Living a Parable

Trust Him

May 22, 2022 Silvia Davis Season 1 Episode 2
Living a Parable
Trust Him
Show Notes Transcript

Trust in God is liberating! It enables us to do more than we ever dreamed we could. It gives us courage, confidence, and happiness. Since we know trusting God is so freeing, why is it also so hard?

If you are allowing fear to hold you back from getting more out of life, this is the episode for you! Be bold, trust in the Lord and do AMAZING things with your life.

To book Silvia to speak at your event or to order your copy of Living a Parable: Finding Lessons in Unlikely Experiences visit www.livingaparable.com

Email: silvia@livingaparable.com

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to Living a Parable. This podcast is based on award-winning devotional, Living a Parable: Finding Lessons in Unlikely Experiences written by author and motivational speaker Silvia Davis. In this podcast, we focus on the fact that God is always teaching and even in the most mundane experiences in our lives usually if we dig just a little beneath the surface, there's a nugget knowledge waiting. So be sure to take out a pen and paper so that you can jot down whatever the Spirit brings to your mind and join me as we extract a lesson from this week's account of an unlikely experience. Hello everyone and welcome to the second episode of Living a Parable Podcast. Here we like to remind you that life isn't something that happens to you, but something that happens for you. I'm your host Silvia Davis and with every episode I encourage you to take note of even the seemingly unimportant things that happen in your life and see if there could possibly be a bigger message waiting. This podcast is based on my book. I know you know that from the intro, but what you don't know from the intro is that I'm the oldest of five children. I have three sisters and our brother is the youngest. There's only seven years between me and my brother. So that's basically to tell you that we're all pretty close in age. There's myself, the next in line is my sister, Leslie, then Lucretia then Gina and then finally our brother Wesley. When we were kids, we didn't have video games and around the clock cartoons to keep us entertained. No, what we had to do was make our entertainment. We had our fun by riding bikes or playing red light green light in the hallway, or maybe even playing baseball with ghost runners when necessary<laugh>. But then there was this one time when Leslie convinced Lucretia to play the Trust Fall Game. If you never played the Trust Fall Game as a kid, then you haven't truly lived. The Trust Fall Game has it all. It has excitement, danger, the possibility for the need of a first aid kit. It had it all. And if you aren't familiar with the Trust Fall Game it's pretty simple. Actually the rules are pretty easy. There are two players, usually at least two players, there's player one and player two. Player one stands in front of player two with their back to player two, the second player, player two has to stand just a couple of feet behind player one. Now the object of the game is for player one to allow themselves to freely fall backward and trust player two, to catch them in this case, Lucretia was player one and Leslie was player two. That memory of that game got me to thinking about trust and how powerful of a force it truly is. When you place your trust in someone or something, you feel more empowered to take chances just like in this situation, Lucretia was putting her trust in Leslie. She had to trust her in order to stand in front of her, with her back facing Leslie, and then to cross her arms over her chest and allow herself to free fall backwards. I mean, no lie kind of as if she was trying to build herself up Lucretia, as she started to fall backwards, she actually said out loud,"I trust yoooooouuuuu." Putting our trust in man is a gamble. I n Psalm 118 verse eight. We are told it's better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust man. And I believe that that is because sometimes even when someone wants to come through for us and they do their best to come through for us, they can still end up letting us down, but not our heavenly Father trust in Him is never misplaced. But even though we know we can trust Him 100%, we still struggle sometimes to start that free fall. Trust is something that i s developed over time. And it's developed by repetitive actions. The more someone comes through for you, the more you're going to trust them. And dare I say that it really isn't any different in our relationship with God. God knows that, He knows we're full of doubt, we're full of skepticism, we're full of worry, we're full of fear. And I know that many times when we're going through these trials, we think to ourselves, okay, God, He's testing me. This is a test, but have you ever thought that a part of that feeling a part of that t est, isn't just to see how you might handle that situation, but to see if you will trust