Desiring to be in God’s presence is a demonstration of trust

LORD Almighty, how happy are those who trust in you!

Psalm 84:12

This entire psalm is a hymn of longing to be in God’s presence represented by the Temple courts and prophetic Mount Zion.

The psalm ends with the statement above, “how happy are those who trust in you.” This Hebrew word for trust also includes meanings like confidence and reliance. To trust is to be confident in and to rely on God. How do we demonstrate a confident reliance on God?

• When we operate our lives from an understanding that there is one God who is establishing an eternal kingdom on earth, we are relying on him.
• When we base our worldview upon the principles he has revealed in his Torah, or his Word, we are relying on him.
• When we keep the eternal perspective over the temporary things of this world, we are relying on him.
• When we give sacrificially of ourselves and what we have in obedience to his Torah, we are relying on him.

We are relying on God when we trust him for the things we cannot see, but are no less real than the physical Temple and Mount Zion. Paul encouraged the early believers to maintain their trust and reliance on God through tumultuous suffering and persecution, because the reality of eternal things superseded any earthly travail.

That is why we are not discouraged. Though outwardly we are wearing out, inwardly we are renewed day by day. Our suffering is light and temporary and is producing for us an eternal glory that is greater than anything we can imagine. We don’t look for things that can be seen but for things that can’t be seen. Things that can be seen are only temporary. But things that can’t be seen last forever.

2 Corinthians 4:16-18

Longing for God’s house is a longing to be in his presence. The Temple and Mount Zion, while they were established as real places in the land of Israel, are metaphors for the larger work of God on the earth in his kingdom. However, these images both stem from his eternal presence in heavenly places.

The psalmist writes, “One day spent in your Temple is better than a thousand anywhere else.” Yeshua taught his disciples, “Don’t be troubled. Believe in God, and believe [i.e., trust, have confidence or reliance] in me. There are many rooms in my Father’s house, and I am going to prepare a place for you. I would not tell you this if it were not so,” (John 14:1-2).

To be in God’s presence is the fulfillment of the life of the believer, the one who trusts in, or relies on, him. How happy and confident we should be!