Trust Jehovah, Not Man

“It is better to take refuge in Jehovah than to trust in earthling man.”​—Ps. 118:8.

1, 2. (a) How many people have a deep, abiding trust in Jehovah today, and why is this so? (b) Who trust Jehovah to bring better conditions?

FEW people today have a deep, abiding trust in Jehovah God. Some do not even believe that he exists. Others may acknowledge God’s existence, but they pay little attention to his will. Even those who are devout in this world’s religions trust mostly in their religious traditions or in their clergymen, not in Jehovah. They are much like those of whom the apostle Paul said: “I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God; but not according to accurate knowledge; for, because of not knowing the righteousness of God but seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.”​—Rom. 10:2, 3.

² Regarding the future of the human family, in whom do people trust to bring about better conditions? Most of them put their trust in human efforts, not in Jehovah’s purpose for mankind. Only a tiny minority of earth’s four billion inhabitants have carefully examined the evidence of Jehovah’s existence, have accepted their responsibilities toward him, and live their lives in obedience to his laws. These persons trust him completely, knowing that he will fulfill his promise of establishing a righteous new order for mankind. They declare, as did the ancient psalmist: “In you I have put my trust, O Jehovah. I have said: ‘You are my God.’” (Ps. 31:14) And they heed God’s warning: “Do not put your trust in nobles, nor in the son of earthling man, to whom no salvation belongs.”​—Ps. 146:3.

3. Why should it not be a source of discouragement that relatively few trust Jehovah?

³ Should it discourage those who trust Jehovah that they are relatively few compared with earth’s four billion people? No, because numbers have never been a measure of the rightfulness of an issue. The masses of humankind often have been wrong. Jesus Christ said: “Go in through the narrow gate; because broad and spacious is the road leading off into destruction, and many are the ones going in through it; whereas narrow is the gate and cramped the road leading off into life, and few are the ones finding it.” (Matt. 7:13, 14) No, trusting the judgment of the masses is not the way through the “narrow gate” to life in its fullness. History is filled with the wreckage of men’s promises, and of the harm that came to the masses who followed blindly.

4. What are we now better able to determine, and why?

⁴ Especially has the folly of trusting in human wisdom become evident in the past century. Now, with the added experience of having seen this highly scientific modern age, we are better able to examine the results of human accomplishments. We can set them alongside the works of Jehovah and more clearly see where our trust should be placed.

VAIN HOPES FOR SCIENCE

5. What part did scientific advancements play in the hopes of many for a better world?

⁵ The hopes of mankind for a better world were raised greatly by the scientific advancements of the past century or so. Many thought that mankind was entering a glorious new era. Finally, it was thought, problems such as poverty, hunger, unemployment, disease, old age and war were now within the power of humans to solve. Regarding such high hopes, author Lewis Mumford relates:

“The notion was that the machine by reason of its rationality of design and its austere perfection of performance was now a moral force, indeed the moral force, one that set new standards of achievement for man . . .

“For every human weakness or disorder, there was supposedly a swift mechanical, chemical, or pharmaceutical remedy. Even the electric arc-light, when first introduced, was hailed confidently as a preventative of nocturnal crime.”

6. To what extent did science produce some things helpful to the human family?

⁶ Without a doubt science has originated many helpful devices. In many lands, housewives no longer have to spend much time washing and sewing by hand, cooking on a wood fire, preserving food for winter months, drawing water from a well or a stream. Science has harnessed electricity from petroleum, coal and gas to run the new washing and sewing machines, the stoves, refrigerators, heating equipment, lighting and other useful products. Indoor plumbing has done away with unsanitary outhouses. Tractors have provided the power of 50 horses. Milking machines have eased the chores of dairy farmers. Medical advances have helped to control various diseases. Advanced technology, with its computers and missiles, has even put men on the moon.

