As I step through our back porch door for the first time in ten, scorching days, I’m quite nervous about what I’ll find. With Alison retiring from teaching right before our trip, gifts increased our volume of flowering plants by a third and the whole, haphazard collection was assembled behind our house. This makes it easier for our neighbor’s daughter to water them in our absence.

Viewing them, I am relieved to see that most are flourishing, though a few are withered and near death. I blame myself for not taking the time to research how much sun each could endure, but then, we were rushing to get out.

This brings me to the attribute of God’s faithfulness.  Plants from a friend aren’t simply a gift. They’re an entrustment. We have an obligation to do our best to keep them alive, to help them thrive, so that the gift continues to give gladness.

In the same way, when God creates, he takes on a responsibility to that which he’s formed – as if he’s given himself a plant to keep alive. The 19^th Century Scottish preacher, Alexander Maclaren, puts this well:

He came forth, and poured Himself, as it were, into beings because His name is Love, and having thus created, He recognises the obligations under which He has thereby come. The smallest microscopic animal, because it has the mysterious gift of life, has a claim on God; and He is bound - I was going to say to do His utmost, but all that He does is His utmost - to care for that creature’s well-being.

And this displays the character of God. Maclaren writes in another place:

That He will do so comes from His very nature. With Him there is no change of disposition, no emergence of unseen circumstances, no failure or exhaustion of power.

I might add: no lengthy trips away.

This is our faithful God. He constructs a world that desperately needs him, then satisfies that need. He loves to display his reliability, and our dependence on him is the process through which he reveals his utter trustworthiness.

We are the plants that would die without water, and he is the gardener with the hose.

The one who calls you is faithful, and he will do it. 1 Thess 5:24

Maclaren brings this home to me through a very bold thought:

Our wishes, when they are right, are prophecies of our possessions. God has put no craving in a man’s heart which He does not mean to fill. 

This challenges me because I have unfulfilled, Word-inspired desires. It is therefore a step of faith to say that if God has put those longings in my heart, he will certainly satisfy them. That’s what his faithfulness should provoke in us: a response of trust in the Creator and Sustainer.

It can be hard, sometimes. Paul Gerhardt (1606-1676), considered to be Germany’s greatest hymn writer (some of his lyrics were used by Bach), captures this beautifully in these verses from a hymn he penned.

God, how faithful you are to us! Thank you for wiring into us the mechanism for trusting you, even though we often struggle with the process. Teach us to rely on you!

Reader: how have you seen your needs driving you to God?

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