I am convinced that without trust, we cannot fully experience the presence of God in our lives. 

As human beings, His very creation, I believe we were created to enter completely unhindered into a relationship with our Creator. Last week, I came to you with five practical reasons on why I think we should be trusting Jesus. Here’s the reality though; a lot of us read these posts, buy those books off of Amazon (along with a million other items we don’t need if you’re anything like me) that tell us the joys and wonders of a life lived trusting. Then we make a declaration that this time, with this sudden bout of inspiration, we will finally start to take our relationship with God seriously. We will finally start to trust Him. 

Sound familiar? If not, then I’m extremely jealous and I need to know your secret… because it has taken me years to finally put my declarative words into hard-fought action. And when I say, “hard-fought action,” I come to you with the sincerest reality that trusting Him is something I have to be intentional about every single day… moment by moment. It’s my own personal challenge, my own battle I struggle with daily. 

For the next few weeks, I want to challenge you to dig deep with me, allowing me to take you on a journey toward a life lived trusting Jesus. I want to share with you things and habits in my life that have helped to push me deeper into my relationship with Jesus, and further on the path of trusting Him. 

A life lived trusting begins only when you start to familiarize yourself with the voice of Jesus.

Friends, everything we are – the very core of who we were created to be – is only found at the feet of Jesus. If we are not seeking His voice over our lives, over our very selves, on a consistent basis, then we are subjecting ourselves to everything else that isn’t Him and His truth. I’ve made some pretty terrible choices in my past; choices driven by selfish motivations and insecure moments. Those choices, and those wounds, were governed by life outside the voice of Jesus. When we don’t know His voice, I believe it’s impossible to truly know who we are. How can we know our identity, our worth, if we are not intimately pursuing the One who created us? 

Maybe you were raised in the church by a Christian family who proclaims the love of Christ. Maybe your life has been full of love and laughter, and you haven’t really encountered any devastation that causes you to question the goodness of God. Or perhaps you aren’t churched at all, and the wounds from your past, the circumstances you’ve encountered, have made you lose all hope of ever trusting a God that would allow such terrible things into your life. Whatever your crutch may be, you are never going to find your worth at the feet of complacency or fear.

Living a life out of ease and comfort is not the same as a life lived trusting Jesus. It’s not going to serve you well to lean on the luxuries of this world when tragedy hits because I promise you it will, and those luxuries will turn to sand in your hands. At the same time, harboring wounds and anger from your past, and letting it fester, is not an excuse to stunt your growth towards Jesus. I get it… people suck sometimes. Life can be so hard and unjust that it can leave you feeling like you were just punched in the chest by a sumo wrestler. But you are never going to find peace while you clutch to the comfort of your anger and place your past experiences on a God that only seeks to make you whole.  

I urge you to make the commitment to seek the Father on a consistent, daily basis. I beg you to ask Him the hard, awkward questions and get comfortable with the sweet silence of meeting Him in the stillness. This is where you will find your worth, this is where those strongholds will turn to dust because they can’t stand against the power of the voice of Jesus, the voice of the King. The lies that whisper you aren’t good enough, your most shameful moments and deepest regrets, flee back to the darkness as the tenderness of His voice melts and reshapes your heart. 

For me, this commitment looks like getting up at 5:30 am every morning before my day has a chance to be filled with craziness and chaos. I roll out of bed, even when I don’t feel like it, trudge down the stairs half asleep, grasp for my cup of coffee and snuggle up under my coziest blanket. I reach for my Bible and my journal, and I come to Him with the attitude and heart of “Ok Jesus, what do you have for me today?” I allow the Spirit to lead me in that one hour before my day begins. Sometimes it’s filled with me talking His ear off. Sometimes I’m angry and sad about someone who hurt me, and I tell on them right there at the feet of Jesus! Sometimes I don’t say a word, open my journal and fill the pages with the words I feel Him speaking to me that day. 

There is no script. I show up with my heart on my sleeve and I give Him everything I’ve got; the good, the bad and the extremely ugly. There isn’t a set of expectations or rules when you approach the throne of grace; there is just you and your Creator, and if you allow it, it will change your life. I promise the more you do it the more comfortable you get, and the more comfortable you get the more you realize how trustworthy He is. 

Once you know His voice, and grow comfortable at His feet, you find your purpose. You find yourself. You stop worrying so much about what everyone else in the room is thinking about you because you walk dangerously with the knowledge that you are fiercely loved by your Creator. He speaks it over you every day, and you know this because you’ve taken the time and made the commitment to seek Him, to find His voice.

When tragedy strikes or you’re faced with a decision that may alter the course of your path, you no longer react by taking matters into your own hands. You turn to the One that holds your destiny, while your old, dying habit of controlling and manipulating no longer takes precedence. Peace takes the place of fear, joy overtakes quaking anxiety and your insecurities are left at the door of who you once were…the woman who once gave into the lie that He isn’t trustworthy, but now knows from the practice of seeking Him that He is so much more than you could ever have imagined. You learn, little by little and moment by moment, that He actually is enough. 

My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. (John 10:27)

A life lived trusting Jesus begins by listening. A life lived listening will always lead you to the doorway of trust where you will find a peace unlike anything else in this world. A peace that promises that even when life falls apart and you begin to doubt everything, your Father is there waiting to hold you together. Waiting to gently remind you of His goodness. 

Jesus just wants to sit with you. His desire is to love on you, heal you and make you whole. He longs to fill your heart and your mind with His truth; His voice. That voice is the very root where your identity is waiting to grow.  

Make space for His presence today, and I promise you, you will find His sweet voice.