TRUST

As part of my interviews for prospective employees, I ask them to come with 10 questions that they will ask me.  Yesterday, I was asked a fairly common question.  "If I am hired, what will be expected of me?"  Before I answered I asked what she thought.  She responded with many expectations such as hard working, friendly, reliable, good attitude, willing to do whatever is needed, etc.  Those are all great but there is one that she left out.  I told her she could do all those things but if we couldn't TRUST her, it wouldn't work out here.  Trust is crucial.

Last week, I had the opportunity to talk with the youth group at a local church.  I was asked, "what is something God is teaching me?"  On my bedroom wall is a picture with Proverbs 3:5-6 on it.  "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.  In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will keep your path straight".  That is easy to say, but often hard to do.

In July, we had a direct competitor open on the other end of our parking lot.  I found out about it near the beginning of 2011.  When I first heard the rumors, I was devastated.  All these years of building up our business and here comes a competitor to "get a piece of the pie", as they told us.  What would it do to our business?  Would we drop so much we had to cut employees hours or entire positions?  What would happen to my income?  Could we afford to keep our kids in the school we have them in and really appreciate?  Would I be "unsuccessful" because another business took our customers?  I was in the pits.

As time rolled on and the rumors became reality, I struggled through it.  I asked what is the purpose of this?  Why was God allowing this to happen?  Well, it became clear that I needed to learn to truly trust God.  I had done all the little things.  Coached good customer service, encouraged our team to keep the store clean, keep the food fresh, be efficient.  All the things that make a good restaurant.  But, did I trust God?

I told the applicant that they could do all the little, technical things right but if I couldn't trust them, it was not going to work.

Here I was doing all the little things right (well, many of them), running a restaurant that customers enjoyed, but I wasn't trusting God.  It won't work out unless I am trusting Him.  In fact, I can mess up alot of the little things, but if my faith is strong and I truly trust Him, He will "make my path straight".