Happy (blessed, fortunate, enviable) is the man who finds skillful and godly Wisdom, and the man who gets understanding [drawing it forth from God’s Word and life’s experiences].
Proverbs 3:13 (AMPC)
If you have ever applied for a job, one question you were probably asked by the interviewer was, “Do you have any experience?” If your answer was yes, the next question might be, “How much experience do you have?” Even though you may have a college degree in a specific field that you desire to work in, education alone doesn’t always qualify us for a position. No matter how much we think we know, unless our knowledge is tested, there is no proof of how we may perform on the job.
God looks for the same thing when He desires to use us for His glory and purposes in the earth. When Moses needed help leading the Israelites, with God’s direction, he gave these instructions to the people:
Choose wise, understanding, experienced, and respected men according to your tribes, and I will make them heads over you.
Deuteronomy 1:13 (AMPC)
You may notice that the list of requirements does not mention talent! A person may be naturally talented in an area, but to be a valuable asset, they also need wisdom, understanding, and experience. Moses looked for men who had some experience before putting them in leadership positions.
When we started to build the ministry God had called us to build, we also needed people to help us. While I was talking with my pastor about some of the needs, he said, “Joyce, always remember that you never truly know anyone until you see them in all kinds of situations.” Why? Because nobody knows how a person will perform until character and knowledge are put to the test. We don’t even know what we will do ourselves until we have the experience of going through different challenges in life.
It is easy to think or even say that we trust God, but do we actually do it when we need to? While writing this book on trusting God, I endured a certain challenge that was painful and lasted a long time. During that time, I was able to trust God to take care of it because I have had many years of experience with Him, and I have seen His faithfulness time and again.
We can read a book on trusting God, but we will need experience in order to get really good at it. As a teacher of God’s Word, I try to share with people that merely hearing or reading something is only part of what is needed. We also need to “do” what we are learning, and in the doing of it, we learn as much, if not more, than we do from the knowledge we have gained through study.
Hebrews 5:8–9 (AMPC) states that although Jesus was the Son of God,
He learned [active, special] obedience through what He suffered. And [His completed experience] making Him perfectly [equipped], He became the Author and Source of eternal salvation to all those who give heed and obey Him.
Even Jesus was equipped to do the job that God wanted Him to do by going through things and gaining experience. I don’t know about you, but that is encouraging to me! It helps me understand that we learn as we go, so to speak. We may find it very hard as young Christians to trust God, but as the years go by and our faith is tested, we will know that God can be trusted. Knowing based on head knowledge is one degree of knowing, but knowing by experience is much deeper.
We need education (the Word of God), but we also need revelation, and I believe that comes from times when our knowledge is put to the test and we have the experience of seeing God’s goodness and faithfulness in our own personal situations.
While the apostle Paul was instructing and encouraging the Corinthians, he told them nothing would ever come against them that was too much for them to bear; God would always provide a way out, because He is faithful to His Word (see 1 Corinthians 10:13). I believe Paul was speaking from experience. He had gone through a lot of difficult things while trusting God, and time after time he saw God deliver him or give him the strength to go through it all with a victorious attitude.
Recently, during a question-and-answer session I was doing about trusting God, a woman asked, “How can I trust God when I have trusted Him in the past and He didn’t come through for me?” Twenty years ago I might have had difficulty answering her, but after forty years of experience with God, I knew the answer. I said, “If you trusted God for something and didn’t get it, then you were trusting Him for something you wanted that was not in His plan for you.” A person of mature faith can trust God for something, but if they don’t get it, they continue trusting God. They trust that if what they had requested was the will of God, He would have given it to them, and they understand that if what they wanted was not the will of God, they are much better off without it. They can actually learn to thank God that they did not get what they wanted! They don’t merely trust God for things, but all the way through things.
Paul said this:
But we do [strongly and earnestly] desire for each of you to show the same diligence and sincerity [all the way through] in realizing and enjoying the full assurance and development of [your] hope until the end.
Hebrews 6:11 (AMPC)
Each time we put our trust in God while going through difficulty, or when we are in need, it becomes easier to do it the next time. Little by little (sometimes very little by very little) we learn to trust God, so don’t be discouraged if you don’t feel that you are as successful at it now as you know you need to be.
