Jesus, Save Me

March 5, 2017

First Sunday of Lent

At this, Jesus said to him, ‘Get away, Satan! It is written: ‘The Lord, your God, shall you worship and him alone shall you serve.'” Matthew 4:10

A priest once told me that the one prayer Jesus always answers with a YES is this one: – Jesus, save me!

Whenever I notice I am being tempted, whenever I feel like there is an evil presence around me, I say – Jesus, save me. And then I feel some peace.

We are all tempted in one way or another. We are all sinners. We are all in need of being saved. In today’s gospel, Jesus gives us the answer we need.

Keep God first in our lives. Keep our eyes on the Lord.

Then we will be more aware of the temptations, more aware of our sins, more aware of our need to turn back to God.

Many years ago at a bible study, we were talking about that well-known verse of John 3:16 (“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life.”)

And the priest teaching the bible study told us something that I have never forgotten. It was very simple and yet profound.

He said that God’s job is to love the world and send His Son. And that Jesus’ job is to love the world and save the world. And our job is to believe.

And then he asked us a kind of rhetorical question – “How well do you think Jesus does his job?”

And I thought to myself, how well do we do ours?

Jesus, help me when temptation comes and I find it difficult to resist. Help me to always turn to you. Help me to always believe. Amen.