Lent
1A 2014
Father Adam Trambley
March 9, 2014 St.John’s Sharon
Jesus was baptized by John.
He came up out of the water.
He received the Holy Spirit.
He heard the voice of God, “You are my beloved Son, with
whom I am well pleased.”
He went into the wilderness.
He defeated the devil.
And that is where we are today.
Jesus starts his public ministry with his baptism. As soon as he hears God’s voice telling him
that he is God’s beloved son, the Spirit drives him into the desert where he
prays and fasts. After forty days and
nights of fasting, he is famished.
Scripture points out to us that he fasted day and night, since some
types of fasting over extended periods allowed eating at night, and Matthew
wants to be clear just what Jesus did.
Then Matthew points out that Jesus was famished, to show that Jesus did
the difficult, painfully incarnate work of fasting. He wasn’t miraculously relieved of hunger by
being the Son of God. He went through
what we experience. Then, while
famished, the tempter comes to him, and Matthew and Luke record three specific
temptations.
The three temptations we read about deal with specific
temptations for Jesus in his ministry.
These three also point to three broad areas of temptation that we all
face, while also providing insights into ways we can recognize these
temptations for what they are and work to avoid them.
The first temptation Satan suggests is to turn stones into
bread so Jesus can have something to eat.
We can see in this the first general type of temptation, which is to
give in to our own appetites and our own desire for comfort and
convenience. The deadly sins of gluttony,
lust, and sloth are always available to us if we allow ourselves to fall into
them.
But the devil isn’t offering Jesus gluttony. He says, “Command these stones to become
loaves of bread,” not “command these stones to become an extra-large hot fudge
sundae with Spanish peanuts, whipped cream and cherry on top.” Later in his ministry we will see Jesus create
bread for five-thousand people, and he was known for attending parties. As soon as the devil leaves, the angels are
going to bring Jesus food. No, Satan’s
temptation here is more subtle. The
devil is trying to turn Jesus away from the important work his is meant to be
doing at the moment by focusing on himself and his needs. Those needs are important in other contexts,
but Jesus went out into the wilderness to hear from God, to become closer to
God, and to prepare himself for the difficult commission God had set before
him. His purpose at that time was to
fast and to pray, not to eat. If he
would turn aside from his difficult work now just to have lunch, the devil
should have no difficulty turning him aside later when things get really
dangerous. Jesus’ response is telling:
“One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth
of God.” Bread is great, and important,
but we can’t knead dough when we are supposed to hear from God.
This first temptation gives us a question to ask about our
own temptations. Is whatever is being
offered to us aiding us or distracting us from our primary task at the
moment? Will what has come to mind make
it easier or harder to do what God wants us to do? For example, building community by texting
people is great but not while driving.
Having food at coffee hour is great, but wrangling over the quantity and
selection of donuts instead of focusing on ways to make visitors feel welcome
might be distracting temptation. Having
a meal out with family members is great, but getting worked up over the quality
of the service or details of the food is probably succumbing to the enemy’s
temptations.
This temptation hits us as the general temptation to appear
special, especially special in a spiritual way, which is a form of pride. We are all individually created and loved by
God, and as such we are special at a level that we cannot even fathom. But sometimes we want to be able to show that
we are just a little bit more special than others. Now if we need God to show up for us because
of our own weakness and difficulty, God is always willing to reach out to
us. But performing stunts to prove that
we are important enough that God will protect us is not good, especially when
we intend others to take note. God is
not at our beck and call to make us look good in front of our friends, or even
in front of our enemies.
Of course, the scripture the devil quotes is true, and God
does protect us when we need him to, and we should ask him to protect us when
we need it. If somebody pushed me off
the top of the temple, I’d be praying hard, and maybe even reminding God of
Psalm 91. We pray for those in harm’s
way, like our armed forces. Life is
sometimes difficult and dangerous, and we need God’s protection, especially if
we are engaged in God’s work.
The question for our discernment and avoidance of this temptation
is: Is this about me or about God? If we
want God’s protection to give glory to ourselves, it is temptation. On the other hand, if we want it to further
the work God wants us to do, including being able to live a quiet life of love,
joy and peace with our family, then we are right to pray for help, allowing God
to provide what he wants. Jesus said,
“Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”
But he also said, “Ask and you shall receive.” Another way to think about this temptation,
that is also a nice segue to the next temptation, is to remember the words of
the three young men who Nebuchadnezzar was about to throw into the fire. They asked for God’s protection, but for his
glory, not theirs. They said, “You can
throw us into the fire. We believe that
God can save us if he wants to. But even
if he decides not to, he is still God and we are not bowing down to you.”
Finally, the devil offers a third temptation. He takes Jesus up a very high mountain and
shows him the glory of all the kingdoms of the world. “All these I will give you,” he says, “if you
will fall down and worship me.” Here we
have a specific expression of the general temptation to use evil means to
achieve a good end. The devil shows
Jesus an incredible amount of good that could be done with the seemingly
slightest compromise, a compromise that might not even seem to matter that much
practically. Imagine the ability to
solve all the problems of the world with no painful rejection, suffering or
crucifixion and on a faster time-line that the two-thousand plus years it has taken
so far doing it God’s way. Imagine
eliminating cruel Roman emperors and brutal barbarian warlords and sadistic
petty tyrants with a wave of the hand.
Imagine all of them being forced to bow down and serve every good cause
of your imagining, if only you trade allegiances. This temptation is Frodo offering the ring to
Galadriel, Darth Vader offering Luke Skywalker a job, and the Nazis providing
Captain Von Trapp a naval commission with security for his family in the Third
Reich. Satan’s temptation is to do more
good in the service of evil than we can imagine ourselves doing if we serve
good, and God, alone.
Jesus, of course, has to pass this particular test to save
the world and to reconcile it back to God.
He would abdicate his mission if he is willing to be a Messiah of any
sort except God’s suffering servant who fully reveals God to the world. Everything Jesus does, regardless of how
effective it seems at the time, must be about God’s glory and nothing
else. “Worship the Lord your God,” he
rebukes the tempter, “and serve him only.”
Then the devil leaves him.
For us, when facing temptations in the practical
rough-and-tumble of daily life, two questions can shed light for us. The first is: “Does this action give glory to
God, or to someone else?” If we are
focused on giving glory to God, we are likely to avoid immoral compromise,
because God is never glorified by evil.
Sometimes, though, we are in such a mix of trouble and difficulty that
we really have a hard time figuring out the lesser of two evils or where God
could be glorified at all in the midst of a tragic environment. In this case, a corollary question arises,
“Which path puts me at the center and makes my own judgment and accomplishments
primary, and which one leaves more room for God to work, including for God to
work through other people?” We tend to
think that the more we do, the more things rely on our judgment, and the more
control we have, the better everything will be.
That thinking would lead Jesus to trade the devil a bit of worship for
command of all creation. Instead, Jesus
submits to God, allows God to work through him in God’s time, and allows God to
raise him from the dead.
In much of our work, the more we leave for God to do, the
more we allow God to work through the decisions and efforts of others, and the
more we recognize the need for all people to use their gifts to accomplish the
work God has in mind, the more we are going to be avoiding the temptation to
serve something besides God. Usually
what we would serve is not Satan, per se, but our own fears, our own control
needs, and our own agendas, all of which masquerade as goods because of the
enemy’s subtle deceptions. When we
focus instead on worshipping and serving God, we can trust God to take care of
what needs to be done. Then we won’t make deals with the devil to try to do a
better job than what we have erroneously decided that God would be able to do
on his own if he were in charge instead of us.
Let’s review Jesus’ three quotations and a discernment
question to help us put them into practice:
·
One does
not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Will this option aid or distract me from
my primary purpose at this time?
·
Do not put
the Lord your God to the test. Is this about me or about God?
·
Worship
the Lord your God, and serve only him.
Does this put me in control or leave more room for God to work,
including for God to work through other people?”
We can heed Jesus’ scriptural advice, as well as praying regularly,
“Lead us not into temptation.”
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