Trust God, not people

Let's start with some scriptural context.

But the Lord said to Samuel, “Do not look at his appearance or at his physical stature, because I have refused him. For the Lord does not see as man sees; for man looks at the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” - 1 Samuel 16:7 (NKJV)

Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. For we know in part and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known. - 1 Corinthians 13:8-12 (NKJV)

Our bodies? Our works? Our creations? Our knowledge? Finite and imperfect.

In Jesus' day, many in Israel failed to understand that the kingdom of God that Jesus spoke of was not of flesh and blood. It was not of material things that we could see and manipulate by our own power, our own will, our own understanding. They expected material salvation, highlighted clearly in how they mocked Christ.

And those who passed by blasphemed Him, wagging their heads and saying, “You who destroy the temple and build it in three days, save Yourself! If You are the Son of God, come down from the cross.”

Likewise the chief priests also, mocking with the scribes and elders, said, “He saved others; Himself He cannot save. If He is the King of Israel, let Him now come down from the cross, and we will believe Him. He trusted in God; let Him deliver Him now if He will have Him; for He said, ‘I am the Son of God.’ ” - Matthew 27:39-43 (NKJV)

They believed that if Jesus Christ could not save himself materially from material powers, then that was sufficient evidence that he could not save himself or any others spiritually either. Most crudely, that because Jesus didn't do what they expected, he was no messiah. At no point did they understand that what they expected was based on, at best, a flawed and incomplete perception on how anything should be.

Nobody has all the pieces of the puzzle. People keep trying to compare the pieces they have to someone else's, and the two argue over whose pieces really belong and whose doesn't, while neither is aware of what the puzzle would look like when put together.

Some of the pieces aren't even ready to be put down, to be added, because the time and place where those pieces are created has not yet occurred, and while we can make guesses, that's the best we can do.

People who place their material state in this life as a priority, and serve their own wellbeing first and foremost, are going to figure things out about the material world, but even what truth they stumble upon in finding success in the material life will be confused by the taint of sin.

There's a reason why ideologies and philosophies tend to come in bundles, and people are encouraged to "take or leave" the entirety of the bundle, instead of discerning what is true and discarding only what is false.

But I fear, lest somehow, as the serpent deceived Eve by his craftiness, so your minds may be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. - 2 Corinthians 11:3 (NKJV)

Knowledge is not sinful, but the pursuit of knowledge to save us as a replacement to following what God has commanded is sinful.

So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree desirable to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate. She also gave to her husband with her, and he ate. - Genesis 3:6 (NKJV)

This conflict was the foundation of Jesus' criticism of the "scribes and Pharisees". What seems good to us is not inherently so, which is the kind of thing that feels stupid to say because of how obvious it should be, but the behavior of many directly evidences that they do not understand that simple truth.

Then Jesus spoke to the multitudes and to His disciples, saying: “The scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. Therefore whatever they tell you to observe, that observe and do, but do not do according to their works; for they say, and do not do. For they bind heavy burdens, hard to bear, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not move them with one of their fingers. But all their works they do to be seen by men. They make their phylacteries broad and enlarge the borders of their garments. They love the best places at feasts, the best seats in the synagogues, greetings in the marketplaces, and to be called by men, ‘Rabbi, Rabbi.’ But you, do not be called ‘Rabbi’; for One is your Teacher, the Christ, and you are all brethren. Do not call anyone on earth your father; for One is your Father, He who is in heaven. And do not be called teachers; for One is your Teacher, the Christ. But he who is greatest among you shall be your servant. And whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. - Matthew 27:1-12 (NKJV)

How God operates tends to directly upend our epxectations. Our assertions about what should be often end up being completely wrong. We are led by those around us "to salvation", only to find ourselves damned by something else entirely.

So, in all of this, trusting people becomes suicidal. Not because the relationships have no meaning or value, but because everyone is going to have something wrong, and we won't really know what all they do have wrong for certain in this lifetime. When we place our trust in people, we put our hope in material things, and we will be let down for it.

When we place our trust in God, however, God will bring people into our lives who are also doing the same, and what can then unify us is not lateral, not a trust in each other, but in our shared trust and worship of the same God. What unifies us is who we serve, our vertical relationships, not how we treat each other, the horizontal relationships.

It is when we don't have trust in people, but in God, that we can gain the necessary perspective to do things like sacrifice for others out of love. To forgive others for when they wrong us. Such things do not occur from our own strength, from our own perspective, but are instead God working through us, and we are but a vessel for God's use.

It is when we are not investing our hope in those around us that we can boldly speak the truth that so many need to hear. When we trust in God, we no longer fear what those around us can do, because we are grounded in an eternal reality that starts to provide a framework for understanding our temporal one.

When we trust in God, we let God arrange the pieces, instead of trying to do it all ourselves by our own means.

