Reflection - Trust is a 3-Way Concept

Trust is a Three-Way Concept

Involves God, You and Your Collaborator 

Even as he prepared the alter to sacrifice Isaac, Abraham knew that Isaac will not be taken away from him. He recalled God's promise of descendants as many as the stars in the sky. Abraham knew God will honor His word even though the current circumstances seem to suggest otherwise. 

For Abraham obeying God was above everything else. Even as Abraham raised the knife, he knew that Isaac, his only son, will be returned unto him in some manner. He had faith that transcended all understanding.    

          

Abraham collaborated in God's plan and so did Job and all good prophets, leaders and kings who are written about in the Bible.  

How do we achieve this level of faith to collaborate with God in his plans for us?  

Abraham knew only one God. There were no other Gods before him. He loved his son, begotten after 100 years. He loved and adored his son. However, he worshipped only God. There is a thin line between loving and adoring…and worshiping. 

We as Christians worship only God the Creator and not the created. We may love and adore our children, our house, our art collections, our friends, our parents, celebrity role models…even our deceased parents, but we are clearly not to worship them. That would be an abomination to God. We venerate Mother Mary and the Saints and seek their intercession, but we are not to worship them. That privilege belongs for only God the Father, His Beloved Son Jesus Christ and the Precious Holy Spirit. 

Intellectually, we know that but practically do we exercise that knowledge in our daily life? Is there a gap between what we know and what we actually do? If there is a gap, there is only one reason for it. We have no time for reflection in the hurly-burly of everyday life. Worse, nobody can help retrieve us from this situation except ourselves. At times, we may cry, "God help me" but God cannot help in a vacuum. He can help if we agree to collaborate with him.  

God does not impose. God cannot impose. But God can dispose. 

God could have stopped Eve from eating of the fruit from the forbidden tree. But He would not because He had already vested them with the FREE WILL to decide. He commanded Adam and Eve not to eat of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge and of Life. But they chose to disobey and test God. God disposed of them by expelling them from the Garden of Eden. 

God sets rules so that we cannot claim we did not know. He did it in the Garden of Eden and He did it again on Mount Sinai when God gave Israelites the Ten Commandments. He continues to do it through history through the prophets and lastly through Jesus. 

Jesus condensed the Ten Commandments into just two: To love the heavenly Father, and love the neighbor as oneself. Jesus said that if you keep these two commandments you would have kept all Ten. The choice to obey or reject is ours. To obtain blessings or invite curses (by casting our lot with Satan) on ourselves is our decision.  

God is omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient. He knows everything that is happening with each of us as we learn in the Psalms 33:13,18-19.

 

From heaven the LORD looks down and observes the whole human race,
But the LORD'S eyes are upon the reverent, upon those who hope for his gracious help,

Delivering them from death, keeping them alive in times of famine.     

  

 

God provides all help through collaborators. For God is Spirit and He always needs a human collaborator who agrees to hear and implement His will. God, through Angel Gabriel had to get Mother Mary's permission to give birth to his only Son. God needed Joseph to accept Mary and the newborn as his own to provide the Holy Family for us to emulate. God needed Abraham's consent to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah after rescuing Job and his family. 

God needed Joseph, son of Jacob, Pharaoh's prime minister, to save his own family and other Israelites from famine that swept Egypt. God had to offer his only begotten Son, Jesus, (replacement for Isaac) to take human form to bear our sins and defeat Satan, once and for all. 

While God needs collaborators, Satan too needs connivers for he too is spirit like God. He needed the serpent in the temptation of Eve as he needs you and me to spread the plague of sin.  

When people say why does God not stop all that is bad in the world, the simple answer is He cannot. However, you and I can do so by discerning the plan that He has in our life. This requires sensitivity to God's Spirit and sufficient alertness to discern and reject the prompting of Satan, who has only one objective – to make us act contrary to God's wishes. 

Jesus has given us the FREE Gift of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit will come when we call provided, we have made space in our hearts for Him to abide, to guide and fight the good fight against the designs of the Evil Spirit.  

For that we need to observe the Six Cs: 

1.    Contemplation on God's Word

2.    Conversation with God to know his will in our life

3.    Commitment to live a spirit-filled life

4.    Communion with God so that His works are constantly             acknowledged

5.    Conversion of our sinful self to higher levels of sainthood

6.    Consecration of our body and spirit to His will

Moment you begin to adhere to this discipline you will find that you are spending your time more gainfully. You are learning more and doing more. You find yourself completely at peace in the most trying circumstances. Your faith gets a strong foundation. You learn to surrender rather than fret about what you have no control over. It helps you act in a way that is good for you while not being detrimental to anyone else. 

You begin to actually see a pattern in your life and a sense of where it is going. You are able to better prepare yourself for the future with decisions based on good judgment. You become an asset to those who come in touch with you. You leave them feeling so much better after their contact with you. You begin to impact people's life starting as a tiny ripple but becoming a tidal wave of positive change in the community in a way unimaginable and immeasurable. 

You become a willing and able collaborator with God to do good – and fight evil. God needs you. Say Yes to Him, today! 

Remember trust is a three-way concept. You need to trust God to help, support, make things happen for you; you need to trust yourself to make it happen by the confidence and self-esteem you command in your abilities and capacity to get it done; and trust in your collaborators in their intentions and ability to help you get it done.

Remember also that any plan which has ‘GOD’ written on it, the evil one will try to scuttle by creating distrust in God’s ability to help you, your own ability to help yourself, and of course, by casting doubts on your collaborator’s intentions. 

In everything collaboration with the Holy Spirit is key to thwart the works of the evil one.