Someone to Trust

I hate to admit it, but for the sake of using a good example, I will.  I watch the teen drama series "Endurance" on Discovery Kids.  I really do fast forward through most of the drama, but when my kids are watching it with me they really want to know why so-and-so's upset.  We get to talk about how to treat others and why the host keeps talking about karma.

If you haven't heard about it, here's how it goes.  Twenty teens (10 boys, 10 girls) go to some remote wilderness area where they play endurance games.  They are paired into boy-girl teams of two, and the last team standing gets to go on a cool trip somewhere like the Galapagos Islands.  Throughout the game teams are eliminated through games of chance, constantly boiling the number of players down.  Teams start off making alliances and talking behind other people's backs to see how they can get them in one of the elimination rounds. 

Now that I've explained it, this is where the plot gets thick.  During the games in the "High Sierras" the blue team won the right to trade players on any two teams, or they could let someone else do it.  A guy on the purple team conspired against the blue team by telling all the other teams to talk blue into letting red (who volunteered to be traded with green) trade themselves.  The girl on blue didn't want to hurt anybody's feelings by splitting up other teams herself, so she gave it to red.  Red then turned against her and split up the blue team. 

Wham!  Instantly she burst into sobs.  None of the people who were directly conspiring showed much remorse and they defended their actions.  But that kept happening to this girl in particular throughout the game with many different people.  They would lie to her and eventually she couldn't trust anybody except her teammate.  One boy set up an elaborate lie to try to trick her about his choices when they where challenging each other in an elimination round.  When the boy's team lost, she said, "That's what you get for lying."  The boy responded, "It's not like it's a sin!"

This poor girl was crying through the whole game because no one would be real with her.  They would say one thing to her, but talk bad about her behind her back and try to deceive her.  And from all that I could tell, she never provoked any of them.  She was tormented through the whole game because many people meant to do her in.

She needed someone to trust, that she could confide in.  She felt alone. 

How about you?  Have you ever told something very deep and personal to someone "in confidence" only to have that person blab it so that everyone knows your secret?  It happens.  And we've all been on both sides of it, too.  We've been hurt victims and been guilty perpetrators. 

We all need someone we can trust, but how can we tell if someone is trustworthy.  Listen to what they say.  Do they ever complain or talk bad about others?  Are they judgmental and critical?  Can they be trusted in little things you say in confidence?  Unless you don't care who knows your struggles and your secrets, then go ahead and tell someone you've just met that you don't know anything about.  Test the waters with a little thing if you are in doubt.  There's nothing wrong with that.

Above all, pray for a true friend that can be counted on as trust-worthy, encouraging, and understanding.  God is faithful and can provide that kind of friend.  Also pray that you will be a true and trustworthy friend to others.  God is the one who can truly change us.  You might even need to ask for forgiveness for not being trustworthy if you've hurt someone in the past. 

When we take our cares to God, we will all get closer to God and find out that we are not all alone in the end.  No one is perfect, but God is working in other people's lives just like He is working in your own.  "Draw near to God and He will draw near to you."