Faith and Restraint: Knowing What to Leave in God’s Hands

God’s involvement gives us a great advantage, but trusting Him also means accepting His timing and refusing to interfere with His process. Through Proverbs 3:5–8, James 1:4, 1 Samuel 13:8–14, and David’s example in 1 Samuel 24, this message explores how to trust God’s competence, endure a long waiting season, and recognise what belongs exclusively in His hands.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:13

Waiting on God is not only having the patience to endure delay. It is also having the spiritual disability not to interfere with what God is already working on. Good morning and welcome to this expression of igniting your day. Every believer desires God's involvement, but when God begins to walk, will we trust his wisdom, accept his peace, and keep our hands away from the parts of the process that exclusively exclusively belong to him? Every believer agrees that God's involvement in any matter is one of the greatest advantages anyone can have. When you can discern that God is with you in a process, you know that you're already at an advantage. Whether it concerns your family, your career, your ministry, your business, your relationship, or your personal development, the presence and involvement of God make an immeasurable difference. The bigger question, however, is this. When God begins to operate in your enterprise, do you have enough patience and restraint to leave him undisturbed to do what he knows is best for you? Can you allow God to carry out his purpose without truncating the process he has chosen? My burden is not primarily about your desire for God's involvement. I believe many of us have advanced beyond that point. We have prayed to God to come in. We have asked him to lead us. We have invited him into our decisions and circumstances. The deeper question is, how much do you trust God? Do you trust him enough to leave him alone and allow him to do what he knows is best for you? This is important because on many occasions we do not actually know what is best for us. We know what we want. We know what would make us comfortable, we know what outcome we would prefer, but God alone sees the entire journey. God alone sees the entire picture. God alone sees the future consequences and the purpose He intends to accomplish. There are three questions we must therefore answer. 1. Do you trust God enough to lead you? 2. Can you wait for the long haul? 3. While you are waiting, will you be disciplined enough not to touch what God is already working on? Some people know how to remain in a waiting season, but they do not know how to keep their hands to themselves. They may wait outwardly while continually interfering inwardly and practically. They know how to wait, but not how to remain restrained. They know how to acknowledge that God is working, but not how to resist the urge to alter, to contaminate, to disrupt or accelerate his process. May the Lord give us the grace to trust him, the patience to remain through the long haul, and the restraint not to disturb what he is working on. Proverbs chapter 3, verse 5 to 8 answers the question: Do you trust God enough to lead you? Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not unto your own understanding. In all your ways, acknowledge him, and he shall direct your paths. Do not be wise in your own eyes, fear the Lord and depart from evil. It shall be health to your navel and marrow to your bones. The instruction is clear. Trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not depend entirely on your own understanding. Do not assume that your interpretation of the situation is complete. Acknowledge God in every part of your life and allow him to direct your path. Tell the Lord this morning, Father, I trust you with all my heart. Yes. Dear friends, you see, to trust God, you must recognize his competence. You must remember that he has proved himself before. You have heard testimonies from your parents, elders, friends, and fellow believers about the greatness of God. God has what it takes to move mountains on your behalf. He has the wisdom required for your situation. He possesses the strength, the understanding, resources, and authority necessary to help you. Psalm 121, verse 1 to 2 says, I will lift up my eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the Lord which made heaven and earth. The psalmist did not merely recognize that help was available. He recognized the identity and capacity of his helper. His help came from the one who made heaven and earth. That means the one helping you is not limited by the situation confronting you. He is not confused about your circumstance. He is not intimidated by the size of the mountain before you. You must recognize that your help comes from the Lord in every situation. At your place of work, it is God's help that you need. In your home, it is God's help that you need. In dealing with your spouse, raising your children, making decisions, navigating a new business, or responding to an unfamiliar season. It is God's help that you need. This recognition forms the foundation of trust. When you know there is no help greater than God's help, you can confidently place your matter in his hands. Can you pray this morning? Say, Father, I recognize your help as my sure and final solution. I will not be caught doubting your competence in my matter. You can do all things. Therefore, I trust you. Yes. So I ask you again: do you trust him enough to lead you? The answer rests partly in your recognition of his competence. When you know that he is able, wise, loving, and dependable, trusting him becomes a reasonable response. For the second question, can you wait the long haul? Perhaps you trust the Lord, but can you wait for the long haul? What happens when the answer does not come in two hours? What happens when it does not come in two days, two months, two years, or even two decades? Will you still be found waiting? Will you still trust God when his competence is clear, but his timetable remains hidden? James chapter 1, verse 4 