Got Trust Issues?

Got Trust Issues?

We put a date on a sticky note: October 16, 2021. That one yellow square lives on a poster-sized post-it note by the copier at 703 Kitsap Street where we mapped out all the events for the fall. This date didn’t have an event title yet, but we knew we wanted to serve our neighborhood somehow that day.

Then Sam Smith from Josephine’s reached out and asked if we could help serve the families on, you guessed it, October 16^th. The date of the final Port Orchard Farmer’s Market. The business owners wanted to serve families and create a festive atmosphere for an Oktoberfest celebration. What with low employment rates and all that, creating extra festivity wasn’t in the cards. Unless others could help!

These are the kinds of direct-answer-didn’t-know-that’s-what-we-needed-there-it-is kind of moments that have marked the life of Chapel Hill Port Orchard. God clearly wants to communicate something to us. Among other things, I think a primary message is:

You can trust me.

Trust is a tricky thing. Slow to build. Elusive to solidify. Quick to lose. 

The Bible has a word for trust: faith. Faith. Trust. Belief. It’s all the same word, pistis, in the Greek. God teaches us that trust is a matter of relationship. But I don’t believe God’s intention is for us to experience trust in him as slow, elusive, and fleeting.

Instead, the Bible talks about faith as substantive—something you can grab hold of. Particularly, faith is the hope you can grab hold of. The promises of God were made complete in the person of Jesus. It’s not elusive; it’s certain. Trust in God is the certainty that what we can’t see exists. (Hebrews 11:1)

This passage has been going deeper and deeper in me:

Believe he is—though we can’t see him; believe he rewards—that there are promises you grab hold of in Jesus.

If you need space to talk about trust issues—whether with God, people, or his Church—we’ve created a safe space for that. Every Sunday we re-open the dialogue with God and one another.

We’re talking this fall through Hebrews 11, the “hall of faith,” where we get to see imperfect people walk out lives where they are commended for their trust in God.

You don’t have to have all the answers to be part of Chapel Hill Port Orchard. It does help to have a strong desire to draw near to God. Come join us! Come look for that post-it note in the copy room and remember just how specifically God is walking with  us, even when we can’t see him.

And come paint pumpkins with us on Saturday, October 16^th. Come rejoice in this season, Fall of 2021, in this neighborhood, downtown Port Orchard. We are a church for our neighbors, seeking the shalom of God in our neighborhood.

-Pastor Megan