Here’s an understatement for you:

The last five months have brought about a lot of change.

No kidding, right? Our vocabulary has changed. We now speak freely using terms like masks, quarantine, herd immunity, and vaccination development. Our relationships have changed. We now connect with other people without physical touch or even proximity. Our work has changed. We now work from bedrooms, couches, garages, and anywhere we can find for a few minutes.

A lot has changed. And though some of us thrive on change, for the majority of us change of any kind brings about a certain amount of frustration. We get frustrated when our old routine doesn’t work any more; when we can’t do things the way we’ve grown accustomed to doing them; when we’re constantly trying to figure out the new rules in this new paradigm. At best, it’s frustration. But it can also have a measure of anger, bitterness, anxiety, and fear thrown in for good measure.

This is what we are feeling. And in our best moments, when we feel any of those things, we can take just a moment of self-examination and objectively ask ourselves why we are feeling that way. It’s easy to blame it on the circumstances, but often a moment of self-examination like that can lead us deeper into our own hearts. What we will find there is not primarily an effect of circumstances, but something else. Something more sinister. And that’s where this key question comes in.

If we are able, during those moment of introspection, we should ask ourselves this question:

Am I believing something that isn’t true?

The reason is simple: Our beliefs drive our actions. And not just our actions, but our feelings. If, then, we are acting or feeling something – virtually anything – the root of that feeling or action is some kind of belief. It has always been this way, right from the very beginning.

Back in Genesis, everything was good. Very good, in fact. All creation existed in perfect harmony, and at the center piece of everything was the crown jewel of creation. The man and the woman lived in perfect fellowship with God, walking without guilt, shame, or any other hindrance with Him. And into this harmony slithered the cunning serpent armed with what must have seemed like a very innocent question and just a few short sentences that followed it:

“Did God really say, ‘You can’t eat from any tree in the garden’?” The woman said to the serpent, “We may eat the fruit from the trees in the garden. But about the fruit of the tree in the middle of the garden, God said, ‘You must not eat it or touch it, or you will die.’”

“No! You will not die,” the serpent said to the woman. “In fact, God knows that when you eat it your eyes will be opened and you will be like God, knowing good and evil” (Genesis 3:1-4).

It was a simple question really.

“Did God really say…” he asked the woman. Just four words. And yet packed into those four words are a far more cunning charge. Behind the simple question the fork-tongued liar was leveling charges against the character and nature of God. What came off like a question was really an accusation.

Satan was not just asking whether Eve knew what God had said; he was accusing God of a lack of generosity. Maybe, just maybe, God was holding back something from them. And if He was, then maybe He was holding back the very best. Never mind there were hundreds, or even thousands, of other trees to eat from; never mind that only one was forbidden; and never mind that the one was forbidden not because God isn’t generous and loving but instead precisely because He is.

And Satan was calling into question the trustworthiness of God. Could Eve, and Adam, and us for that matter – can we really believe God says what He means and means what He says? And if He does, can we trust that He actually has our best interests in mind when He issues prohibitions like this?

And Satan was calling into question the love of God. For if we cannot trust that God is doing what is good and right by us, and if we cannot believe that He is generous with us, then how can we believe He actually does love us?

The first human beings started to believe wrongly, and because they believed wrongly, they acted wrongly. And the same thing is true for us.

When we feel all those things today – all that frustration, all that anxiety, all that anger, all that confusion – it’s a moment for us to look down deep inside ourselves and see if something in our belief system has gone haywire. But not just stop there even – to go a step further and remember that the question of God’s love, of His wisdom, of His justice, of His grace – has already been proven for us:

“For while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For rarely will someone die for a just person—though for a good person perhaps someone might even dare to die. But God proves his own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:6-8).

The issue has been settled. God has given us all the proof we need at the cross. The question for us, on a daily basis, is how deeply we believe it.