Trusting in God

Father Pisut,

I am taking advantage of your section "Ask Father Pisut" by coming to you via email to ask you about trusting God. Every time I think about God I spend time thinking about ways to grow in holiness. However, my biggest obstacle has been "trust". I want my soul to go be obedient and docile to God's will for me but for some reason I get overwhelmed with fear. I constantly pray to accept His will in my life. Yet, I continue to struggle with lack of trust in Him. Other than praying, I really do not know what else to do.

If you do not mind me asking, what do you recommend I do in order to trust Him blindly? I tend to believe my fear has to do with negative experiences when fully trusting someone which I should not have. Now, I seem to have a strong faith in God but I need to learn to trust Him despite of the wrongdoing I have experienced in the past from people I had trusted.

I appreciate your feedback.

Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam



In some ways yours is a more difficult question to answer since, unlike the other questions that I have received, it deals with what is intangible and the vagaries of the human heart. The Catechism of the Catholic Church tells us: "'The sum of your word is truth; and every one of your righteous ordinances endures forever.' 'And now, O Lord God, you are God, and you words are true;' this is why God's promises always come true. God is truth itself, whose words cannot deceive. This is why one can abandon oneself in full trust to the truth and faithfulness of his word in all things. The beginning of sin and of man's fall was due to a lie of the tempter who induced doubt of God's word, kindness, and faithfulness." (CCC 215)

That being said, and I believe what the Catechism says to be beautiful and true, I realize that living the Christian life is not always easy. I think part of the problem with realizing that we trust in God is that we want it to be comfortable. When we trust in God we want to feel at peace with our decision having no doubt that things will go well. If that is God's will perhaps that will be our reality. However, part of the nature of trust is that in difficult situations we have to endure what may not be comfortable in order to do the right thing. We want trust in God to conventionally mean that we are doing the right thing and that will lead to success. If life was comfortable and we had no doubt that things would turn out well then what do we need trust for? The reality of trusting in God is relying on him to build us up to live in him when living in God is opposed to what the secular world offers. Trusting in God means that while it may at times be uncomfortable we know that we are doing the right thing and that we will be sustained in the difficulties that often come with being true to God in the midst of a world that often isn't. Yes, pray always. Pray to be faithful to God and he will sustain you.

Fr. Pisut