Lean Not on Your Own Understanding

OK, so I just had a revelation that I need to share. Perhaps I am the last one to get this, the last horse out of the gates if you will, but something just made sense to me that hadn't before, and I just had a new appreciation for a verse that I have known for years.

The verse is the famous "Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding" (Proverbs 3:5).

Now I've had this (and its following) verse memorized for years and have recited it ad infinitum. I've heard sermons on it, read books about it and written about it before. But it wasn't until just a few minutes ago that I truly understood a part of it that never made sense to me.

The first part of that verse is pretty self-explanatory. "Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart." Although easy to understand, it is hard to do. I, myself, have tried over and over again to "trust with all my heart" but have failed miserably. I think now I realized why.

They key to that verse is in the second part--the part that when I recite it I have always kind of glossed over and never made much sense. Until now.

Whenever I try to "trust God with all my heart" I tend to get stuck on one thing. For a person like me who is (for the most part) pretty logical, a lot of times when I think about what God wants me to do I often get stopped at "it doesn't make sense." Why would God ask me to do something like that? Why me? Why now? Why in this way? Path A is so much easier--why does He insist I keep on going down Path B?

To put it in very real terms for me: working a few more years makes a ton more sense. I get paid a lot more, have a secure "nest egg" for when I do eventually go to seminary school, I get more "real world" experience, I appease those around me, I could live comfortably and safely and securely, etc. etc. etc. It is logical. If I were in court I could argue a firm case for why I should work more. And no jury would disagree. All that parts just add up.

So why, then, do I constantly feel as though that isn't in God's plan? Why when I try to trust him am I constantly getting back the sense that He wants me to start His ministry right away and not work in the corporate world more?

It is because of what God tells us in that verse. Part of trusting in God with all of your heart means that you "lean not on your own understanding." Put another way, you do things that don't make sense--or seem logical--to you. But that's the point! The key to trust in God is sometimes to put away logic, reasoning and rationale and to do what God wants you to do.

I have always been hung up on trusting in God because it is when I start to do that that my logic kicks in. I list in my mind the pros and cons of each major decision I have to make. And what I have found is more often than not "God's Will" is listed on the losing side of my choice. But it is in what "column" God goes in that is the only one that matters.

God calls us to do things that might not make sense. When God was leading the Israelites out of Egypt, instead of taking them by way of Philistine country, which was shorter on their way to Israel and frankly made more sense, He instead took them to the Red Sea. Yep, you heard me. God said that in order to get to New York from California he doesn't want you driving East. Instead, he wants you to get in your car and head West. Never mind the fact that there is an Ocean in front of you. You head West and let God take care of the rest.

It didn't make sense. It was illogical. But we are dealing with the Creator of the Universe here. And so they followed. They didn't lean on their own understanding--they didn't do what made sense. They trusted God. And what did God do? He parted the sea! He turned your car into a boat! The Israelites trusted God and He showed them wonders unlike any other and protected them from a band of chasing Egyptians.

And we are called to do much of the same.

God right now is calling me in a direction that doesn't make sense. If I add up all of the pieces, I'll end up a dollar (or a couple of hundred thousand dollars) short if I go to seminary school next year. Almost all of the advice I have gotten up until now has been to work longer. And it's a good argument that makes a lot of sense.

But it just doesn't feel right. It seems as though God is leading me in another direction. It doesn't make sense and to be honest I don't know right now if I have enough faith to carry through with it.

But if I am serious about trusting God, then I have just realized that I might just need to trade the logical for the illogical...and see the impossible come true.

"Trust in the Lord your God with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight." ~Proverbs 3:5-6