“Teacher, we wish to see a sign from you.” Some of the scribes and Pharisees in today’s Gospel ask to see a sign. What they are really asking for is another sign. Jesus has been healing and teaching with great authority and still that is not enough. They want just one more sign! Jesus might well be thinking, how much more will it take to convince you? The problem for these religious authorities is that Jesus did some things that fit their expectations of a Messiah but Jesus did other things that did not fit into their understanding of the ways of God. Instead of allowing Jesus to challenge their understand of the ways of God some scribes refused to accept that Jesus came for God and even demonized Him. But other Jews and Jewish leaders allowed God to challenge their preconceived notions and discovered that God was doing something new in their midst.
Like these scribes and Pharisees, I am sure that all of us would like to see a sign, one more sign to make our faith strong and secure. But there are already signs of God acting all around us if we take the time to look. Ultimately faith is built on trust, a trust that comes from the experience of the love of God that we experience through our parents and children, family and friends, in the church and outside the church, in the goodness and beauty of creation and as we look into ourselves and see there the image and likeness of God. Faith is trust, signs point us to the compassion and goodness of God but they cannot prove God with scientific certainty.
As we ask Jesus today for a sign, Jesus tells us to look all around us and at ourselves and see there the presence of God.