He Likes Your Yucky Bits

Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Psalm 37:3

I came across this verse the other day and was reminded of how I held on to it when I was raising my daughters. My focus then was on cultivating faithfulness in their lives, and while I think that is an apt application, I also think it is a limited one.  Let's take a closer look.

While I was quick to jump to the part about cultivating, the admonition begins with trusting in the LORD, the one God who makes Himself personally known to us. We need to know God as He reveals Himself to us to trust Him. And that trust becomes the basis for the good to be done.

A lot of you know that I am raising a guide dog puppy, but not many know that I also have a couple of parakeets. A dog can be trained to perform certain behaviors by just about anyone and by a number of methods. With a parakeet, the goal cannot simply be getting it to perform behaviors. You will not get anywhere with the little critter until he or she trusts you. I adopted my birds about a year ago and have been working on building trust and establishing a relationship with them almost daily for that entire time. One has just recently begun to hop onto my finger when a treat is offered. The other no longer freaks out when I stick my hand in the cage. Both are major accomplishments! 

Next, we are told to “dwell in the land”. This reminds me of the old saying I used to see on t-shirts, “Grow where you are planted.” It's easy to focus on everything besides where we actually are. We can become envious of the places where other people live, be it in a nicer house or a different country. We may compare and find ourselves wishing we were living with more money or nicer relatives. Maybe you’d like a more fulfilling job or better health. Our minds dwell on the past, filled with longing or possibly regret or on the future filled with anticipation and anxiety. 

Can we truly dwell (live intentionally and with thanksgiving for the gift it truly is) in the land (situation and location) God has placed us?  We can if we are trusting in the LORD and focusing our efforts on doing good, so let's move on to the phrase that caught me in the first place.

“Cultivate faithfulness”.

I am not much of a gardener. I love pretty flowers and fresh vegetables, but it is a lot of work to have a flourishing garden!  I do know that it starts with the right soil. I love the way my husband can take the yucky bits of food that get cut off during preparation, or even leftovers that have been at the back of the fridge too long, dump them in the compost bin and months later have nutrient rich soil!

God does that! I

If we give Him our yucky bits, He can use even the worst of it to help us grow our faith.

Have you ever left something in the refrigerator too long because you just didn’t want to deal with it?

It’s going to stink and be messy, and you’d just rather ignore it?

Please don’t tell me I’m the only one who ruined Tupperware because the mold started growing into the plastic! I know it can be unpleasant and messy, but give it all to God! Let Him work His miracles with it, transforming the things you would most like to forget about into the very things that fuel your growth!

So we have our compost turned to soil and we’re trusting God in the land where He has placed us.

Now what?

Some definitions of “Cultivate” I read include, “to raise or grow”, “to acquire or develop”, and “to try to improve or develop”.  Cultivate is a verb. We are being asked to raise, grow, acquire, develop and improve faithfulness. That sounds like a lot of work! But it is the Holy Spirit who does the heavy lifting here and, praise God!, He doesn’t get bored with the project like I get bored with my garden. Philippians 1:6 reminds us that He who began a good work in you will complete it!

When I quoted Psalm 37:3 above, I was using the New American Standard version of the Bible. Other versions put it a little differently. They all start with trusting the Lord, doing good and living in the land, but rather than ending with cultivating they say: “verily thou shalt be fed” (KJV), “feed on His faithfulness”(NKJV), “thou shalt be fed with His riches” (Wycliffe) “enjoy safe pasture” (NIV), “enjoy security” (RSV).

Cultivating faithfulness isn’t a list of Pinterest projects I need to do with my kids. (Though some of them are a lot of fun!) Cultivating faithfulness is being where God has placed me, trusting Him daily, enjoying and making use of the safe pasture He provides as He grows the fruits of His faithfulness in the rich but messy soil of my life.

I hope you find the grace that is in this verse that I did as you move the focus from the work of cultivating to the grace of trusting and dwelling!