We are all in the school of life, and we learn more and more as we make our journey. The psalmist David spoke often about those who have experience with the Lord. He said those who have experience with God’s mercy will lean on and confidently put their trust in Him (see Psalm 9:10). As we experience the goodness, kindness, mercy, unconditional love, and generosity of God, it gives us confidence that we can trust Him in any kind of situation. Even if He doesn’t give us what we hoped for, we will eventually see that He does always give us the best thing for us. Just because we don’t understand God’s reasons for why He does things the way He does them, it doesn’t mean that His ways are not right. We eventually do understand, although sometimes it takes a lifetime to do so.
People often say, “I wish I could be young again and know what I know now,” but that is impossible. We only know what we know now because we have gone through the school of life.
I was not able to put life on hold and go off to Bible school when God called me to teach His Word, but I was and still am in the school of life, and I have learned many things that I could have never learned by merely going to school.
David spoke of what he called “sanctified experiences” (see Psalm 119:7). I love that thought! Some things we’ve experienced probably would not have been of our choosing, yet in God’s infinite wisdom they become “sanctified.” In other words, they are holy experiences that are used to help us truly know God and the power of His resurrection.
During the six years that God tested our faith after I quit my job and we had to totally lean on Him, I grew spiritually in amazing ways. It was not the way I would have chosen, but it was definitely the right way!
I enjoy pondering how God took care of the Israelites while they were making their journey through the wilderness and attending the school of life. He fed them manna (a supernatural food) and they had no idea where it came from or proof, except for the promise of God, that it would come the next day and the next. They literally had to trust God one day at a time. Sometimes the only way we will learn to do something is when we have no other choice.
During the forty years they journeyed through the wilderness, the Israelites’ clothing did not get old (see Deuteronomy 8:4). They didn’t get any new ones, but what they had lasted a miraculously long time. God said that He was testing them to see if they would keep His commands or not. You see, there is no proof of trust without a test! His purpose was to promote them into much better circumstances, but first He had to teach them to be so dependent on Him that they would never forget Him after going through the things they experienced with Him (see Deuteronomy 8:2, 7, 11).
In the school of life, I have experienced the betrayal of those I thought were good friends, the rejection of family members and friends when they didn’t agree with my choices for my life, misunderstandings, false accusations, persecution, and other painful events. But I have also learned the importance of forgiving those who hurt me and of refusing to be bitter and angry. I have learned integrity, excellence, peace, patience, self-control, how to choose the right friends, to keep God first in my life, to value people, and literally thousands of other life lessons. Most of them were not easy to learn because they required a test that eventually turned into experience that now allows me to trust God with greater and greater ease as the years go by.
I believe I can say with certainty that trusting God does get easier, as does life with Him. As we choose to “put” our trust in Him instead of in other things, we learn and we grow in our ability to do so. I have watched Dave live with what I call a “holy ease” during most of the fifty-plus years we have been married. At one time it irritated me that life seemed so easy for him and so hard for me, but then I learned that life isn’t easy for any of us, but we can live with a holy ease by trusting God at all times, in all things.
Dave seems to learn a bit faster than I do. I am a little hardheaded and usually have to have a few more “sanctified experiences” than he does before I finally learn. He learned early in life to cast his care on God and let God take care of him. I recall in the early years of our marriage when we experienced difficulties that he would try to tell me that my worrying and being upset weren’t going to change anything, and that I should trust God. I wanted to do that, but I simply did not know how. If you are having a difficult time trusting God, I want to assure you that I know how you feel, but I know from experience that as you continue your journey, you will learn. Don’t be discouraged with yourself if sometimes you seem to have very little faith; just remember that when we use our little faith, it can become great faith over time.
Jesus told the disciples, who panicked in a storm, that they had little faith (see Mark 4:40). Yet a few years later, we see these same men exercising great faith as they actively spread the Gospel of Christ in a time of intense persecution. Their little faith grew into great faith, and so can ours. They didn’t learn to have great faith lying on a beach on a sunny day—they learned it in a hurricane-type storm! They failed to trust God in the storm, but eventually they learned to trust Him at all times, in all things. These men faced death daily, and yet they continued to press on, because whether in life or death, they knew that they could trust God!
When Jesus was suffering on the cross and about to draw His final breath, His last words were words of trust. He said, “Father, into Your hands I commit My Spirit!” (Luke 23:46).
I pray that we will all learn to trust God to the very last breath that we draw! Living a life of trusting God makes a life that might otherwise be miserable, enjoyable. Trust is a powerful gift that God has given us, so let’s unwrap it and use it at all times, in all of our ways.