Embracing trust in life's tightrope walk

Then Blondin walked over to where the Duke was seated.

“Do you believe I could take a man across in this wheelbarrow?” he asked.

The Duke answered in the affirmative.

“Hop into the wheelbarrow,” Blondin offered.

The Duke, of course, wouldn’t do it.

“Is there anyone else here who believes I can do it?” Blondin asked.

No one from the crowd volunteered. Finally, an older woman stepped up — Blondin’s own mother — and was successfully wheeled back and forth across the tightrope. The Duke believed that Blondin could do it. But only Blondin’s mother trusted her son.

Our relationship with God should be not like the Duke of Newcastle, but like Blondin’s mother.

Faith is theoretical; you believe, but you don’t have skin in the game. Trust is practical: if the person you trust does not, in fact, know how to wheel a person across Niagara Falls, you will be up the creek without a paddle — literally and figuratively.

The Rebbe — Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory — described the difference between emunah (faith), and bitachon (trust).

“Bitachon is not merely the faith that G-d has the potential to bestow good upon a person and save him from adversity and the like. Rather, it means that the person trusts that G-d will actually do this. And his trust is so absolute that he is completely serene and does not worry at all.”

As Chovos HaLevavos, the classical work on Jewish ethics, states, “The essence of bitachon is the serenity felt by the person who trusts. His heart relies on the One in Whom he has placed his trust — that He will do what is best and most appropriate for him in the matter at hand.”

The decisions we make in life need a component of trust — without that, we would be paralyzed with indecision. We do our research, we put in the effort and we trust that our investments will pay off and that our efforts will bear fruit.

When you interview a candidate for a job, you are putting faith in their words and abilities. If you hire them, you are demonstrating that you trust them. When you date someone, you do so because you believe they’re a good person. When you marry someone, you are saying that you trust them.

As the Jewish people prepared to enter the Promised Land of Israel, Moses spoke to them, explaining what was different about their new home.

“For the land into which you are entering, to inherit it, is not like the land of Egypt from which you are coming, that you sow your seed and water it with your feet like a vegetable garden.

“The land into which you are crossing to inherit is a land of hills and valleys, which drinks water of the rain of the heavens. A land which the Lord your God seeks; the eyes of the Lord your God are constantly on it from the beginning of the year to the end of the year” (Deuteronomy 11:10-12).

In Egypt, farmers would plant crops in the fertile Nile Delta, and every year, like clockwork, the Nile would flood its banks, fill the canals, and they’d irrigate the crops — pushing wheels with their feet to raise the water into the irrigation ditches. They might have had faith, but they didn’t need trust.

Not so in the Holy Land. In Israel, the farmer would plant seeds and turn his eyes heavenward, awaiting the rain, trusting in God to provide.

It is human to want to be in control of our own destiny. But ultimately, no matter how much effort we put in, there will always need to be a degree of trust that our efforts will bear fruit. The serenity that comes with not only faith, but trust in God empowers us to do our best work, confident that we will be blessed with success.

Tucson faith leaders, we would like to include your original sermon or scriptures of encouragement. Sermons must be written by the person submitting them, not borrowed from another source or writer. If you are a faith leader from any religion or denomination, please contact Sara Brown at sbbrown@tucson.com.