Trust (lean on, rely on, and be confident) in the Lord and do good; so shall you dwell in the land and feed surely on His faithfulness, and truly you shall be fed. 4 Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He will give you the desires and secret petitions of your heart. 5 Commit your way to the Lord [roll and repose each care of your load on Him]; trust (lean on, rely on, and be confident) also in Him and He will bring it to pass. 6 And He will make your uprightness and right standing with God go forth as the light, and your justice and right as [the shining sun of] the noonday. 7 Be still and rest in the Lord; wait for Him and patiently lean yourself upon Him; fret not yourself because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who brings wicked devices to pass. 8 Cease from anger and forsake wrath; fret not yourself — it tends only to evildoing. 9 For evildoers shall be cut off, but those who wait and hope and look for the Lord [in the end] shall inherit the earth. 10 For yet a little while, and the evildoers will be no more; though you look with care where they used to be, they will not be found. 11 But the meek [in the end] shall inherit the earth and shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace.  Psalms 37:3-11 AMP

Verse 3: “Trust (lean on, rely on, and be confident) in the Lord and do good; so shall you dwell in the land and feed surely on His faithfulness, and truly you shall be fed.” If we put our trust in God alone and not the arm of the flesh or the wisdom of man, then we will have His protection, favor and provision. If we truly trust God and His word, then we will focus on pleasing Him – by obeying Him; by doing good – and leave everything else in His hands. We cannot expect all God’s blessings if we don’t fully obey His commands. If we obey all God’s commands, then we are entitled to receive the fulfillment of all His promises to us.

Verse 4: “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He will give you the desires and secret petitions of your heart.” Deep in the heart of every person are deep desires and secret wants. Not fleshly or evil or ungodly desires, but things that mean a lot to us, things that come from deep within us. We think they are our ideas, but the Lord is able to place things in our heart that line up with His plans for us – the things that will make us truly happy and content. As long as we try to follow our heads, we will be forever chasing rainbows, but if we look deep on the inside, we will see the things that have the ability to give us true satisfaction. The key to walking in the reality of these things is for us to delight in the Lord and also to commit our way – everything we have and everything we do – to Him alone. To “delight” in someone means to experience great pleasure and joy in his or her presence. This happens only when we know someone really well – so in order to delight in the Lord, we need to get to know Him so much better than we do now. It’s our life-long quest – to know Him better today than we did yesterday. The more we come to know Him, the more we become aware and convinced of His great love for us, the more we are delighted in and by Him!

To commit means: to roll upon, or repose on. Proverbs 16:3 NKJV says, “Commit your works to the Lord, And your thoughts will be established.” And the AMP says, “Roll your works upon the Lord [commit and trust them wholly to Him; He will cause your thoughts to become agreeable to His will, and] so shall your plans be established and succeed.”

To commit ourselves to the Lord means entrusting everything to Him – trusting Him with our lives – trusting Him with everything that concerns us – our families, our job/career/ministry, our possessions, our choices in life. To commit ourselves to the Lord means to trust in Him fully and completely, believing that He can care for us better than we can ourselves! If we do this, then for the rest, all we need is to patiently wait for Him to work out what is best for us! This is not procrastination or abdication, but it is faith – faith in God’s will, and faith in God’s plan, above our own. We are not sitting idly by – we are working according to what He directs and doing good and being a blessing wherever we are and wherever we go. While we work God’s plan, He is working to fulfill the desires and secret petitions of our heart!

Verses 7 & 8: “Be still and rest in the Lord; wait for Him and patiently lean yourself upon Him; fret not yourself because of him who prospers in his way, because of the man who brings wicked devices to pass. Cease from anger and forsake wrath; fret not yourself — it tends only to evildoing.”

Be still. Rest. Wait. Don’t fret. Cease from anger and forsake wrath. All these require great trust in God and great faith in His word. Most people live their lives frantically trying to make their own way. They are stressed and worried; impatient and hurried; and when things don’t go according to plan, they get angry and frustrated. This destroys their health and their relationships and ultimately, their quality of life and potential length of life. They live a shorter, harder life, because they won’t, or can’t, trust God with their life. Some people even resort to wrongdoing to accomplish their goals, but it opens the door to disaster and destruction.

The word “rest” here means: to be silent; be still or stand still; keep silence; be dumb; tarry; wait; to cease; to be cut down or off; to forbear; to hold peace; to quiet self. In other words, we should calmly resign and leave all things in the hands of the Lord. We should take a deep breath, relax and leave our life in God’s capable hands! The scripture says that you should “wait patiently for Him” or “patiently lean yourself upon Him”. That means that you are to set yourself to expect God to answer! Expect God to come through for you!

Anger and worry – or fretting – are both very destructive emotions. If we are angry or worried, we demonstrate that we have no faith in God’s love or His provision; we are trusting in the arm of the flesh; we don’t really believe that God is in control! God tells us not to worry, but to cast our cares on Him instead – because He cares for us and is watching over us and watching out for us! When you dwell on your problems, you will become anxious and angry. But if you concentrate on God and His goodness, you will find peace. You must make the choice of where you will put your focus!