7. How has science created many problems?

⁷ But while science has helped with some problems, it has created many others. For instance, the automobile, though providing fast transportation and convenience, has produced problems that are not being solved. Enormous congestion and frustration occur in large metropolitan areas. Gas fumes add to the industrial pollution that hangs over many cities. And the automobile has become one of the most deadly instruments ever invented. According to the United Nations’ World Health magazine, about 250,000 people die each year in road accidents. Millions more are injured.

8. How has scientific militarism affected our century?

⁸ Another grim fruitage of science is noted by the book Great Events of the 20th Century, which says: “Without question, the great shaping force of the 20th century has been the phenomenal growth of scientific knowledge​—and never has that knowledge been more vigorously pursued than in times of war.” Tanks, airplanes, flamethrowers, machine guns, submarines, missiles, atomic bombs and other weapons have been produced by science. They have taken the lives of over 100 million people in this century, more than in any other age. “Woe to those,” God’s Word accurately stated, “who put their trust in war chariots, because they are numerous, and in steeds, because they are very mighty, but who have not looked to the Holy One of Israel and have not searched for Jehovah himself.” (Isa. 31:1) Although scientific militarism has proved to be catastrophic, the nations now spend a record 300 billion dollars a year on war preparation. About 25 percent of all scientists in the United States and the Soviet Union do war work; less than one-hundredth of one percent work at arms control or disarmament.

9. Has science helped to solve the human family’s distressing problems?

⁹ Has science helped to stem the worldwide rampage of crime? No, for crime has increased just as God’s prophetic Word said it would in these “last days.” (Matt. 24:12; 2 Tim. 3:1-5, 13) Why, in the United States alone, a Census Bureau survey indicates that 37 million major crimes are committed each year, triple the number actually reported to police. Too, while medical science has helped to fight some illnesses, others have raged out of control. Heart disease has reached epidemic levels, as has venereal disease; and cancer has become a major killer. Health problems have been made worse due to man’s pollution of the air, land and water, and his chemical treatment of foods. And science is completely helpless before the ravages of old age and death. Mankind’s condition remains just as God’s Word says: “Through one man sin entered into the world and death through sin, and thus death spread to all men.” (Rom. 5:12) Furthermore, in spite of all the advances of modern science, Parade magazine states: “There are more starving, impoverished, illiterate and unemployed people in the world than ever before.”

10, 11. (a) How have some worldly authorities recognized the failure of science? (b) What did the Bible accurately say about human efforts?

¹⁰ Thus, the results of this scientific age are clearly to be seen. We know from actual experience what it has brought forth. We can conclude as did the book Environmental Ethics: “The present technology is already a failure.” Author Lewis Mumford also stated: “The notion that mechanical and scientific progress guaranteed parallel human benefits . . . now has become completely untenable.” And historian Arnold Toynbee declared: “We have tried allowing the machine to run us, with shocking results. . . . Unregenerate man is hardly to be trusted with the dangerous toys his laboratories have hatched.”

¹¹ Now we can see clearly what has happened to the human family because of putting trust in man. It is just as foretold by God’s prophet Jeremiah who said: “Cursed is the able-bodied man who puts his trust in earthling man and actually makes flesh his arm, and whose heart turns away from Jehovah himself.” (Jer. 17:5) Also proved trustworthy are these words of the inspired psalmist: “Unless Jehovah himself builds the house, it is to no avail that its builders have worked hard on it.”​—Ps. 127:1.

JEHOVAH WORTHY OF OUR TRUST

12. Who only deserves our trust as regards life’s essential matters?

¹² As human experience has shown, it is folly to trust human wisdom respecting essential matters of life. We cannot trust man to solve the huge problems of the human family. It is Jehovah alone, the Almighty Creator, who has the remedy. So when it comes to such a vital matter as looking to someone for guidance during these critical times, it is to Jehovah that we need to turn. Would you trust the scribblings of an infant as a map for a dangerous journey? Or would you depend upon the directions of an expert thoroughly familiar with the route? For our journey through these dangerous “last days” and in our quest for eternal life in God’s new order, human wisdom is totally unreliable as a guide. That is why the Bible says: “Blessed is the able-bodied man who puts his trust in Jehovah, and whose confidence Jehovah has become.”​—Jer. 17:7.