says, But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Habakkuk chapter 2, verse 3 says, For the vision is yet for an appointed time, but at the end it shall speak and not lie. Though it tarry, wait for it, because it will surely come, it will not tarry. Let me ask you this question again. Will you still trust God when his competence is clear, but his timetable remains hidden? This is the key to enduring a long waiting season, friends. You must recognize that patience is not idleness. As you wait, patience is working. Waiting becomes more difficult when you no longer realize that something is happening within you. James does not present patience as inactive. He says, Let patience have her perfect work. Patience has a work. There is something patience is doing in you. There is something patience is doing for you. There is something patience is doing to you. Every period of waiting can become a place of construction. From the day you choose to wait on God, patience begins to mature, strengthen, correct, and complete something within you. When you recognize that patience is working, you will not interpret your waiting season as empty time. You will not conclude that nothing is happening simply because the answer has not yet become visible. The external situation may appear unchanged, but patience is carrying out an internal work. It may be strengthening your character, it may be deepening your trust. It may be correcting your motives. It may be teaching you dependence. It may be preparing you to carry the answer when it finally comes. The scripture says, let patience have a perfect work. Do not interrupt the work patience is doing. Do not abandon the process because you cannot see its full result. Why don't you pray this morning? Father, open my eyes to recognize the work patience is doing in me. Yes, I choose not to despise my waiting season. Let patience complete its work in my heart and life. Yes. My dear friends, we should also thank God for the work patience has already been doing in us. Yes, works we may not have even recognized. There are ways in which waiting has already changed you. There are attitudes you no longer carry. There are weaknesses you cannot recognize. There are decisions you are better equipped to make. There are burdens you can now carry with greater maturity. Your recognition of the potential within patience will bring comfort to your waiting season. Patience is not dead, it has the capacity to work in you, for you and through you. Abakuq reminds us that the vision has an appointed time. Though it appears delayed, we are instructed to wait because it will surely come at the time God has appointed. Therefore, my friends, make a decision today. I choose to wait. I recognize that God alone is my help. I will not abandon Him for another source. I will not change my focus. I insist upon God's help and I choose to wait for his appointed time. Yes. The third question: Will you keep your hands off what God is already working on? Let us assume you have chosen to wait. Will you be disciplined enough not to touch what God is already working on? Will you be disciplined enough to not to disrupt a process God has set in motion? While waiting, there may be responsibilities you must fulfill. There may be lessons you must learn, places you must go, prayers you must pray, and actions you must take. Waiting is not passivity. But will you be spiritually discerning enough to recognize that certain responsibilities are yours while others belong exclusively to God? Can you say these matters are mine to handle, but that one belongs exclusively to God? Can you say these steps are mine to take, but God has not authorized me to take that additional step? Can you say this is within my responsibility, but that is outside the boundary God has established for me? My dear friends. Something happened to Saul. Saul had been instructed to wait for Samuel. He waited seven days according to the appointed time, but Samuel had not yet arrived. Meanwhile, the people were scattering and the Philistines were gathering. Under pressure, Saul instructed that the bond offering and peace offerings be brought to him, and he offered the sacrifice himself. As soon as he finished presenting the bond offering, Samuel appeared. Samuel asked him, What hast thou done? Saul explained that the people were scattering. Samuel had not arrived within the expected period, and the Philistines were assembling. He then said, Therefore said I, the Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal, and I have not made supplication unto the Lord. I forced myself therefore and offered a burnt offering. Saul felt compelled, my dear friends. From an external perspective, the pressure appeared genuine. The people were leaving, the enemy was approaching. Samuel appeared delayed, yet, pressure did not give Saul permission to cross a boundary God had established. Samuel told him that he had acted foolishly and had failed to keep the commandment of the Lord. Saul's interference carried serious consequences for his kingdom. Yes, Saul waited seven days, but when the pressure intensified, he no longer had the restraint necessary to remain within his assigned boundaries. This teaches us that it is possible to wait for a period and still destroy the fruit of waiting through one presumptuous action. Pressure must not drive us to touch what God has not authorized us to touch. Fear must not move us beyond the boundaries of obedience. The opinions of people must not force our hands into actions God has not commanded. Romans chapter 12, verse 1 says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, only acceptable unto God, which is a reasonable service. When your body has been presented to God, pressure should not be permitted to move it in a direction contrary to his will. Your hands belong to God, your feet belong to God, your mouth belongs to God, your mind belongs to God. Therefore, declare this morning, Father, I have presented my body to you. No pressure will move me in the direction you have not authorized. No fear, no urgency, no external demand will make me touch what you have instructed