First Sunday of Lent Yr C 2025

Title

Do You Trust Me?

Outline

I keep hearing this question from God: do you trust me?

Or, Where is your faith? That is a question as to whether we fit into our culture. Our culture trusts technology to figure it out, to change reality, to supply bread and, of course, circuses, that is entertainment to distract us from reality. It trusts leadership seminars or organizational seminars or people with MBA’s to supply their needs.

That was not the history of Israel. They were Aramean refugees in Egypt who were mistreated there as wave after wave of Catholic refugees have been mistreated here. God, not a leader, not technology, delivered them and brought them to Canaan and they were to offer a basket of firstfruits to God: “Yes, Lord, I trust you and this is your provision, not what we captured or created. Thank you.”

Jesus is asked the same in the wilderness

The Spirit brought him, not into a banquet hall, but the desert so the devil could trust him. “You are hungry, you have a real need, do you still trust yourself to the Father’s will or will you take things into your own hands and use your power independently?” Jesus responds implicitly, “I will trust him,” for the rest of the quotation is “but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

Likewise the devil offers him “all the kingdoms of the world” - power and authority - for the mere price of submission, trust, worship. “No, I will worship God and him alone.” And the devil offers him honor, for if Jesus really trust God he would trust the promise of protection in the scripture. “No,” answers Jesus, “it is not faith but doubt that tests God.” And, of course, that statement also closed the door to the devil’s tests, for he was testing the “Son of God,” God incarnate.

The same happens to us today

My grandmother worked as a teacher in a Plymouth Brethren orphanage in England. They ever fund raised, but simply asked God for their needs. One morning the cook said there was no food for breakfast. The head said to the staff who were already at prayer, “Put the pots on the boil and we will betake ourselves to prayer.” That prayer was answered abundantly.

But do I trust him or just like such stories? I like Israel can look back over decades of God’s provision and care, but do I trust him now or give in to the voice of my inner anxiety and try to figure out how I can solve the problem? What about when I hear of my Ukrainian friends, my South African friends, my German friends, my children being adverse affected by decisions made in this country? Do I stew or dialogue uselessly within or write on social media, or do I trust him, do I pray the Chaplet of Divine Mercy?

I find that if I am to live in trust there is two things I must do. Make a prayer of trust my constant mantra and spend time in silence before the Blessed Sacrament. Then my inner eyes see him; I realize he is not perturbed; I see he is calm in his plan that already is for him; and to his calm smile I can respond, “Yes, Lord, I remember you care in the past and I trust you now.”