Him to handle that situation? Have you ever thought that God might be strengthening your ability to rely on Him, to come through for you, by putting you in situations that call you to rely on Him over and over again? Think about the Hebrews when they were enslaved in Egypt, back in the Old Testament. God could have, with one word, lifted all of His people out of that land, but He didn't. In Exodus 7:3, God tells Moses that He i s going to harden Pharaoh's heart specifically so that He could multiply His signs a nd wonders. He wanted to show them the mighty works that He was capable of and was one plague gonna be enough? Mm-hmm two plagues? Uh, Nope. Three? God sent 10 plugs. And for the grand finale, at least as far as the Egyptians were concerned, there was the parting of the Red Sea where the Hebrews crossed o n d ry land a nd the Egyptians who tried to follow perished. That demonstrated God's might, but the Hebrews still didn't fully trust Him to take care of them. Because we l earned i n Exodus chapter 16, about a month and a half after leaving Egypt while they were in the wilderness, they began to gripe about not h aving f ood. And in response, God didn't give them a storehouse full of food. No, instead every d ay he provided m anana for them and He gave them explicit instructions, not to take more t han they needed to eat for that day. If they tried to get more than they needed to eat for that particular day, what they would find was the extra that they had taken for themselves would spoil and they couldn't eat it anyway. God wanted them to depend on Him, to wake up every day and know that what they needed was going to be there. The only exception to that rule was the day before the Sabbath. They were allowed to gather enough food for two days so that they wouldn't have to work, to gather food on what was supposed to be their day of rest. Now God was working to build their trust in Him. And even though the original Hebrews who were rescued from Egypt never really did fully place their trust in God, as they should have, which is what led to them, wandering in the wilderness for 40 years, we are still able to learn a lot about human nature and about God by studying what the Israelites went through and how they ultimately entered the promised land. There was something that God wanted for His people to have, and He wanted them to have that land that He promised them. But in order to obtain it, they had to literally fight for it and above all else, they had to trust Him because the nations that they were going to fight in order to get that land were mightier than they were. They needed to trust Him. And they needed to conquer their fear. If you don't already know this, then let me be the first to tell you, there is something that God wants you to have as well. It's your gift. And we all have one. This gift is something that brings happiness and it brings a sense of fulfillment. And it, it doesn't exist just for you Uhuh. This gift is meant to be used by you to uplift and edify others. It's given to you so that you can give it away. Maybe your gift is to teach or encourage to lead, to listen, to speak, the list can go on and on, but whatever it is, you need to know it's of great value. If you don't know what your gift is, I would encourage you to first pray about it and then think, what is it that you long to do? What is that burning desire? I mean, forget whether or not you think it can make you rich, but rather think, is this something that will bring glory to God? Is it something that will help others? See, if you're living in your gift, everything else will absolutely work itself out. Proverbs 18:16 tells us that a man's gift makes room for him and brings him before great men. In other words, prepare to be amazed by the doors that are going to just appear before you and open. But just like with the Hebrews, we have to trust and to reach our full potential we have to have the kind of trust that will make us take on things that appear to be mightier than we are. We have to be able to trust Him enough to face our fears. I will give you an example of what I'm talking about using my own journey. It took me a minute to realize what my gift is. And, um, as a side note real quick, I wanna tell you, when I say a minute, as I mentioned in the first episode, I'm, I'm black, but my husband is white and we have a lot of fun pointing out the differences in our upbringings and in our cultures. So when I say to my husband, that something's gonna be a minute, he will sometimes jokingly ask me, he's like,"Is that a white minute or a black minute?" By white minute, meaning a true 60 seconds and by black minute, meaning bruh, you just gonna have to wait. So in this case, when I say it took me a minute to realize what my gift is. I mean, it took about 45 years. I am a visual person and it helps me to put situations into something that I can see. So I'm gonna share with you the, the vision that comes to mind when I think of this situation for