Trust is a Command

It cost $1100 to go to Peru over Spring Break. It took $3500 to get to China. $1940 more to go to Peru in two weeks.

That's a collective $6540 on mission trips in one year.

Thanks to the power of my God and the generosity of many friends, family members, and people that I've never even met, I have had almost no trouble getting the money needed to do this.

But it's down to the last. I have approximately $1100 of the needed $1500 to go to Peru. Our money is due on Friday. All of it.

My parents say that they will loan the money if they have it then, but there is no guarantee that they will have $400 to lend me at the end of the week.

As I sit and think about the possibility of not going to Peru, I am devastated. Would my church take me off the team if I couldn't pay for it? As fear and anger go hand in hand, I felt anger bubbling up inside of me. How could they say I couldn't go? I started Worthday. I've been planning it for months! And to not see the fruit of my labor? And there I find the root of the problem.

I am afraid of not seeing what I have worked so hard for. Of not doing what I've been looking forward to for nearly a year. And, most of all, of not seeing my precious, precious Carmencita.

But, no. I'm not at the root quite yet. It is not enough to simply accept being afraid. You have to understand that fear is a sin. Fear is not trusting God to provide for your needs.

When confronted with this uncomfortable truth, I squirmed. I trusted God. Didn't I?

No.

Not when I thought about it. I am in a constant state of fear. Worried about speaking at Worthday. Worried that it won't go the way I envisioned it. Worried that I won't get to see Carmencita. Worried that I won't get to see Hectór. Worried that I'll get sick.

All of those fears, all of those anxieties, were thoughts that I was choosing to think. And in choosing to think those thoughts, I was disobeying a direct command of God. Do not fear.


Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?
                  - Matthew 6:26


What a dishonor to God, to my Father. Even after He died for me, I refuse to trust Him.

I've realized that trust is not a special possession or an inherent tendency. It is a command. We are told that if we are truly followers of God, we have to trust Him. We have to let go of fear.

So it is with great difficulty and much trepidation, that I let go of my fears about Peru. About getting the money to go to Peru.

I serve a great God. A God who is capable of parting seas and bringing the dead to life. A God who is far more capable than I of getting $400 in five days.

Our God is greater. Our God is stronger. God you are higher than any other. Our God is Healer, awesome in power - Our God, our God. And if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us? And if our God is with us, then what could stand against?