“He Will Act”

With the lazy days of summer slowly slipping away, and the rush of a busy fall looming, one question pesters the mind: Are you ready?

Some of you are preparing to head toward college. Some of you are determining just how to give special care to a needy loved one. Others are discerning how to spend precious dollars in an economic slump. Still more of you are prayerfully considering how you might make greater investments of time, talent and treasure in God’s unfolding work in your world. Seasonal transitions such as this give us pause and cause us to think about those things that emerge bigger than us. Are you thinking about those kinds of things today?

Verse five of the thirty-seventh psalm offers you an accommodating word of counsel. “Trust in the LORD, and He will act,” it says. You might repeat that a few times to yourself, and as you do heed the unambiguous manner in which it is written. Notice that it is no invitation to fret or fear or wring hands. There is no suggestion that one should look into the looming months with trepidation or anxiety. Clearly, we are invited to do one incredibly simple thing—trust. And yet, this is also often the hardest thing of our existence, for it requires surrendering our own perceived control over the matters that swirl around us.

Thankfully, the summons to trust is qualified by the hopeful phrase that follows: He will act. That is no pie-in-the-sky nicety designed to make us feel fuzzy and warm. It is a concrete reality upon which we can rest. The eternal God of all creation and beyond will act if we will entrust to Him those things that weigh upon us. Of course, there are no formulae suggesting in what ways He will act. Or when. Perhaps the implication here is clear: the Lord will act, and knowing that He will do so should be sufficient for us.

As you begin to wave good-bye to the summer months and cast a glance toward the ready-to-arrive autumn, let me invite you to recognize this prayer as a helpful resource for establishing trust in the One who will act:

Father,
There is much about which I am willing to fret. And yet you clearly invite me to see the days ahead from the vantage point of faith. As summer melts away and fall stands up after its long slumber, help me—indeed, cause me—to really believe that you will indeed work in all the things that swirl around me. I choose this day to entrust unto your care these specific things. . . (and then name them!).
Amen.