Trust Issues?

Trust is an important part of any relationship. So how does one know if he/she are trusting type? Try dropping that person on a highway in the middle of a unfamiliar town -say San Diego- in a rental car he/she can't afford to damage with a GPS.

This is what I endured earlier this month. Let me just say now that I have little sense of direction. I rarely drive anywhere unfamiliar, and I don't enjoy being lost.

So imagine my anxiety when my job sent to California and insisted I drive around. On previous business trips, I enjoyed the safety of a cab in unfamiliar terrain but that was an impossibility in San Diego. Yet I was hopeful.  I decided I would spend some additional money to rent a GPS and all would be fine.

Moments after picking up the rental car, I found myself hopelessly lost. You'd think that having the GPS by my side would have helped things. It did after a while, but I had to learn a few lessons about trust first:

Don't Act Until You've Heard From That Still, Small Voice - My first mistake was I drove off before I heard anything from my GPS.  Big mistake- I almost immediately found myself in the middle of a highway, unable to pull over and totally lost.

Trusting means admitting ignorance and accepting guidance. As a woman, a wife and a driver, I find this particularly challenging: I was convinced that my still charging GPS was broken, and I, a directionally-challenged person, could do better at navigating in this new town.

I mean, I'm a smart person - I, unlike my husband, am comfortable with the idea of stopping at the gas station for directions AND I have an iPhone! Surely, I could figure out the streets of California without the GPS, right?

Turns out that the answer to that question is no.  Never have I been so happy to hear "Recalculating" and "In point 1 miles, turn left on to..."

Listen When the Still, Small Voice Speaks -This should have been a no-brainier, but it was not.  I was thrilled to hear from the GPS, but the moment I got out on the street again, I began to second-guess everything it told me.

Turn right here? Or should I turn right at the next exit?

Stay straight... Stay straight onto this exit or on the current highway??

How far is point 1 miles??? Oops! I missed my exit.

Take it from me and believe the Bible when it says "Lean not to your own understanding." - Especially when you don't have any understanding!

Stop Trying to Fix Things - I have to confess that I made an embarrassing amount of mistakes out on that highway. I turned a trip that was supposed to take 25-30 mins into a hour-and-half-long ordeal - mainly because I kept trying to fix things after I mistook the directions.

Oops I turned on the wrong exit, let me drive to down the street and hop onto this exit.

Oh I turned right when I should have kept straight. Let me U turn here and turn left there.

Oh no, I can't U turn here. Let me keep driving straight, then turn left, then turn into this parking lot and then turn back out of the parking lot, turn right, then turn left, then turn right.

I had turned one mistake into a jumble of mistakes with all my fixes. Even the GPS seemed confused: Recalculating. Now turn... Recalculating. Recalculating. Recalculating. I must have looked funny... and tragically sad.

Now that I think back, the right fix should have been to just stop, drop everything and wait for the GPS to figure out the right recourse. Trusting doesn't mean relinquishing some control; it means letting go of all control. If your holding back, you're not really trusting.

Enjoy the Ride - After an hour of mistakes, I finally relented and allowed the GPS do the navigating.

Still I was incredibly tense. I mean my shoulders ached from hunching over the steering wheel. My fingers were cramped from gripping onto the steering column tightly. I furrowed my brows so much my forehead hurt.

"I will follow your instructions, GPS but I am not going to like it," my body said.

Weeks later this declaration sounds silly...that is until I think of how I do it everyday. I admit it:

-I begruging follow other's good advice because it wasn't my own idea. Later I am shocked when it worked out better than I expected.

-I grumble and grunt through tasks that my colleagues and friends praise me for later.

Each time this happens I am embarrassed in the end- embarrassed that I didn't happily accept that bit of advice from the beginning, embarrassed that I didn't  believe from the start that a certian task would ultimately benefit me, embarrassed that after a hour and half of driving, I STILL didn't trust the GPS.

There's that T word again.

When you truly trust, you should feel immediate joy because you fully believe in the power, ability and true of the person or thing advising you.

I rented the GPS because I know that GPS can follow maps better than I can. I should trust that.

I married my husband because I knew he is of sound sound judgement, true faith and loves me.  I should trust that.

I accepted the Lord Jesus as my saviour and entered into a relationship with God because He loves me more than I could even love myself. I should trust that.

If I truly trust in the above, I should feel joy even as I follow what seems like uncertian advice.