13-15. (a) How does the universe manifest Jehovah’s wisdom and power? (b) Why should this enhance our confidence in Jehovah? (Isa. 40:28, 29)

¹³ Jehovah’s works, backed by his wisdom and power, inspire in us confidence. When we see what he already has done and is capable of doing, our appreciation of his ability to direct our lives and to fashion a righteous new order is enhanced. An example of Jehovah’s ability is to be found in the material universe itself. Before telescopes were invented, the few thousand stars that could be seen by the naked eye were considered to be all that existed. But the first crude telescopes revealed many more. Modern instruments now probing the universe reveal so many billions of stars that, as Jeremiah stated, “the host of heaven cannot be numbered” by man.​—Jer. 33:22, American Standard Version.

¹⁴ It was then discovered that the heavenly bodies are not just scattered about haphazardly. They are grouped together into what are called “galaxies,” each one containing billions of stars and other matter. The galaxy we live in is called the Milky Way, having an estimated 100 billion stars like our sun. The diameter of our galaxy is calculated to be about 100,000 light-years; and light travels about six trillion miles (9,600,000,000,000 kilometers) in just one year! And that is not all. Recent observations by man, says National Geographic, have “left him stunned.” So many galaxies have been observed that one estimate of their number is ten billion; another observer estimates 100 billion! Further, it has been observed that these galaxies are organized too. They are arranged in “clusters,” a number of galaxies being grouped together in each cluster.

¹⁵ The immensity of the universe, its order, and the precise laws governing the movements of heavenly bodies, have astonished some scientists. As Science News observes: “Contemplation of these things disturbs cosmologists because it seems as if such particular and precise conditions could hardly have arisen at random.” Of course, the universe did not just arise “at random.” The wisdom, power, order and law manifest in the universe all stem from the grand Creator, Jehovah God: “The heavens are declaring the glory of God; and of the work of his hands the expanse is telling.” (Ps. 19:1) So far-reaching is Jehovah’s ability that he does with ease what men find impossible, even to “counting the number of the stars; all of them he calls by their names.”​—Ps. 147:4.

16. New discoveries about living things should lead to what conclusion?

¹⁶ Many scientists are becoming more awed, also, by the wisdom and complexity manifest in living things on earth. Science Digest contained this item: “With new discoveries being made almost daily in molecular biology, the likelihood that life began as an accident is becoming more remote, if not impossible.” A scientist estimates that the coded instructions found in one human cell would fill a 1,000-volume encyclopedia. From where did all of this come? A volume of encyclopedias on a shelf surely tells one of the existence of intelligent authorship. So does the amazing amount of information, as well as the wisdom and complexity, found in living things. Thus, simply and truthfully, the Bible states of Jehovah God: “With you is the source of life.”​—Ps. 36:9.

17. What should humble persons acknowledge?

¹⁷ Humble persons will acknowledge what many scientists and others do not, that Jehovah is indeed “the Creator of the heavens and the Grand One stretching them out; the One laying out the earth and its produce, the One giving breath to the people on it, and spirit to those walking in it.” (Isa. 42:5) This glorious Creator, who demonstrates such ability and wisdom, surely is worthy of our trust. As the twenty-four elders acknowledged in vision: “You are worthy, Jehovah, even our God, to receive the glory and the honor and the power, because you created all things, and because of your will they existed and were created.”​—Rev. 4:11.

18, 19. (a) How do God’s works compare with man’s? (b) What should be our attitude in regard to trusting God or man?

¹⁸ So, in comparing the works of God with the works of man, we can ask: Who deserves our complete trust? Surely it is not man, even with all his scientific advancements. The tremendous damage and confusion he already has caused on earth show that he does not have the answers to the problems of life and cannot be trusted to get them. As the World Book Encyclopedia observes:

“Despite the great advances made in science, scientists still have many unsolved problems. . . .

