Will God Provide for You?

I think this is a core question that gets down into the nitty-gritty of many of our struggles to trust God. I think a lot of us are quick to say that we do trust God to provide for us when we are in a situation where we actually need him to do so, and may be a little less sure when things become dire.

It’s one of those things that it’s easy-ish to embrace when things are good, but when you feel held to the fire and pushed to the breaking point – even then do you still believe he’ll provide?

This ended up being a lot more timely than ever anticipated. I laid out the whole year in December 2021, praying about what message God wanted to share with people during which month of 2022. April was clearly meant to be provision, and then lo and behold we are presented with a month of rampant inflation, high gas prices, and global unrest. I don’t know if there ever is a bad time to grow in trust of God‘s provision, but this is clearly a good one.

So much of the conversation about whether or not God will provide has to rest on our believe about who God is. We have to get clear on that if we’re going to reason through whether or not He is trustworthy and whether we are actually going to trust him.

So let’s look at what we know about God.

God is revealed to us by Jesus as a good Father. That’s the image I always come back to more than any other - this image of God as a good dad not only willing but aching to delight in his children.

If you’re a parent you know how much you just want your kid to feel safe with you, have fun with you, and know that you will provide for them.

I think the image of a three year old who is constantly anxious about whether or not they will be fed is a powerful Image to ponder - if we came across this situation, specifically in a family where poverty was not an issue? Wouldn’t we worry that the child had abusive parents? And again, I want to drive home that this analogy would not involve a child living in poverty, mainly because of another thing we know about God - God is not only Father but also Creator (and One who creates from nothing at that) so lack is not really in His vocabulary. If something is needed He can simply create it, so this is not a family where the parents are unable to provide though they want to. This is a family with more than enough, and yet this child fears starvation every day.

What kind of witness is that child to their family? What do we assume about the parents if we come across this situation? Clearly they can not be good. How could they be? How could it be good to let a small child live in such anxiety every day?

We live like this not because it reflects the reality of our situation, but because we do not fully embrace our membership in the family. Instead of thinking of ourselves as children who will of course be provided for, we think about ourselves as slaves or servants, walking on eggshells and afraid to upset the status quo for fear we may be thrown out.

There is no stability in our position in our minds and everything depends on consistently showing up ready to work and do what needs to be done. This is ultimately where all the anxiety we feel about God‘s provision lives and dies: in how we see ourselves in the context of relationship with God.

As long as we are servants and slaves, we will fear. But the moment we become children in our minds, as we already are in reality, we become open to our good Father having the space he needs to reassure us that everything will be fine. It becomes safe to trust. It becomes safe to hope. We are ultimately, finally safe.

It doesn’t mean we will understand perfectly, as it is frequently the experience of children in good families who still must face trials and frustrations they don’t like or understand, but ultimately we will be OK.

That’s what this whole month is about here at PSR. We want to help you make this transition in your identity so you can stand firm in your childhood and your confidence that God will absolutely feed you, care for you, and provide for your every need. And the best place to get started right now is by listening to today’s episode of our podcast where we dive even deeper into this lie and the verses that we are using to combat it this month.