myself. Once I realized what I felt I was supposed to be doing, and I knew God had equipped me with everything I needed, or at least a way to get what I needed, in my mind I saw myself standing at the edge of a cliff. There was this huge drop in front of me. In order for me to be what I was supposed to be, in order for me to be the happiest and the best version of myself, I understood that every step for the rest of my life was going to have to be one that I took in faith. I needed to have faith. As I looked out over the edge of this cliff, I couldn't see how I was gonna cross the other side. I couldn't see a bridge. I couldn't see a mountain climbing apparatus. I couldn't see tools. I couldn't see a helicopter coming from the distance to drop me a line. I couldn't see anything, but what does Hebrews 11:1 tell us about faith? It tells us that faith is the assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things, NOT seen. I had to have faith and that faith had to become trust, which would lead to action. So I had to take that first step. I prayed for His guidance and His will not mine. And I thought back to all the times, God has been there for me before; those times that He worked to build my trust. And I took that step off the cliff. In other words, I made a financial commitment and took my first step to writing a book. When I took that first step, I didn't fall. Instead in my mind, what I saw was a single paver that appeared beneath my foot and it was suspended in midair yet. It was sturdy enough for my weight. The thing was that paver didn't appear until AFTER I took the step and neither did the next paver or the next. The step always had to come first. Sometimes I can see myself stuck, even though I can look back and see how far I've come. I can see those pavers reminding me of every other step I took in faith. I still allow that fear sometimes to creep up and it tries to stop me from having the trust that I need to take the next step. But even when I'm afraid, I work at taking that next step. So my question to you is where are you? Is there anything that you feel the Lord has called you to do? And do you feel like you were meant for more, but you're afraid to take that first step because it's absolutely, paralyzingly terrifying? Have you told others what your dreams are and now your family and your friends, they're all standing behind you yelling,"Don't do it. That's crazy. You gon die!"? But that desire you have to take that step, it has a hold on you and it refuses to let go. Or have you taken the first steps, like me, and you've stopped because the next step is even scarier than all the steps you've taken to get to this point? As for me, I can't express how thankful I am that I took that first step. If I hadn't taken that first step, then I never would've written a book. I never would have done this podcast. I never would've won an award for the book. I never would've met some of the people that I've met. This journey, and it's just getting started, is already amazing! Trust. Trust Him to lead you through the wilderness, trust Him, to make your path straight and to lead you to where He wants you to go. Trust Him, to get you across that chasm trust that He will provide you the skill, the opportunity, the words, the wisdom to do whatever it is that he has called you to do, because that's what He does. He doesn't give you a task or a longing to do something for Him without giving you a way to do it. In Exodus 36 verses one through two, we see that when God wanted His sanctuary built, He gave skill and understanding to those who were going to build it. We see over and over again, where God gives the ability to do amazing things to the least likely of people. So you could have that trust to do your amazing for Him! And through it all, with every accomplishment, never forget to give Him all the glory and the thanksgiving. Okay. So you might be wondering what happened with Leslie and Lucretia? Did Leslie catch her?<Laugh> Child, please! As soon as Lucretia started to make that free fall, as soon as Leslie saw her move, Leslie did some kind of a ballerina spin move and got all the way out the way. I mean, Leslie moved so fast she was standing next to me watching by the time Lucretia hit the ground. Even Wesley and Gina, as young as they were, they looked at Lucretia like,"We told you." but that just goes to show, you can't put your trust a hundred percent in man, or in your 11 year old sister.

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Thank you for listening to this week's episode of Living a Parable Podcast brought to you by award-winning author and motivational speaker, Silvia Davis. Be sure to follow this podcast and tune in every Monday for a new episode, and for even more stories and lessons like the one you heard today, visit www.livingaparaable.com to order your copy of Living a Parable: Finding Lessons in Unlikely Experiences available in paperback, ebook, and audible. So until next time my friends be blessed.