Trust What You Can See & Ignore What Is Promised

Ed, my neighbor next door, saw me by my back door dismantling a bathroom cabinet a couple of days ago. He was smoking by his garage and hollered through his cigarette smoke; “If the old stuff is coming out the back door the new stuff must be coming in the front door.”

He was right in new stuff was coming in for our main floor bathroom. I told him we were rearranging bathroom cabinets and, we were going modern by replacing our old toilet with a double flush one. “Which plumber will install your toilet?” Ed asked. I told him that my wife was confident that together we could install it ourselves. My wife and our son had installed a toilet once before, and she was certain we could install another one. Ed knows that I’m not much of a handyman, and he had to say that it was good that my wife knew how to install the toilet. All I could do was nod in agreement.

I knew that Ed would be over to check out for himself if we succeeded in our D.I.Y. project. Ed says that he has learned not to trust anyone, unless he can see for himself, what they claim to have done. Sure enough, after a few days Ed came to have a coffee, and check our improved bathroom. I think he was disappointed the toilet was working fine. He tried out both sides of the dual flush like kid seeing if he can break a toy. Thankfully, the toilet passed Ed’s inspection.

Ed is convinced a person should never trust another person’s word. According to Ed, what people say is like a feather in the wind. It carries no weight at all. I challenge Ed on his point of view telling him that most people are trustworthy, and what they say can be believed. I have asked Ed if what he tells other people cannot be trusted. Ed says that what he tells others depends on how much he likes them. He believes that most folks don’t exactly lie, but they do stretch the truth to suit their purpose. “No one expects the whole truth and nothing but the truth, except a judge and jury, and they seldom hear it,” Ed claims.

No one denies that there is a comfort in being able to see for oneself what has been reported to be completed is completed. It is impossible to check out everything that we have been told. We are always faced with the question of trusting or not what we are told. Folks in the Bible avoided telling the truth when they were guilty of doing something that they were warned not to do. Adam and Eve hid from God after they disobeyed him. The truth may be embarrassing, criminal, and just plain ugly, but there is no hiding it from God. Everyone puts trust in someone or something. Ed says that he trusts himself more than anyone or anything else. I believe many others would agree with him. Yet, we cannot totally trust ourselves alone as we must trust our surgeon or mechanic etc. We do put our faith in others, and many do trust God more than themselves or other people.

 

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