Trust me, I’m a………….

I see that our banks have been fined over 2 billion pounds for manipulating foreign exchange markets. This is merely the latest in a litany of corrupt practices which have come to light since the beginning of the financial crisis in 2008. Despite the increased adverse publicity, our banks are continuing to pay out eye watering sums of money in annual bonuses to their top executives.

Meanwhile another of the UKs revered national institutions, the National Health Service seems to be staggering along from one scandal to another. The Daily Telegraph has recently highlighted the difficulties faced by some NHS whistleblowers who have attempted to bring corruption and malpractice to light. Writing in the ‘Telegraph’, Jake Wallis Simons lamented:

‘The most bewildering aspect of the NHS whistleblowers scandal is the apparently widespread assumption within the health service that it is better to hush something up than improve services for patients. Time and again, health authorities have turned a blind eye – to put it mildly – to dangerous malpractice or criminal wrongdoing on the part of clinicians simply in order not to draw negative attention to themselves. Which, they fear, might cost them their funding. And, it is alleged, the fat-cat salaries taken by those at the top.’

At the centre of power, Westminster politicians continue to be held in low esteem, five years on from the expenses scandal of 2008/9. Recently released figures show that MPs are now claiming even more in expenses than they were before the 2009 scandal.

Although the rules governing the payment of Parliamentary expenses have been tightened, it would appear that many of our MPS have simply found new ways of keeping their ‘snouts in the trough’. Nepotism is now on the increase. Growing numbers of MPs are employing relatives and business associates on the public payroll.  More than 25% of MPs (168) recently listed wives, children and even parents on their expenses returns.

It used to be that doctors, bankers and Members of Parliament were universally regarded as trusted members of society. Not anymore!

Most alarmingly our Institutional churches have been weakened by liberalism and wholly compromised by scandal and allegations of concealment and ‘cover ups’ going back over decades.

Writing in the Spectator earlier in the year, Douglas Murray acidly lamented the decline of trust in our public institutions: ‘Who would trust MPs?  Until recently most of us thought they were just in it for the expenses. Now it turns out they’re in it to abuse kids too.

We know because we’ve read it in the papers. Not that they’re any better, tapping Milly Dowler’s phone. Still, at least you can trust the BBC. Apart from their old stars, that is, or the higher-ups who covered for them or fingered the wrong ‘paedos’. Really, the police should have stepped in years ago. Except they were probably busy being racist.

So who will speak up for the kids? Once it could have been a bishop or something. Though not after what we now know about the Catholics. And the Church of England’s not much better. Frock-wearing paedos. Thinking about it could drive you to illness. Except you can’t take any chances these days. Not with the NHS just waiting to kill you with a superbug and then giving Jimmy Savile the keys.

Rarely since the last days of Rome can there have been such a dearth of authority in a society.  One by one, in the lifespan of most people in Britain, the institutions which once defended and epitomised our country have fallen and now appear unable to get up again.’

Well said Douglas!!

As a born again Christian I could despair of the society in which I live. However I take heart from what I read in the Bible.

The Book of Proverbs tells believers to: ‘Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding.’  This sums up the Bible’s teaching on trust. Believers are to trust in the Lord, not in people, their plans or the world’s wisdom and devices. The Lord alone is to be trusted because His nature is faithful and true.

The Psalmist David knew what it meant to wholly trust in the Lord. In Psalm 91 he testifies of that experience: “Whoever dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of the Almighty. I will say of the Lord, ‘He is my refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.’ Surely he will save you from the fowler’s snare and from the deadly pestilence. He will cover you with his feathers, and under his wings you will find refuge; his faithfulness will be your shield and rampart. You will not fear the terror of night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in the darkness, nor the plague that destroys at midday. A thousand may fall at your side, ten thousand at your right hand, but it will not come near you.”

It is because of God’s nature that I trust Him with all my heart and commit every aspect of my life to Him with every confidence.