If I were bold, I would do it in pen, but it seems I would always make a mistake and the picture wouldn’t look quite right. I enjoyed the connect-the-dot pictures I used to do as a child. Sometimes the images were simple and had a few dots to connect, others had more details and were much more complicated to follow. The end result was a picture that I had drawn, and for a girl who did not get that creative gene, it was always a proud moment of accomplishment.

I’m 80 days into the Bible-in-a-year podcast with Fr. Mike Schmitz, and I’m starting to connect the dots for a much more detailed image of the story of salvation. A story that isn’t just history, but the present and future too. For about the past 30 days, the story has been of the desert wanderings and I’ve realized that my education about salvation history has been the Cliff Notes version, the punctuated key points. However, it’s in the minutia of text that is both the foundation and explanation of why the key events were important. I remember learning that because the Israelites worshiped the golden calf, while Moses was meeting with God and receiving the 10 Commandments, they were punished by being made to wander in the desert for 40 years. That is true, but it’s really only part of the story. 

Taking the story back to Egypt, why did God send the plagues on the Egyptians? The high level answer is that Pharaoh would not let them go. The deeper answer is that the Israelites were starting to behave like the Egyptians, worshipping their deities and following their customs. The plagues that God brought on Egypt were symbolically denouncing their deities and illustrating that He, and He alone, was the all-powerful God. Each plague corresponded to an Egyptian deity, and by controlling those created elements, God was educating the Israelites and breaking their erroneous beliefs. When they slid back into worshipping a false god, God had to give them additional education, thus the 40 years wandering in the desert. 

I’ve heard many homilies that link the 40 years the Israelites spent in the desert to the 40 days Jesus did, as well as the 40 days of Lent. Yet it’s only been after reading what transpired in the 40 desert years that I see how God was instructing the Israelites, giving them opportunities to practice trusting in Him (which often revealed itself as an issue). Living in the Promised Land was not going to be an end for the Israelites, but rather the beginning. Living according to God’s law, they were to be an example to the world as it was known then. They were to be a shining beacon that would gather all the peoples and bring them into belief of Yaweh, the personal God that took care of those who believed in Him and followed His commandments. That was to be the Israelites’ mission: to evangelize the world for God. Likewise, Jesus spent 40 days in the desert preparing for His mission: to preach, to heal, to die, and to rise again. Every year we are called into the desert of Lent to learn from God and to practice trusting in Him. Even though at the end of every Mass we are called to, “Go in peace, glorifying the Lord by your life,” we use the time in Lent to dig deeper into what God is calling us to do: our mission.

In connecting the dots of the desert wanderings to Jesus’ time in the desert and our Lent, I see that while times and details change, the pattern remains. And yet while the mission is to evangelize the world to God, how we do it — the focus of our activities, may change from year to year. Some years we may be called to spend in prayer, other years may be to donate to a particular Catholic charity, while other years we may be asked to be active participants helping to serve the needs of others, bringing the light of Christ to those who need it most. We are all called to a mission. When we fully embrace our own unique one, there is no limit to what God can achieve working in us. We only have let go and let the picture emerge, just like it does when we connect the dots, not just in pen but in permanent marker!