“Botanists still do not know exactly how the process of photosynthesis works. Biologists and biochemists have not yet found the answer to the question of how life originated. Astronomers have not yet developed a satisfactory explanation of the origin of the universe. Medical scientists and physiologists do not know the cause or cure of cancer or how to cure the various virus diseases. . . . Psychologists do not know all the causes of mental illness.”

¹⁹ Jehovah does know the answers to all these things. And he certainly has the wisdom and ability to provide the solutions to mankind’s plaguing problems. Hence, appropriate is the Bible’s warning: “Do not put your trust in nobles, nor in the son of earthling man, to whom no salvation belongs.” (Ps. 146:3) Instead, those who love what is right, who love life, and who want to see better conditions in the future will be among those described by the psalmist: “Those knowing your name will trust in you, for you will certainly not leave those looking for you, O Jehovah.”​—Ps. 9:10.

Keep Trusting Jehovah for the Reward

“Happy is he that is trusting in Jehovah.”​—Prov. 16:20.

1, 2. Why should we trust Jehovah to remedy mankind’s problems?

THOUSANDS of years of history have demonstrated that humans, however well intentioned and scientifically advanced, cannot remedy mankind’s huge problems. Only the Creator of the universe, and of life on this earth, can be trusted to do so. He alone has the wisdom, the power and the will required. Appreciating this, the psalmist declared: “You are my hope, O Sovereign Lord Jehovah, my confidence from my youth.” (Ps. 71:5) That hope is well placed, since God’s Word promises: “The hope does not lead to disappointment.” (Rom. 5:5) Rightly, then, the Bible counsels: “Trust in Jehovah with all your heart and do not lean upon your own understanding.”​—Prov. 3:5.

² A very compelling reason why we should trust Jehovah is that the future of mankind will be decided by him, not by humans. Nor will it be determined by any mythical idea such as “evolution,” nor by any blind force labeled “progress.” Indeed, the future already has been determined by Jehovah. And we can trust him to fulfill what he has purposed for the future since “it is impossible for God to lie.” (Heb. 6:18) Further, Jehovah comfortingly tells us: “So my word that goes forth from my mouth will prove to be. It will not return to me without results, but it will certainly do that in which I have delighted, and it will have certain success in that for which I have sent it.” (Isa. 55:11) No human can be so trustworthy.

3. What reassurance does Jehovah give his servants?

³ In addition, Jehovah shows his loving concern for his servants by keeping them informed about his purposes: “The Sovereign Lord Jehovah will not do a thing unless he has revealed his confidential matter to his servants the prophets.” (Amos 3:7) Says Jehovah: “New things I am telling out. Before they begin to spring up, I cause you people to hear them.” (Isa. 42:9) How reassuring it is for God to tell his trusting servants ahead of time what he will do in the future. And as his promises are fulfilled, it builds even greater trust in him. Jesus said: “I have told you before it occurs, in order that, when it does occur, you may believe.”​—John 14:29.

TRUSTWORTHY AT ALL TIMES

4, 5. (a) How did Jehovah’s words to our first parents prove to be true? (b) In what ways have other parts of God’s earthly creation suffered?

⁴ From the very beginning of mankind’s history, Jehovah has demonstrated the trustworthiness of his promises and that his warnings are to be heeded. An example is what happened to our first parents, Adam and Eve. They misused the fine gift of free will that God had given them. In fact, Eve believed that independence from God’s rule would actually improve matters, enabling her to “be like God.” (Gen. 3:5) But was that the case? No, for Jehovah already had warned that turning away from his rule would be certain to result in misery and death. Jehovah knew that humans were not created with the ability to be successful, independent of their Creator.​—Gen. 2:17; 3:17-19.

⁵ Jehovah’s words to our first parents certainly proved to be true. When they moved out from under God’s direction they also lost contact with the sustaining Source of life. In time, they grew old and died, just as God had warned. They also passed on imperfection to their offspring. All mankind has thus experienced the calamity of sin and death brought upon us by our first parents, who trusted human rule instead of God’s rule. (Rom. 5:12) And it has been a calamity for the animal realm too. Man no longer exercises loving dominion over the animals as he did in the beginning. (Gen. 1:26) Instead, man has exploited the animals, causing the extinction of many varieties, especially in recent years. Man has also exploited, plundered and polluted the earth so that in many places it too is in disorder. “All creation keeps on groaning together and being in pain together until now” as a consequence of man’s not trusting Jehovah.​—Rom. 8:22.

