Of Some Passages and Examples of Holy Scripture to Aid Us in Gaining This Familiar and Filial Confidence in God

| Raa the first point it will be well to see the great habit which those ancient Fathers had of attributing all events to God, by whatever channel they came. Holy Scripture relates (Gen. xlii.) how Joseph’s brethren were coming home with wheat brought from Egypt. Now Joseph had instructed his steward to put tied up at the mouth of each one’s sack the money that they had paid for the wheat, just as they had brought it with them. On their journey they came to stop at a house and they had a mind each one to give his beast a feed of wheat. The first to open his sack saw at once his purse with the money in it and told the others. Each one addressed himself to his sack and they found there the money. The narrative says then that they said in trouble to one another: What is this that God hath done us? (Gen. xlii. 28). It is to be well taken note of that they did not say: “This is a trap that they have set for us; there is some fraud here.” Nor did they say: “The steward by carelessness has left each one’s money in his sack.” Nor did they say: “Perhaps he wanted to make a present to us of the money in alms.” But they attributed it to God and said: “What can this mean that God hath done to us?’—confessing that, as not a leaf stirs on a tree but by His will, so neither has this happened but by His will. And when Jacob came into Egypt, Joseph went to visit him with his sons, and the old man asked, “What children are these?” and he replied: These are my sons that God hath given me in this land of Egypt (Gen. xlviii. 9). Jacob made the same answer on meeting his brother Esau, when the latter asked him what children were those he brought with him; he replied: These are the sons whom the Lord hath given me (Gen. xxxiii. 5). And, offering him a present, he said to him: Receive this present—he calls it a blessing of God, with Whom to bless is to do good—which, he says, God hath done for me, who is he who giveth all things—Suscipe benedictionem quam attuli tibi, et quam donavit mihi Deus tribuens omnia (Gen. xxxiii. 11).

Likewise, when David in great anger was going to destroy the house of Nabal, and Abigail his wife came out to meet him with a present to appease him, David said: Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, who hath sent thee today to me, that I might not go on to shed the blood of the house of Nabal (I Kings xxv. 32). As though he would say: “Thou hast not come of thyself, but God has sent thee that I might not sin; to Him I owe this favor—may He be praised for it.” This was the common language of those saints, and should also be ours.

But coming more to the point, the history of holy Joseph, which we have already touched upon, makes marvelously well to our purpose. His brethren out of envy, that he might not come to be in command over them and be their lord, as he had dreamed, sold him for a slave to some traders of Egypt. This means, which they took for his undoing and that he might not come into command, God took to fulfil the designs of His divine providence and bring him to be lord over them and over all the land of Egypt. So said Joseph himself to his brethren when he discovered himself to them, and they were amazed and bewildered at the event. Be not afraid or alarmed at having sold me into these parts: it was for your good that God sent me here that ye might have food, and the people of Israel might not perish and come to an end. God sent me: it was no design of yours: they were the counsels of God. Can we possibly resist the will of God? (Gen. xlv. 5-8). Now who will not hereupon trust God? Who will fear the contrivances of men and the reverses of the world, since we see that they are directed to a sure end by God and that the means which men take to persecute us and do us harm, are the very means that God takes for our good and increase? My counsel shall stand, and all my will be done (Isaias xlvi. 10). Go here and go there, go where you will, but in the end the will of God must be accomplished, and He will direct the means thereto.

St. Chrysostom dwells to this effect upon another particular of this history, how Pharaoh’s cupbearer, after being restored to his office, forgot his interpreter Joseph for two whole years, though he had enjoined upon him so earnestly to remember him and intercede for him with Pharaoh. Think you, says the saint, that it was by chance that he forgot? It was no chance; it was the resolution and plan of God, Who wished to wait for the nick of time and a happy conjuncture to draw Joseph out of prison with greater glory and honor. For, if he had remembered him, possibly his influence might have availed to deliver him immediately from prison in some obscure manner, without his being either heard or seen. But as God our Lord did not intend him to go out in this manner, but with high honor and authority, He allowed the other to forget him for two years, that so might come the time of Pharaoh’s dreams, and then at the instance of the king under stress of necessity he might come out with the majesty and glory wherewith he did come out to be lord of the whole land of Egypt. God knew very well, says St. Chrysostom, as a most wise worker in metals, the time for the gold to be in the fire and the time to draw it out.