Trust God, not people, and in turn God will give you new eyes to see people as God does, and to do works in their lives as God sees fit.

The alternatives only lead to damnation.

Daily Bible Study: Proverbs 3:27-30

Do not withhold good from those to whom it is due,
When it is in the power of your hand to do so. 
Do not say to your neighbor,
“Go, and come back,
And tomorrow I will give it,”
When you have it with you.
Do not devise evil against your neighbor,
For he dwells by you for safety’s sake.
Do not strive with a man without cause,
If he has done you no harm.

Proverbs 3:27-30 (NKJV).

This passage reminded me of Ananias and Sapphira, in that the deceitful games we play with resources that have been entrusted to us never reflect well on our motivations. If you owe someone something, and you have the capacity to give it to them, there is no "good" reason to withhold it from them, though plenty of "bad".

The difference between a high and low-trust society is significant, because behaviors are entirely different in each. In one the well being of others is considered along with personal gain, balancing them, where in the other personal gain is such a priority that even negative impacts on others do not offset the viability of a choice.

God desires a high-trust society for those who follow him, that people would deal openly and honestly with each other, that selfish motivations would be put aside, and that people would care about one another, both in the present and looking towards the future. The problem is that in a high-trust society, only those with good character will be content, happy.

Thus the crux of the problem: humans are born naturally crooked, inherently solipsistic, and naturally form low-trust societies, because without God's work in our lives "good character" never has a chance to reliably form. The patterns don't ever get truly etched in our hearts and minds, but become conditional tools used when it benefits us, and set aside when they don't.

The less the explicit influence of God has existed on a people, the more pronounced this dynamic is, with those whose rebellion against God being most open thus creating and living in the most cutthroat and selfish of neighborhoods. The people who instead align themselves to God build high-trust societies, as their priorities are not stuck in the material, but account properly for the supernatural.

In our modern world, there is much said about how to treat a "neighbor", who one's "neighbor" is, and the advances in technology have certainly skewed that understanding in a manner which is easy to exploit by those who are in rebellion with God, whether openly or in secret, and on a scope which is able to affect lives which, in Jesus' era, lived almost entirely disconnected, unrelated.

Especially with the Enlightenment's attempts at creating a "secular religion", complete with a set of moral guidelines, the emphasis has been on the avoidance of conflict and the self-sacrificial steps one can take to improve the lot of someone else. These are seen as the highest virtues, and while sacrifice is virtuous, charity a good thing, God does not place them in the same priority as to how the Christian faith is to be walked out.

God's primary concern, to put it bluntly, is that people repent and are saved from sin, not that they are comfortable and fed with a roof over their head. Look at the book of Job if you want to better understand the extent to which God "cares" about creature comforts, material possessions, and how their presence or absence should (or shouldn't) affect our ability to praise God.

Humans were created to glorify God, not ourselves, and when you look back in Genesis at the Tower of Babel, the hubris on display with regard to human accomplishment in seeking to obtain material salvation for ourselves, you will get the sense that God doesn't enjoy or entertain humanistic endeavors that run contrary to the glorification of God.

Even simpler still, this passage speaks to common decency, that if you are literally living next to someone, you should treat them well, because you both are part of the same "tribe", the same "nation", and you are living near each other for mutually beneficial reasons, so do not undermine the unity you would otherwise have for selfish reasons.

But this is an ideal, and while even the USA has experienced it before, in the past when neighbors were actually neighbors in this sense, that was before each household was treated as an individual country, each home a nation unto itself, fixated on distinction and individualism, and yet paying lip service to "community" through civic acts which held no real meaning in the grand scheme of things.

All of it brought about by our open rebellion against God.

In the USA, neighbors now plot evil and manifest it through votes, through lawsuits, and through social manipulation, through the twisting of scripture to align with the secular religious priorities, all working together to create and sustain the low-trust society we now exist in, where despite living next to you, your neighbor no longer is concerned about your safety, but will openly plot your demise, expecting that you're doing the same to them, any evidence to the contrary be damned.

In this light, while we should try to create and uphold a high-trust society, it is actually unwise to just apply wisdom blindly, to presume that because a choice or a path is wise under ideal circumstances, it is equally so when dealing with everything else. This does not mean the wisdom is invalid, or that it is not true or a noble and righteous ideal, just that God does not command the suicide of his followers as a means of declaring God's glory.

Treating those who are in rebellion with God as if they really are your neighbors, as if they are united with you in pursuit of glorifying God, you do not spread the Gospel, because implicit in your actions is the belief they are already saved, they just need to "walk in the faith".

In treating those in rebellion as if they are already saved, you only distract them from their need for salvation, and you burden them with living in repentance without the power of God.

People need salvation, neighbors who are united in their identity. Merely pretending you have that is not applying wisdom.