6. What resulted from trusting, or not trusting, Jehovah during the days of Noah?

⁶ By Noah’s day, centuries after the rebellion in Eden, the world of mankind had become exceedingly corrupt and violent. God told Noah that the ancient world was to be destroyed by means of an earth-wide flood. Noah and his family trusted Jehovah, so they began preparing for it: “Noah proceeded to do according to all that God had commanded him. He did just so.” (Gen. 6:22) But Noah had to keep trusting Jehovah for many years, since he was told about the flood decades before it occurred. What of the other people in that ancient world? “They took no note,” Jesus said. Yet, right at the appointed time “the flood came and swept them all away.” (Matt. 24:39) Our existence today demonstrates that Jehovah’s words were trustworthy. It also proves that the best course for humans is to keep trusting Jehovah. Why so? Because all of us are descendants of Noah. Those who did not trust Jehovah in Noah’s day did not have any more children. They all perished under the floodwaters, cutting off their lines of descent.​—Gen. 7:22, 23.

7. How did Jehovah’s promise prove trustworthy in Abraham’s time?

⁷ Jehovah’s trustworthiness was again demonstrated in the days of Abraham. Jehovah had informed Abraham and his wife Sarah that they would have a child. However, Sarah was well past the age of childbearing. When she heard the news, she laughed. Noting this, Jehovah said to Abraham: “Is anything too extraordinary for Jehovah? At the appointed time I shall return to you, next year at this time, and Sarah will have a son.” Exactly at Jehovah’s appointed time, Sarah had her son, Isaac. Jehovah had miraculously rekindled the procreative powers of Sarah in line with his purpose to bring forth the Messiah through Abraham’s line of descent.​—Gen. 18:9-14; 21:2.

8. How were Jehovah’s promises fulfilled for an entire nation?

⁸ In the days of Moses, God’s servants were severely oppressed by the brutal world power of that time, Egypt. But Jehovah said: “Unquestionably I have seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and I have heard their outcry as a result of those who drive them to work; because I well know the pains they suffer. And I am proceeding to go down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a land good and spacious, to a land flowing with milk and honey.” (Ex. 3:7, 8) These promises were fulfilled, as God caused the release of his servants from Egypt, taking out of the way other strong enemy nations too. His servants, several million of them, ultimately came into a “land good and spacious,” “flowing with milk and honey.” So Jehovah’s promises to that entire nation proved to be trustworthy, being fulfilled in every detail.​—Josh. 21:43-45.

9. What happened to Israel and Judah because of not trusting Jehovah?

⁹ Had ancient Israel kept trusting Jehovah, they would have continued to prosper in their new land. But instead, they began trusting their own human wisdom. Eventually gross apostasy and corruption became habitual in spite of Jehovah’s undeserved kindness. God’s spokesman Ahijah prophesied regarding the ten-tribe northern kingdom of Israel: “Jehovah will indeed strike Israel down . . . and he will certainly uproot Israel off this good ground that he gave to their forefathers.” (1 Ki. 14:15) Jehovah’s words again came true: “The king of Assyria captured Samaria and then led Israel into exile in Assyria.” “Jehovah removed Israel from his sight, just as he had spoken by means of all his servants the prophets. So Israel went off its own soil into exile in Assyria.” (2 Ki. 17:6, 23) Later, Jehovah’s words again proved true, when the southern kingdom of Judah was taken into exile by the Babylonians.​—2 Chron. 36:15-21.

