Text: Isaiah 43: 1 – 21
Memory Verse: "Though the fig tree does not bud and there are no grapes on the vines, though the olive crop fails and the fields produce no food, though there are no sheep in the pen and no cattle in the stalls, yet I will rejoice in the LORD, I will be joyful in God my Saviour. The Sovereign LORD is my strength; He makes my feet like the feet of a deer, He enables me to go on the heights”. Habakkuk 3: 17 – 19
Welcome to June, the month of grace. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ abide with you throughout this month; and may this grace take you to a point where you develop an unimaginable trust in God.
This month marks the end of the first half of this year. However, the year is already full of events such that if nothing else happens this year, we have recorded more than enough to qualify the year as an “eventful year”. In this year so far, we have witnessed several deadly earthquakes that have claimed hundreds of thousands of lives; many have perished in air disasters, floods and other natural disasters. We have even had volcanic eruptions in Iceland which sent plumes of ash thousands of feet into the air, leading to closure of several airspaces around Europe with the resultant air travel disruption and its massive economic sequel. And today, British Petroleum (BP) is struggling with massive oil spill pouring from a ruptured oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico that has defiled all solutions proffered so far irrespective of the ingenuity involved. Such are the magnitude and the diversity of natural disasters in this year that the Daily Hot News, one of the internet’s sources for news, already described 2010 as “The Year of Natural Disasters”.
During a recent discussion with some of my colleagues and friends on the current events in the world, it became apparent that there is a very high level of anxiety amongst people about what is becoming of the world. Not a few people are worried about their future; and many are extremely fearful about what could happen to them. But my answer to them and to you my reader is this: You can trust God!
But how and why should anyone trust God in all of these? Someone may want to ask. Let us begin to answer the question by looking at what it means to trust. To trust is to to have belief or confidence in the honesty, goodness, skill or safety of a person, organization or thing. It is to hope and expect that something or someone is true. Some of the factors that help us have belief or confidence in the honesty, goodness, skill or safety of a person include their character, reputation, authority, power, antecedent, etc. Trawling through the scriptures from Genesis to Revelation, and especially from our text, I found that the character, reputation, authority, power and antecedent of God are so great that one is compelled to do nothing else but to trust Him and trust Him absolutely. Please look at this with me. God is the Almighty – Elohim (Jer. 31:34), He is sovereign (2Kings 19: 13, 19), faithful (2 Cor. 1:20), righteous (2 Tim. 4:8), holy (Lev. 11:44), merciful (Num 14:18), eternal (1 Tim. 1:17), loving (1 John 4:8), omnipotent (Ps147:5), omniscient (1 Sam 2:2), omnipresent (Ps 139:1-4), transcendent (Jer. 10:10). God is honourable, His antecedent confirms this. Prophet Habakkuk (in agreement with many other Old testament prophets) declared this boldly in Habakkuk chapter 3, as he recounts the great things God did in the lives of His chosen people, the children of Israel. God parted the Red Sea and allowed the Israelites to walk on dry ground whilst He destroyed the chariots, horses and their Egyptian riders in the same Red Sea. This He did after He had demonstrated His power and authority over king Pharaoh by calling on His creations to deal with Egypt and Pharaoh, compelling him to let His people go. He did many great things to ensure that He got them to the Promised Land in fulfillment of His promise to Abraham, their ancestor. And when humanity had no hope of escaping from the consequences of sin, He gave us His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ, to give us eternal life. And as if these were not enough, hear His promise to us as recorded in Romans 8:32: “He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all—how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give us all things?”
How I wish I had the time and the space to continue to discuss with you my friends, the scriptural evidences of the qualities that made it compelling for you and me to trust God. But friends and brethren, you just have to trust God. You can start to do this by learning to know Him as you read His words and commune with Him in prayers. And like everything that has to do with God, having faith is essential to trusting God. Without faith it is impossible to please God; as anyone who comes to Him must believe that He is real and that He rewards those who diligently seek Him. God is honourable; and you can trust Him. This is the word of the Lord for you this month.