
Aspirational Adventures 