Refine Your Understanding: Faith vs. Trust
Having faith in God and having faith that God is going to perform something in you or in your life is not the same thing as trusting God to do that thing. You may have deep faith and still exhibit traits of fear (like anxiety and control, for instance) because you lack trust. Or, vice versa: you do trust in God but you lack hope about the future, your thoughts tend to be pretty negative, or you don’t necessarily have joy when it comes to your outlook on life because you lack faith.
We need both.
Trust
Scripture confirms that we cannot both fully trust God and have fear. One most bow to the other and oftentimes we allow our trust to bow to our fear. See Isaiah 12:2; Psalm 56:3. Fear doesn’t always manifest as terror in the most obvious sense of the word. Fear also manifests as anxiety and control — you feel the need to be in control because you’re afraid, and you’re afraid because you don’t truly trust God.
There are three common ways that fear manifests as anxiety and control:
Monitoring or watching what you’re believing God for
Essentially, you are checking on the promise to see if it looks like it’s progressing, delaying, about to come to pass, and so on. Anxiety causes the need for constant reassurance — constant confirmation that what He said is still true when life lifes and things happen that cause you to start to question whether He’s going to do what He promised. The truth is it is God who watches over His word to perform it, not us. We have to release the supervisory role that we take on when God says something. He is the one that knows what things are supposed to look like from the time He speaks a thing until the time He performs it. He is the one that spoke the word. His eyes are on His promise so yours don’t have to be. See Jeremiah 1:12, AMP (… I am [actively] watching over My word to fulfill it.”)
Believing you have the power to influence the outcome of what God said
One definition of ‘control’ is “the power to influence or direct people’s behavior or the course of events.” When we are operating in control we believe that if we take certain actions, or refrain from taking certain actions, we can make something God spoke happen. The truth is, we cannot both fully trust God and believe that our hand needs to be involved somehow.It’s important to note here that there are times when we’re believing in God for something and we need to take actions that demonstrate our faith or step out in faith. But there’s a difference between taking practical steps within your ability to demonstrate your faith vs. operating in a spirit of control that makes you think your action or lack of action is essential to the outcome. It’s that belief that your hand is essential that demonstrates a spirit of control. You only feel the need to be in control when you don’t fully trust God.
Creating your own tests or factors that need to be met in order to verify the truth of God’s word.
Another definition of ‘control’ is “to check or verify.” When you feel the need to check or verify what God said in order for it to be true by setting up factors or litmus tests in your mind to determine the truth of the matter, you are walking in control (fear) and not trust. This may look like the following: God tells you that you’re going to be moving into a new home. It’s confirmed that He said it, so that’s not the issue. But in order for you to trust that it’s going to happen, you tell yourself “that must mean I should see X, Y, or Z happen,” or that must mean if I see “A, B, or C then it’s not going to happen.” You fill in the blanks. Of course, we don't realize we’re doing this in the moment. What we’re actually looking for are assurances. It’s a spirit of control because we’re, once again, inserting ourselves into the role of supervisor or watchman over His word. It’s also the pride of believing that we are the ones who determine whether something He said is true or not based on applying our own limited factors. The truth is, control is an illusion. It makes us think we’re strong when really we’re weak, afraid, and in need of our Heavenly Father.
So, what does it mean to trust God?
Trust requires surrender — completely releasing control; releasing the monitoring or watching what you’re believing God for; and releasing the belief that your action or inaction will influence the outcome of what you’re believing God for.
Trust means genuinely believing that God has your best interest at heart, is for you, and will work on your behalf out of the perfect love He has for you.
Trust means knowing and honoring God as the one in control, not us.
When we trust God, we are promised to walk in confidence, security, strength, abundance, and fearlessness. And out of all of this, we produce good fruit.
“Blessed is the man who trusts in the Lord, and whose hope is the Lord. He shall be like a tree planted by the waters, which spreads out its roots by the river, and will not fear when heat comes; but its leaf will be green, and will not be anxious in the year of drought, nor will cease from yielding fruit.” Jeremiah 17:7.