by Anna Haiar

Trusting God With What’s Ahead

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“The steps of a man are established by the Lord, when he delights in his way; though he fall, he shall not be cast headlong, for the Lord upholds his hand.”
Psalm 37:23–24 English Standard Version

A few summers ago, I was visiting Las Vegas with some friends when we made our way down to Fremont Street. There I spotted a replica of Zoltar, a fortune telling machine, and immediately recognized it from my childhood. In the 1980s movie Big, a young Josh Baskin stands before the flashing fortune-telling machine Zoltar and makes a wish: he wants to be “big” — that is, he wants to grow up and become an adult. He longs to skip ahead, to control what comes next, to get what he thinks will finally make him happy. Overnight, his wish comes true…and so do challenges that he never imagined. Grown-up life just so happens to be complicated, confusing, and sometimes lonely. By the end of the movie, Josh realizes that what he truly needed wasn’t to see the future, but to trust that the right time and season would come.

We often do the same thing. We want to know what’s next. We long to rush through the waiting or to grab hold of outcomes before they’re ready. But God doesn’t hand us a Zoltar machine to reveal the future. Instead, He gives us His presence and his Word to guide our steps.

Psalm 37 reminds us that the Lord establishes our steps. He doesn’t just chart the course. He walks with us along it. When we stumble, He steadies us. When we doubt, He delights in guiding us forward. The future isn’t ours to manipulate; it’s His to unfold. Our job isn’t to predict the path but to hold tightly to the One who knows every turn.

When we let go of control and trust Jesus with what’s ahead, peace replaces pressure. The unknown no longer feels frightening because we know who is holding our hand.

Copyright Family of Christ Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado