Lent 1
February 21, 2010
Deuteronomy 26:1-11
Psalm 91:1-2, 9-16
Romans 10:8b-13
Luke 4:1-13
Is there anybody here who has never been tempted? Is there anybody who has never given in to temptation? I didn’t think so. In fact, I can be pretty sure that each of us has had our bouts with temptation; sometimes we win and sometimes we lose. We lose because we are human; we win because we are also divine. Divinely made by our God for the good we are capable of being and doing, but subject to temptation because of our human propensity to sin.
Luke’s gospel account of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness is instructive. I like Luke’s account of this story because Jesus seems so human to me, even as he shows us how divinely capable he is to resist the temptations of the devil. Jesus makes resisting temptation seem humanly possible; not just the small temptations we experience daily, but the big ones, as well. And Jesus does it with the same tools we have at our own disposal as a baptized people of faith.
The first tool Jesus shows us for resisting temptation is the Holy Spirit. Ironically, Jesus is led into that desert wilderness by the Holy Spirit. And that seems odd until we realize that the Holy Spirit is not leading Jesus into temptation, he is merely leading him to the place where he is most likely to be tempted. If you remember, Jesus has just received the Holy Spirit in a very public way at his baptism. But, as we who are baptized know, that does not automatically mean that our divine Jesus will be able to resist temptation because, after all, he is also still very human.
So, while the Holy Spirit leads Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted, the Spirit also dwells in Jesus. You might say she resides in Jesus’ tool box, ready to serve God’s good purpose for him. As baptized Christians and people of faith, we can also claim that the Holy Spirit is in our tool box; she is also journeys with us into those wilderness places of temptation, and she is ever ready to guide us through them.
Another tool Jesus has in his tool box for resisting temptation is the authority of scripture. We also have that tool in our tool box. It is the authority of scripture. When Jesus finally comes face to face with the devil and his powerful temptations, Jesus makes reference to a powerful source of scripture to refute each one of them. But as Timothy tells us in his epistle, only those who read, mark, learn and digest scripture can rely on its power and authority to serve us in our times of trial.
In each of the ways Jesus is tested Jesus also shows us how to deal with the devil who tempts us. In our gospel account the devil’s temptations are tests. In the devil’s first test, Jesus helps us remember that the devil is always looking for us in our most vulnerable places. After 40 days in the desert wilderness Jesus is hungry. The devil challenges Jesus’ divine power to turn a stone into a loaf of bread. Jesus realizes the devil’s temptation is not about his hunger; it is not about the bread. The devil is testing the divine power and authority of Jesus to see if he can get him to use them for selfish purpose. But Jesus does not fall for it. He knows he is meant to use his power and authority to much greater purpose. “One cannot live by bread alone,” says Jesus. And Jesus passes this first test with flying colors.
How instructive this test of power and authority is for us; to realize that we have also been given the power and authority to resist the things our bodies hunger for, so that we can use them for God’s greater purpose. When you think of it, Jesus’ ability to resist temptation would be greatly compromised if he had been intent on satisfying only his human hunger. But Jesus stays plugged into the power tools that can see him through this temptation: the power of scripture and the power of the Holy Spirit. He is able to resist the tempter’s snare and delusion that a rock can really feed our hunger and satisfy our need. And he will not waste his power or use his authority to make that happen.
Jesus shows us how important it is to know when our bodily needs and passions are pressuring us to give in to their tempting promises of reward and satisfaction. He shows us how necessary it is for us to stay plugged in to the power of the Spirit and the authority of scripture to help us ask the important questions which help us discern the difference between our wants and our needs. Questions like, what do we really hunger for? What is lacking in us that causes such hunger? How do our wants become needs, and how do our needs become obsessions? What can we do about it? How can we find holy ways to resist our wants and healthy ways to feed our needs? Jesus answered those questions with promises of Holy Scripture and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And so can we.
