Who Do You Trust? That’s a Good Question!

I’m probably going to date myself again with this reference, but do you remember the old game show, “Who Do You Trust?” It was hosted by Johnny Carson before he became a late-night talk show icon. (Some readers are already saying, “Never heard of the show – and who’s Johnny Carson?”)

 

It's not the show I want to bring to your attention, but its name. Because I think that is an excellent question for each of us to consider, especially these days. One candidate is the government, but I suspect many of us have grown skeptical for many reasons I won’t bother to enumerate. It’s gotten to a point that on a scale of trustworthiness, pop-up used car lots generate more confidence than politicians.

 

The mainstream media has been receiving a lot of criticism – in my opinion, deservedly so. Used to be that we had journalists with names like Cronkite, Huntley and Brinkley who merited our trust, but their “tribe” seems to have disappeared.

 

For a year now, medical “experts” have been advising us on the coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic, but they’ve changed their stories so many times, it’s hard to tell up from down or left from right anymore. Like the weather report, if you don’t like what you’re hearing, just wait a minute or two.

 

So the question remains, who do you trust? Do we trust the vaccines, or a particular pharmaceutical company, feeling assured that they will be able to beat the virus into submission and restore sanity and normalcy to our daily lives? We get assurances, but do we get guarantees?

 

Recently I was reading from an old, trusted source. It’s the Bible, and one passage in particular provided me with a clear reminder of where our trust should lie, especially when all other options prove to be unreliable, misleading, even outright deceptive. The passage I’m referring to is Psalm 91. It starts off:

“He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty.

I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’

Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence.

He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge;

His faithfulness will be your shield and rampart.

You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, 

Nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday….”

 

This psalm goes on for 10 more verses, but the point is clear: Our trust should be in God alone. People, even those with the best of intentions, are fallible and often undependable. Only in the Lord do we have the assurance that He has our best interests, no matter what circumstances we face, and is attentive to our cries for help.

 

Reading on in the psalm, it gives us this promise: “ ‘Because he loves me,’ says the Lord, ‘I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name. He will call upon me and I will answer him; I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him and honor him…’” (Psalm 91:14-16).

 

Government leaders make promises but often fail to keep them. Medical authorities make diagnoses, and prescribe treatments and responses, but they’re not always correct in their assessments. Today’s media deliver the “news” packed in heavy linings of bias and imbalanced reporting. But in the Lord of the Old Testament and the New Testament, the unfailing, never changing, all-knowing and ever-present God, in Him we can truly trust. I hope you’ve already learned that.