Having confidence in God
Sunday 8th January 2023
Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you;
he will never let the righteous be shaken.
Psalm 55:2 (NIV)
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
What a wonderfully encouraging verse for the start of a new year! How good it is to know that we are not alone, that we have somewhere to cast our cares, and that ‘somewhere’ is ‘someone’ who is none other than the Lord. Surely he can take care of our cares – and of us – while not necessarily removing those cares but sustaining us through them.
I was reading that verse in my ‘quiet time’ last week, when I realised that it is an invitation to trust in the providence of God, a doctrine which is beautifully unpacked in the following questions and answers of the Heidelberg Catechism:
- What do you understand by the providence of God?
A. The almighty and ever present power of God by which God upholds, as with his hand, heaven and earth and all creatures, and so rules them that leaf and blade, rain and drought, fruitful and lean years, food and drink, health and sickness, prosperity and poverty—all things, in fact, come to us not by chance but by his fatherly hand. - How does the knowledge of God’s creation and providence help us?
A. We can be patient when things go against us, thankful when things go well, and for the future we can have good confidence in our faithful God and Father that nothing in creation will separate us from his love. For all creatures are so completely in God’s hand that without his will they can neither move nor be moved. (Heidelberg Catechism, Lord’s Day 10).
Here is a God on whom we may cast our cares with confidence, whom we may trust to sustain us through another year as he did through the past year.
Lord, teach me to be patient when things go against me, thankful when things go well, and confident in you for the future. Amen.
Yours warmly, in Christ,
Chris Hobbs (Senior Minister)