TRUSTING AND WAITING ON THE LORD
The Bible tells us: “Trust in the Lord and lean not unto your own understanding, and he will direct your path” (Proverbs 3:5-6). David, whom the Lord said was “a man after my own heart,” was blessed to be a king for trusting and waiting on the Lord. David counsels us, “Wait for the Lord” (Psalm 27:14). We should trust in and wait on the Lord Jesus Christ, “who loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings and priests to His God and Father,” when we trust and wait on him (Revelation 1:5-6).
BLESSED FOR TRUSTING
DAVID trusted and waited on the Lord. The Lord blessed him to be king of God’s people. God saw David as “a man after his own heart,” even when David was only boy (1 Samuel 13:14). God’s sent his prophet Samuel to anointed David to be the next king of Israel at the time he was a boy (1 Samuel 16:13).
However, David waited patiently for years, allowing the Lord to grow and prepare him for the throne of Israel. God enabled him to gain recognition by killing and beheading a giant who was and enemy of God’s people. And the Lord taught him to be a great leader by heading an army and winning many battles.
However, David refused to move ahead of God when he had opportunity to kill Saul, the reigning king—although Saul sought to kill David because of his fame and favor.
But David saw Saul as the one God had chosen to be king before David (1 Samuel 24). David waited on the Lord and was blessed to be king of God’s people (2 Samuel 5:1-3).
TROUBLED FOR NOT TRUSTING
SAUL lost his position as king of Israel because he failed to trust and wait on the Lord. Before Saul went to war against the Philistines, God told him to wait on God’s chosen prophet to offer a burnt offering to the Lord. But because Saul saw the prophet Samuel was running late, and fearing his army would abandon him, Saul offered a burnt offering to God. When Samuel arrived and saw what Saul had done, the prophet told Saul he had disobeyed the Lord’s command; and that the Lord “has sought out a man after his own heart” to be ruler over his people (1 Samuel 13:8-14).
Saul disobeyed God on another occasion when the Lord sent him to fight the Amalekites, and told him to destroy everything including cattle and sheep. Saul spared the king of the Amalekites, the best of the cattle and sheep, and all that was valuable. When he was confronted by the prophet of God, Saul said, “the soldiers…spared the best of the sheep and cattle to sacrifice to the Lord your God.” God rejected Saul because Saul did not have a heart to trust and obey him. (1 Samuel 15:18-23).
God knows our hearts, as he knew the hearts of David and Saul. He always deals with us in love; but he deals with each of us according to our hearts and our willingness to trust him (1 Samuel 16:7).
TRUSTING AND WAITING ON THE LORD FOR ALL OUR NEEDS
There are many things we might need or want—money, recognition, companionship, house, car and you-name-it. There is the possibility of being like David or like Saul. In our anxiousness to get what we feel we need or want, like Saul, we could go ahead of God. Or, although we may find it challenging to wait, like David, we could decide to trust in the Lord. God’s Word says, trust in the Lord with all our heart, and lean not to our own understanding, and he will lead you in the right path and will bless us at the right time (Proverbs 3:5-6; Prov. 27:14).
God’s Word counsels us to “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness”– and trust that he will add all other things we need and want (Matthew 6:33; Psalm 37:4). For “He who did not spare His own Son but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also, along with Him, freely give us all things [including heaven]?” (Romans 8:32; John 14:2-3).