me to live alone in the name of Jesus. Here is a deeper secret, friends. Deuteronomy chapter 29, verse 29 says, The secret things belong unto the Lord our God, but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children forever, that we may do all the words of his law. This scripture, my dear friends, establishes a boundary. The secret things belong to God, the revealed things belong to us. The things God has clearly instructed us to do are our responsibility. But what he has not revealed, entrusted, or assigned to us remains within his domain. This suggests that when you do not have an instruction to proceed, you must be careful not to manufacture one. When God has not confirmed that you should touch a matter, you are safer trusting him than forcing your way into it. When God has not revealed the next step, silence is not necessarily permission to invent one. The unraveled, unknown, and unassigned things belong to the Lord. The revealed things belong to us so that we may obey what He has instructed. Why don't you pray this morning? Father, help me to remain where you have placed me. Let my hands remain where you have instructed them to remain. Give me the discernment to recognize what belongs to me and what belongs exclusively to you. Yes. Friends, God is the one who has brought you this far. When he requires you to take another step, he is capable of communicating it to you. He is too caring to conceal an instruction that is essential to your obedience. You do not have to violate your peace or abandon godly principles in order to help God fulfill his promise. No. We see this principle clearly in David's life. David had already been anointed to become king. He knew that God had spoken concerning his future. Yet, Saul, the sitting king, continually troubled David and sought to take his life. Then David received what appeared to be an opportunity to remove Saul. He had access, power, and an apparent advantage. But David recognized that having the power to do something did not necessarily mean he had God's permission to do it. In 1 Samuel chapter 24, verse 11 to 12, David said to Saul, Moreover, my father, see, yea, see the skirt of thy robe in my hand. For in that I cut off the skirt of your robe and kill thee not. Know thou and see that there is neither evil nor transgression in my hand, and I have not sinned against you. Yet thou hauntest my soul to take it. The Lord judge between me and you, and the Lord avenge me of you, but my hand shall not be upon you. David said, My hand shall not be upon you. That is restraint. David recognized that there were things he had the ability to do, but did not have divine authorization to do. He had the power to touch Saul. He had the opportunity to retaliate. He had people around him who could interpret the opportunity as divine approval. Yet David understood that certain things were out of bounds. God had anointed David to become king, but David refused to use his own hands to remove the man who currently occupied the throne. He refused to manufacture the fulfillment of God's promise through disobedient means. David understood that God could fulfill his word without David contaminating the process. This is a crucial lesson. An opportunity to act is not always an instruction from God to act. You may have the power, you may have access, you may have support, you may even have a convincing justification, but you must still ask whether God has authorized your action. There are promises God has made concerning your life. There may be prophecies, convictions, and clear words that have gone ahead of you, but you must still possess the restraint to say, My hand shall not be against what God has not authorized me to touch. Why don't you pray this morning? Father, help me to recognize the things my hands must not touch. Help me to recognize the places my feet must not go. The words my mouth must not speak. And the thoughts my mind must not entertain. Pray this over your children as well, my dear friends. Lord, wherever my children go in this life, give them discernment. Help them recognize the people, the places, the opportunities, and the matters their hands must not be against. In the name of Jesus. Amen. So my dear friends, there are three levels of trust we have examined this morning. One, do you trust God enough to lead you? Two, do you trust him enough to wait for the longer? And three, do you trust him enough not to interfere with what he is doing while you wait? My dear friends, it is one thing to invite God into a matter, it's another thing to surrender the method, peace, and outcome to him. Genu trust does not merely say God is involved. Genu trust also says, God, lead me as you choose. Genu trust also says, God, take the time you know is necessary. Genu trust also says, God, show me what belongs to me. Genu trust also says, God, keep my hands away from what belongs to you. Genu trust also says, God, complete your work without my fear, impatience, or presumption contaminating the process. May the Lord give you the patience to go at his pace when he chooses to move slowly. May he give you the discernment to recognize your responsibilities. May he give you the restraint to leave his responsibilities in his hands. May he preserve you from pressure, pressure-driven decisions. May whatever God calls holy remain holy in your hands. May whatever he calls consecrated remain consecrated in your care. May your trust in his competence become greater than your anxiety about his timing. And may you possess the discipline to say, as David did, my hand shall not be upon thee. And that's it this morning, my friends. But before I go, I'd like to encourage you, take a moment today to identify one matter you have committed to God but are still attempting to control. Ask him plainly, Lord, what part of this process belongs to me, and what part must I leave entirely in your hands? Then obey whatever he reveals and refuse to interfere with what he has reserved for himself. Thank you very much, friends, for being here till this long. I'm wishing you this morning an amazing day ahead. God bless you.