Is Psalm 119, of course; I read from The One Year Bible every day for my devotions because it automates them for you. (I have a physical copy which I bought for like a dollar at the thrift store, which I love, but I currently read it on my Kindle because nobody can move my marker around that way or turn the pages for me, and I can make notations, and it remembers where I left off.) Lately the portion for Psalms has been a bit of Psalm 119.
This year I find myself reading the Old and New Testament portions as usual, praying the Psalm, and then regarding the snippet of Proverbs at the end as sort of a kicker. I didn't set out to do this, it just sort of happened since so many of the Psalms are in first person. When reading them, it's just natural to apply them to your own situation. (Even the violent ones, asking the Lord to judge the wicked, can be applied if you think of "the wicked" as being a dreadful situation.... or our own tempations...or the Adversary.)
Psalm 119 is all about the Word of God, His law and regulations, and it contains a lot of exactly what I need right now--requests that God would make the speaker wise, and help him/her to understand and apply the Word. It's amazing, although I suppose I shouldn't be surprised by now, how God sets up Scripture to speak into our lives. I really should expect it, since He's been doing it for years with me now, but I am still pleasantly stunned every time. Kind of the same feeling I got after memorizing the anatomy textbook in school and then seeing real surgery--whatyaknow, the liver really IS there! Astonishing!
We have a tricky time sometimes believing in God's provision. In fact I think we have, because of our myopic perspective and our fallen nature, a tricky time believing in much of anything that doesn't come from us. I.e., we have to convince ourselves that other people might genuninely be having a different experience than we are--just ask a warm-blooded person married to a cold-blooded person. Even after knowing each other's physical constitutions, the warm-blooded person still tends to think that the cold-blooded person can't possibly be chilly in such a warm room, and vice versa.
If we have a hard time believing about something silly like that, it's no wonder we struggle with the idea that God really will give us what we need.
Sometimes we can accept it for things like money (especially if we don't really have much control over our salaries) or health (especially if we have a bad diagnosis and there isn't a lot we can do) or safety (especially if we are a passenger and can't control the steering on the plane). Sometimes we struggle with all those areas. But often we struggle with trusting God's provision in the areas that it seems like we DO have control over. For instance, will I trust God to help me get enough housework done? Will I trust God to manage my body--sleeping, eating, etc?
(Note: that last sentence I almost wrote, "Will I trust God to help me manage my body" and realized exactly how deeply ingrained my grasping for control really is.)
Trusting God to provide for you in all areas of life is part of the Christian paradox inherent in "...work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you". As C.S. Lewis puts it bluntly, "On the one hand it sounds like you don't do anything, and on the other it sounds like you do a damned lot." So by trusting God to provide for say, my housework, that doesn't mean that I sit in a chair and wait for angels or fairies to come and wash my dishes. Trusting God's provision for my health doesn't mean that I quit learning about my body. It does mean that when I discover a truth--that the day will go better if I can have the dishes washed every night, or that God has designed my body so that it's possible to discern certain things like ovulation or when to stop eating--that I have to go on believing it in the same way that I have to go on believing more "spiritual" truths, like that my salvation was determined from the foundation of the world and I can't screw it up.
God provides for me, which doesn't mean I stop doing anything. But it means I let the control go--I go wash the dishes even when I'd rather read and my brain is trying to convince me that it won't really affect the next day, or I trust that God will manage my body and that the cues it sends me are accurate--and sometimes that's very difficult.
(Note: dishes and bodily cues are just two examples I picked. Perhaps God has not spoken to you about your dishes. Please don't get all condemned and think you're sinning if you don't wash dishes one night--that's just my thing.)
May I suggest you give yourself permission to find it difficult? Sometimes I think that the biggest trouble we have is with believing that things should, once we understand them, come easier. Just because something is true or simple doesn't make it easy, so perhaps it would help to start expecting difficulty. Then we won't be so surprised and disjointed when we run headlong into our own natures. We're not home yet, after all.
Read Psalm 119 if you get the chance, or part of it anyway. God provides discernment and encouragment, just like He provides everything else we need. Isn't He good?
Cheers,
Breanna
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