In the First Book of Kings we have another history in which the providence of God shines clearly out in many particular details. God had told the Prophet Samuel that He would mark out for him the man who was to be king of Israel, that he might anoint him: Tomorrow at this hour I will send thee him whom thou shalt anoint as King (I Kings ix. 16). That man was Saul, and the way in which He sent him was this. His father’s asses were lost, and his father told him to go and seek them. He took with him a stout young servant, and they ranged hill and dale, but could not discover them nor find any trace of them. Saul was minded to return, since he thought that they were getting late and that his father would be anxious about them. The boy said to him: “We must not go back home without them: but there is in this town a man of God (it was the Prophet Samuel) ; let us go there for him to tell us about them.” On this account they went to Samuel; and when they came, God said to him: This is the man whom I said I would send thee: him thou must anoint for king (I Kings ix. 17). Oh, the secret judgments of God! His father sent him to find the she-asses, but God sent him to Samuel to be anointed king. How different are the designs of men from the designs of God! How far were Saul and his father from thinking that he was going to be anointed king! Oh, how far are you many times, and your father and your superior, from what God intends! From the quarter where you least think it, from there does God draw what He wants. It was not without the will of God that the asses were lost; it was not by chance that his father sent Saul after them, nor was it by chance that he could not find them, nor the advice that the boy gave that they should go to consult the prophet about them; but all this was the ordinance and arrangement of God, Who took these means to send Saul to Samuel to anoint him king, as He had said. Your father thought that he was sending you to study at Seville or Salamanca that you might become a great doctor and afterwards might hold some preferment in which you might live like a gentleman; and it was not that, but God was sending you there to receive you into His house and make you a religious. St. Augustine thought, when he went from Rome to Milan—and the prefect of the city, Symmachus, thought the same—that he was going to lecture on rhetoric; and it was not that, but God was sending him to St. Ambrose to be converted.

Let us set ourselves to consider the variety of vocations and the various means whereby God has drawn to religion this person and that, which is certainly matter of admiration. Had it not been for I know not what little thing or trifling incident, you would never have been a religious— and all these were contrivances and inventions of God to draw you to religion. Let this be observed, by the way, for the benefit of some who sometimes have a recurring temptation to think that their vocation cannot be of God because it came by means of trifling things like those. That is a delusion of the devil your enemy, envious of the state and condition in which you are; for it is the usual way of God to make use of these means for the end which He intends; namely, His own greater glory and your good advantage. We have many examples of this in the lives of the saints. Hath God care of oxen? (I Cor. ix. 9) or of she-asses? But He uses these means for you to come to reign like Saul: for “to serve God is to reign.”

When afterwards the Prophet Samuel went on the part of God to reprove Saul for that disobedience which he had committed in not destroying Amalec as God had commanded him, Samuel after having reproved him turned his back to go away. Saul seized his mantle, that he might not go, but might intercede for him with God. The text says that a piece of Samuel’s mantle remained in Saul’s hand, the garment being torn. Who would not but think that this tearing and dividing of the prophet’s mantle happened by chance, because Saul pulled hard, and the mantle was old and rotten? Yet it did not happen without a particular disposition of God, to make it understood that this signified that Saul was set aside and deprived of the kingdom for his sin. So Samuel, seeing what was done, said to Saul: By this division of my mantle understand that the Lord hath set thee aside and removed thee from the kingdom of Israel, and hath given it over to thy neighbor, who is a better man than thou (I Kings xv. 28).

In the same First Book of Kings we read that one time Saul had surrounded David and his followers as in a circle (I Kings xxiii. 26), in such sort that now David despaired of being able to make his escape. In this hard pressure there came a courier in haste to tell Saul that the Philistines had entered into the country and were pillaging and destroying all before them. Saul had to raise the blockade and go off to meet the greater need, and so David escaped. This raid of the Philistines was not by chance, but a contrivance of God thereby to set David free.

Another time the satraps of the Philistines cast David out of their army and induced King Achis to bid him return home, and that though the king kept him in his company with great good will and had great confidence in him. But, as he said, you do not please the satraps (I Kings xxix. 6). It looked as though this action of the satrapS was a mere piece of chance, but it was not chance nor for the end that they thought it, but by the special providence of God, for David on his return found that the Amalekites had set fire to his town of Siceleg and taken captive all his women and children, even David’s own wives. He went after them and destroyed them and recovered all the booty and prisoners without exception, which would not have happened if the satraps had not cast him out of their army; and to this God directed their design, though they directed it to something else (I Kings xxx.).

In the history of Esther this particular providence of God shines out clearly in many minute details. What out-ofthe-way means did not God use to deliver the people of the Jews from the cruel sentence of King Ashuerus! By what means did He displace Vashti and choose Esther for queen, who was of the people of the Jews, that she might afterwards intercede for them! It looks like chance that Mardochee got wind of the treason that some were plotting against King Ashuerus, and that he came to reveal it, and that the king was lying awake that night and could not sleep, and that he made them bring him the chronicles of his times to entertain him, and that in the reading they hit upon that good deed of Mardochee; yet nothing of this happened by chance, but by the high counsel of God and His special providence, who wished by these means to deliver His people. And so Mardochee sent a message to Esther, when she shrank from entering to speak to the king and excused herself on the plea of not having been called. “Who knoweth but that the reason of thy having been made queen was that thou mightest be able to help us at this time?”