TRUSTING JEHOVAH IN OUR DAY

10. In our day, what kind of trust do Jehovah’s servants need to show?

¹⁰ Today God’s servants are surrounded by a grossly corrupt and violent world, similar to that of Noah’s day. To keep from being swallowed up in wickedness, discouragement, or disbelief, we very much need to keep trusting Jehovah fully. We need to have the same attitude of mind that Joshua, a faithful servant of Jehovah, had long ago. He said: “You well know with all your hearts and with all your souls that not one word out of all the good words that Jehovah your God has spoken to you has failed. They have all come true for you. Not one word of them has failed.” “Not a promise failed out of all the good promise that Jehovah had made to the house of Israel; it all came true.”​—Josh. 23:14; 21:45.

11. How have Jehovah’s words for our generation been fulfilled?

¹¹ However, it is not only in ancient times that God’s servants have seen the fulfillments of his words and promises. Similar fulfillments have come to pass in our day. An example of this is what has happened to the world in this generation. Contrary to the predictions of many human leaders that this century would mark a glorious new scientific age where mankind’s problems would be solved, God’s Word accurately foretold: “Know this, that in the last days critical times hard to deal with will be here.” The greed, hatred, lawlessness, world wars, juvenile delinquency, family breakdown, religious hypocrisy and disbelief in God, foretold to take place in our time, have all come to pass. This has happened according to Jehovah’s precise timetable, beginning with the year 1914, the turning point of modern history.​—Matt. 24:3-14; 2 Tim. 3:1-5, 13.

12. In what ways has Jehovah prospered his servants today?

¹² Yet, in the midst of this very difficult period, these “last days” of the present system, Jehovah has protected and prospered his trusting servants in a marvelous way. Despite immense cruelties heaped upon them by persecutors, his worshipers have grown until they number into the millions. As Jehovah’s Word had foretold: “The little one himself will become a thousand, and the small one a mighty nation. I myself, Jehovah, shall speed it up in its own time.” (Isa. 60:22) In addition, his servants are learning how to produce the fruitage of God’s guiding spirit, for they are cultivating “love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faith, mildness, self-control.” (Gal. 5:22, 23) Fulfilled upon God’s servants are the words of Psalm 29:11: “Jehovah himself will give strength indeed to his people. Jehovah himself will bless his people with peace.” And all of this is happening while the world, in contrast, descends deeper into “fornication, uncleanness, loose conduct, idolatry, practice of spiritism, enmities, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, contentions, divisions, sects, envies, drunken bouts, revelries, and things like these.”​—Gal. 5:19-21.

13, 14. While secular authorities recognize mankind’s critical problems, what remedies do they still offer?

¹³ Secular authorities acknowledge the critical condition of the world. But they do not look to Jehovah for the remedies. They are still looking to human wisdom for the way out. An example is noted in the book Environmental Ethics, which says: “Any realistic examination of man on earth today shows that he is headed for the cataclysmic disasters of famine, pestilence, and war.” But what remedy is suggested? The authors state:

“Some form of world government such as a universal United Nations must be established so that mankind can consider himself as a species and manage himself as a whole.

“A world-wide educational program is needed to convince the people of the world of the necessity of programs to bring population and resources into ecological balance, and this can be accomplished only with international cooperation. . . .

“One can hope that the power elite of the world​—the leaders of government, business, industry, and the military—​will see the need of planned world cooperation for the good of the human species, and thus form a world government.”

After thus pointing to the need for a world government, however, they expressed the fear “that the need will not be acted on . . . until famine, pestilence, and war strike a large proportion of the world’s people.”

¹⁴ Similarly, in the book entitled Ark II, scientists D. Pirages and P. Ehrlich observe:

“Noah had ample warning from a respected authority to build his Ark, and he used his time to good advantage. Skeptics laughed, ridiculed, and drowned​—but Noah . . . survived.

“We too have been warned that a flood of problems now threatens the persistence of industrial society, but this time the ark cannot be built out of wood and caulking.

“We must ensure our survival by redesigning the political, economic, and social institutions of industrial society. If a new institutional ark cannot be made watertight in time, industrial society will sink.”

15. (a) Why is there no reason to trust human remedies at this late date? (b) Who are truly cooperating with the only remedy for mankind’s problems?

