Believing in God is not the same as trusting in God

It is one thing to believe that God created the universe, and including your life ‘in it’. It is another thing to trust God with your life. Believing in God is about assuming that there is a creator and endorsing what you take as a fact about the origins of the universe. Whereas, trusting in God is in a different order, as it is about giving over to God your life and in its entirety (your worries, fears, hopes, aspirations, emotions, will, commitments, loves, hates … everything about you and of you) trusting that God will look after you, loves you, and always has your best interests at heart (and see, for example, Philippians 4:4-7).

Therefore, trusting God is much more difficult but much more profound and life-changing, than merely believing in God. Remember what James said in his letter (James 2:19) “You believe in one God? You do well. Even the demons believe and shudder”. Therefore, with the act and decision of trusting God, you are not only believing that God exists as the demons do according to this scripture, you also choose to have a positive relationship with God. This choice is often not easy, especially when the world and the circumstances you find yourself in, seem hostile and burdensome. But this kind of relationship is the invitation we have from God to us, and is an invitation repeated over and over throughout the Old and New Testaments.

Moreover, for Christians this invitation to trust God is from Christ who, for Christians, is God created a person. So, in other words, we are being invited to relate to God as a person who we can trust, precisely because, like us, he loves us and knows what it is to suffer and go through hard circumstances too. He also knows what it is to defeat these circumstances and to triumph, even over his own death on a cross, through his resurrection. And it is the latter, strange and even bizarre fact, which is the hallmark of why we should trust him – as nothing can defeat this trust and the love and power of God, even death itself. Once we acknowledge and accept this fact in our lives we realize that to trust in him is the ultimate choice (the choice which underpins all other choices), anticipating that we too can enjoy his victory, in our own death and our own resurrection.