We are well-familiar with the devil’s second test. The devil promises Jesus the kingdoms of this world to rule by his own power and authority. “If only you will worship me,” says the devil, “it will all be yours.” Jesus refutes this temptation with these words of scripture: “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.” How often are we faced with the temptation that if only we had more, could be more, would accomplish more we would be happy, content? And how often do we succumb to the promise that we can have it all, only to find that when we get the things we want, they cannot make good on their promise that they will satisfy our hunger for them.
Our news is filled with stories of people who sell their souls for the promise of wealth, or power, or status, only to find that wealth and power and status do not only NOT satisfy their hunger, they only create a greater hunger, and a more willful desire to compromise their souls, until their constant striving brings them to ruin. I think of the hunger for money and the temptation of greed which sent Bernie Madoff to prison for life, or the hunger for power and control which resulted in a political scandal ending the presidency of the most powerful leader of the western world. I read about he hunger of entitlement which fed the scurrilous passions of politicians like John Edwards and Mark Sanford, sports stars like Tiger Woods and religious leaders like Ted Haggard and caused them to fall from a place of status and adulation to shame and public humiliation. And how instructive it is to watch as such sinners as they try to redeem themselves. Their public statements of remorse echo the judgment, the grace and the promises of scripture which enable them to admit their sins, seek forgiveness, rebuild their damaged relationships and restore them to good repute. Even more, they seem to recognize that it takes a power greater than themselves to accomplish that feat. We Christians call it the power of the Spirit.
The devil’s third test might not be so obvious to us, because it catches us so unaware that we often don’t even recognize its power over us. It is the temptation to test God. It is the temptation to believe that God will respond to our personal will and whim. That God will save me from myself. That God is on my side. That I am the center of God’s concern, even at the expense of others. When the devil dares Jesus to throw himself off the pinnacle of the temple to prove that the angels will protect him from the fall, Jesus refutes this foolish temptation in these words of scripture: “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” But even people of faith put God to the test.
How many of us have challenged God in such ways. Okay, God, I’ll believe in you but only if you show me! Or, I will do what you want me to do, but only if you give me a sign. Or, hey, God, you didn’t give me what I asked for, so I will stop believing in you, and stop going to church. Then there are the ways we test God by trying to bargain with him. If you will do this for me, I will promise I will.... Or, this test which comes in a comment often made by survivor of a horrible tragedy. “It was God who saved me.” I wonder, do they know what else they are saying in that statement. Like, how worthy I am, and how unworthy are those who died? And what does that statement say about God? That God plays favorites? That God chose me because I am special?
It is the height of human arrogance, I believe, to presume that God acts on our own will, or for our own purpose, to accomplish our own good. That we even presume that we can try God’s hand, and put him to a test of our own making. Because God’s hand will not be moved except by his own will, and for his own purpose. What is instructive about Jesus’ third temptation is that the devil would tempt us to put our own self-will, and our personal understanding of God against the test of scripture and the experience of faith. We don’t make the rules for God, rather God gives us the tools of scripture and faith so that we can live by his rule for our life.
There is much we can learn about God and Jesus, about the devil and temptation, about the authority of scripture and the power of the Holy Spirit, and there is a lot we can learn about ourselves in the events of Jesus’ temptation. We learn that Jesus faced the same temptations we face. We learn why he succeeds and why we sometimes fail. We also learn that we have the same tool box Jesus was given to face our temptations. The authority of scripture and the power of the Holy Spirit. But we have a few other tools in our tool box that Jesus did not have, because he did not need them. He did not need them because as scripture tells us, “Jesus was tempted in every way, but did not sin.” But we are human, we fall prey to temptation, we fail the tests. We sin. And so, God gave us Jesus who brought with him the tools of redemption, tools of forgiveness and reconciliation which can restore us to ourselves, to our God, and to the people who bless our life.
As we begin our journey with Jesus through this Holy Lent, let us remember that because of Jesus’ suffering and death and resurrection, there is no journey we can take in this world that will not lead us to God. No desert, no wilderness, no temptation, no sin which can keep us from the love of God and a life of holiness. As long as our tool box is full, and our tools worthy; as long as we are plugged in to our source of power, and we are always ready to have Jesus teach us how to become more proficient in using them for the purposes of God’s good, and ours.