¹⁵ Does human history give any sound reason to believe that this corrupt system can be “redesigned”? Is there any basis for trusting the nations suddenly to cooperate world wide, unselfishly, in every sphere of human activity? Are they conducting a worldwide educational program that would unite all mankind under one government, and motivate all people to a common purpose? None of these things are being done by them. In all the nations Jehovah’s servants alone are peacefully and unitedly cooperating to teach people about the incoming one government for all mankind that Jehovah has purposed, his heavenly kingdom under Christ. They do not promote a redesigning of this present unworkable system of things, since that is not God’s purpose. He will not redesign it, but will demolish it. In that promise we can trust.​—Dan. 2:44; Matt. 6:9, 10.

16. In what promises should we have full confidence?

¹⁶ Jehovah’s servants must not be misled by any schemes to perpetuate this present corrupt system of things. They should, instead, keep trusting Jehovah with full confidence to bring this wicked system to an end and to replace it with his new order of righteousness. (2 Pet. 3:10-13) We must be confident that Jehovah alone can and will, for his trusting servants, “wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore.” (Rev. 21:4) Precisely at his appointed time, Jehovah will fulfill such promises, for “these words are faithful and true.”​—Rev. 21:5.

17. What serves as a source of encouragement to us?

¹⁷ In addition, as an encouragement to keep trusting in him, Jehovah asks his servants to keep their eyes focused on his rewards. “He that approaches God must believe that he is and that he becomes the rewarder of those earnestly seeking him.” (Heb. 11:6) The hope of the reward was a stimulus to first-century Christians. The apostle Paul said: “My beloved brothers, become steadfast, unmovable, always having plenty to do in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain in connection with the Lord.” “God is not unrighteous so as to forget your work and the love you showed for his name.”​—1 Cor. 15:58; Heb. 6:10.

18. Should our trust in Jehovah be diminished even if we have to face death?

¹⁸ Our trust in Jehovah should not be diminished even if we should have to face death before God’s new order becomes a reality. We can have the same trust that Abraham had when he was asked to sacrifice Isaac. “He reckoned that God was able to raise him up even from the dead.” When Jehovah intervened, Isaac was as good as dead, which is why the Bible says that, from the dead, Abraham “did receive [Isaac] also in an illustrative way.” (Heb. 11:19) Can any human agency bring back the dead? Surely not. Only Jehovah can, through the arrangements that he provides.​—Acts 24:15.

19. What are some of the rewards Jehovah’s trusting servants will receive in the New Order?

¹⁹ In God’s new order, his trusting servants will receive the full reward for their faithfulness to him. Forever will they be freed from the corrupt system of things that now oppresses them. Forever will they be freed from the curses of sin and death. And the fine training that Jehovah’s servants are now getting in working and living together according to God’s standards will be put to immediate use as they cooperate under the direction of God’s kingdom to begin building a paradise new earth. What happiness will then be experienced by all those who kept trusting Jehovah! How grateful they will be to Jehovah as they see blessing after blessing poured out upon them! Truly, “the meek ones themselves will possess the earth, and they will indeed find their exquisite delight in the abundance of peace.”​—Ps. 37:11.

20. What confidence can we have as to how earth’s resources will be used under God’s kingdom?

²⁰ In God’s new order, people will no longer have to worry about the inventions and machines of science working against them. Jehovah, who created all material things, including energy, knows what his servants should use to make the earth a paradise. Advances in knowledge or in living standards will no longer work to damage and pollute the earth. The Creator and Regulator of the billions of galaxies in the universe knows how to direct his people in the most beneficial and lasting use of the things he has made for their enjoyment. Thus, from the record of the past and present, we have every reason to keep trusting Jehovah, as his Word counsels: “Trust in Jehovah and do good; reside in the earth, and deal with faithfulness. Also take exquisite delight in Jehovah, and he will give you the requests of your heart. Roll upon Jehovah your way, and rely upon him, and he himself will act.”​—Ps. 37:3-5.