Holy Scripure and ecclesiastical histories are full of like examples, that we may learn to attribute all events to God and take them as coming from His hand for our greater good and profit. In the book of the memoirs of St. Clement there is recounted a notable thing to this purpose. When Simon Magus was being tracked out by St. Peter, St. Barnabas had converted St. Clement at Rome. The latter went to St. Peter, told him of his conversion, and begged to be instructed in the things of the faith. St. Peter said to him: “You have come at an opportune moment, for tomorrow there is arranged to be a public disputation between me and Simon Magus; we will go there and you shall hear what you ask.” At this moment there came in two disciples, and told St. Peter how Simon Magus sent them to say how some business had turned up, and beg that the disputation should be put off for three days; and St. Peter said, “Let it be so.” When he came out, St. Clement was much distressed; and St. Peter, seeing him sad, asked him: “What is the matter, son, that I see you sad?” St. Clement answered: “I would have you know, father, that I am much distressed at seeing the disputation put off, which I could have wished to have been tomorrow.” Here is a thing much to note: in a matter of so small weight St. Peter took his hand, and preached him a great sermon. “See, son,” he said, “among the heathen, when things are not done as they wish, they are much put out; but we who know that God guides and governs all, must hold on in great consolation and peace. Know, son, that it has been for your greater good that this has happened, since now you will understand better. Had the disputation come off immediately, you would not have understood so well; since it has been put off, you will understand it better, for between now and then I will instruct you, and you will relish and profit much by it.”

I wish to conclude with an example that we have in the Life of our blessed Father Ignatius, in which also this same truth comes out in strong colors; it is the going of Father Francis Xavier to the East Indies. It is a thing worthy of consideration, the way this holy man came to go to the Indies. Our Father Ignatius had named for this mission Fathers Simon Rodriguez and Nicholas de Bobadilla. Father Simon at the time was ill with a quartan ague; nevertheless, he embarked immediately for Portugal. He wrote to Father Bobadilla to come from Calabria to Rome. He came, but so emaciated by the privations and labors of the journey and so weak and injured in one leg when he arrived in Rome—and at the same time the ambassador Don Pedro Mascarenas was on the point of returning to Portugal and could not wait for Bobadilla to get well, nor did he wish to set out without the second Father that had to go to India—that in place of Master Bobadilla there was substituted Father Master Francis Xavier, with the happiest result, and he set out at once with the ambassador for Portugal. That Father Francis Xavier had not been named, but Father Bobadilla, and that they substituted another in Bobadilla’s place because the departure was in haste, seems to have been a chance. And yet it was no chance, but by the high counsel of God, Who had determined to make him the apostle of those parts. Further, when they came to Portugal, seeing the great fruit that they produced here, there was an idea of detaining them; and finally it was determined that one of the two should stay there and the other go on to the Indies. You see here another turn of affairs, going to make the issue contingent. But with God there is no contingency; in the end it had to be Father Francis Xavier who went to the Indies, for that was the will of God and so He had determined, since this it was that made for the good of those souls and for His glory. Let men plan as they like and carry it by the way they command; God will take this way as a means to accomplish His plans and do that which is most suitable for you and for His greater glory.

From these and other like examples, as well from Holy Scripture as from our daily witness and experience, as well in others as in ourselves, we must go on planting and imprinting in our heart this confidence by means of meditation and consideration; and we must not stop in this exercise until we feel in our heart a very familiar and filial confidence in God. And take it for certain that the greater the confidence with which you throw yourself upon God, the safer will you be; and on the other hand, until you come to have this filial confidence, you will never enjoy true peace and repose of heart, for without it all things will trouble and alarm you. Let us, then, once for all throw ourselves and cast ourselves altogether into the hands of God and trust in Him as the Apostle St. Peter advises: Throw all your solicitude upon God, because He hath care of you (I Pet. v. 7) ; and the prophet: Cast thy care upon the Lord, and he will nourish thee (Psalm liv. 23). Thou, O Lord, hast loved me so much that for me Thou didst deliver Thyself over entirely into the hands of cruel executioners: and Jesus he delivered over to their will (Luke xxiii. 25). Is it much that I should place and deliver over my whole self into hands that are not cruel, but so compassionate as Thine, that Thou mayest do with me what Thou wilt, since I am sure that it will not be for anything else than what is better and more appropriate for me?

Let us accept that division and agreement which Christ our Redeemer made with St. Catherine of Siena. The Lord did many comforting favors to this saint, and among them one in particular. He appeared to her one day and said: “Daughter, forget thyself to remember Me; and I will think of thee and take care of thee’—Cogita tu de me, et ego cogitabo continenter de te. Oh, what a good agreement and what a good exchange! What a great gain this would be for our souls! Now the Lord is ready to come to this agreement with each one of us: forget yourself and give over scheming; and the more you forget yourself to remember and trust in God, the greater care will God take of you. Who, then, will not accept this division, so advantageous and so consoling, being that which the spouse says she had made with her Beloved: I to my Beloved, and he in turn commits himself to me (Cant. vii. 10). And elsewhere: My beloved to me, and I to him (Cant. ii. 16).