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Tom Lenhart Let us pray. I confess I was perplexed when I first read today’s passage from Luke that Martha just read. It chronicles Satan’s famous temptations of Jesus after his forty days in the wilderness. What troubled me was why would God set Jesus up this way? Why put Jesus to these tests? If we accept the concept of the Trinity -- that Jesus is the second person, the Son of God -- the outcome of these temptations -- these tests in the desert, on the mountain top and in Jerusalem -- is preordained. Jesus, the Son of God, would, of course, reject Satan’s overtures and enticements. Furthermore, what loving parent would knowingly subject his or her son to such tests – as turning done the opportunity for bread after fasting for 40 days? These were not your run of the mill tests – it was not helping your child prepare to take the SATs or try out for a play. Rest assured, however, that my three years at Divinity School were not a complete loss. I do understand the symbolism of the 40 days of fasting and of the temptations. Elijah fasted for 40 days, Moses fasted for 40 days before receiving the commandments and most germane of all the Israelites wandered in the wilderness for 40 years during which they were subjected to repeated tests of their faith in God. This passage is quite clearly an effort by the writer of Luke to identify Jesus with the heritage of Israel. Further, it suggests that Jesus will fulfill the prophesies in the Hebrew Bible and be the vehicle through which salvation will be available universally to all, Jew and Greek alike. The temptations clarify also that Jesus is the Son of God. It is not that Jesus does not have the power to turn stones into bread, to lead great nations, or safely to jump off the Temple in Jerusalem but his power is not about self but profoundly about others and assuredly about saving us. He, thus, starts his ministry having proven to be above such temptations. He is truly the Son of God and this illuminates and empowers his ministry But this passage serves also to highlight the humanity of Jesus through his exposure to those temptations that threaten to separate all of us from God. Last week in preaching about the transfiguration, I suggested that the point of that mountain top event, whether literally true or not, was to remind Peter, James and John and us, the readers of that passage, that Jesus was the Christ – the Son of God and that unique identity makes all the difference in our understanding of Jesus’ life, death and resurrection. It seems to me that one of the principle points of today’s passage -- these temptations of Jesus and his responses to them -- is to highlight the other side of the Christ paradox -- that Jesus was also a flesh and blood human being. Perhaps the most vexing issue for the early church, indeed for the church and believers in all ages, is this question how to understand Jesus Christ. Is he the Son of God and/or also fully human? It is the issue that split our forbearers into Congregationalists and Unitarians. Council after Council in the early church -- some of which you have heard of such as the Council at Nicea and many that you have not -- struggled to come up with a formulation -- a verbal formula -- that would describe this paradox. The most famous of these formulas -- the so-called “Definition” developed by the Council at Chalcedon in 451 CE proclaimed that Christ has two natures – one divine and one human. Neither of which is divided from the other nor confused with each other.[1] Now if you think about it that statement is itself paradoxical. While I don’t believe our passage solves or eliminates this paradox, it does add to our understanding of Jesus. Jesus “full of the Holy Spirit” travels to the wilderness. The phrase “full of the Holy Spirit” is often used in scripture to signify a moment of prophecy or to identify someone who is a prophet. As with Moses and Elijah, those called to be prophets often retreated to the desert to re-center, recharge and to reorient themselves to what God had in mind for them. And fasting – as many do in a modified way by giving something up at Lent – also served to re-center and refocus them. Jesus’ time in the desert is, thus, not so strange. Indeed, those of you who have gone on a spiritual retreat will find much of the experience familiar. There is, therefore, nothing other worldly about Jesus’ endeavor or time in the wilderness. What then happens? After he has spent his time in the wilderness – not during the 40 days but after -- he is tempted to separate himself from God – to sin. Again think about our lives, how often is it that after we have seemingly sorted things out -- got our life together -- that we are sorely tempted to take the easy way out or tempted by the seductions of our world. Now the presence of the devil or as identified in older translations Satan -- is I admit a bit different. None of us I expect will admit to meeting with Satan. But if as many suggest Satan is the personification of our own inner instincts to selfishness and sin then it is not so strange to find oneself in the presence of Satan or in the parlance of modern Star Wars mythology to give oneself over to the dark side. It is particularly enlightening to look at the temptations themselves. On the surface they do seem a bit strange. The first, the challenge to turn stone into bread is not one that we human beings usually confront. Or do we? This challenge as well as the others are not surprising framed in Hebrew Bible terms. The Israelites were often confronted with the stone/bread dichotomy as they entreated God to provide for them in their time in the wilderness. As you will recall manna appeared at just one of these times. Jesus’ response to Satan’s challenge reveals what is really going on here. While styled as the challenge to use divine power to turn stones into bread, this temptation is at bottom a test about what is most important in life. Is it material possessions alone – the bread of life that is important or are there other things -- love of family, friends, neighbors, doing justice and walking humbly with God – that feed us that are more important? It is the question that lurks behind all of our decisions about how we spend our time and resources. It is, as Jesus response reveals, a faith question The second test of Satan, I submit, is also a test that we confront. What does Satan offer Jesus but power – political and economic power. “Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And the devil said to him ‘I will give their glory and all this authority [to you].’” (Luke 4: 5-6) And what does Jesus have to do to obtain this power – no more than turn from God to the devil. Or put another way to turn from relying on God to rely instead on himself. To paraphrase the test in terms we may recognize -- we can have all the power we want if we turn from God – that is if we place ourselves and our desires at the center of our lives. That test has a familiar sound. In the world of my prior experience -- the siren sound of power and authority echoes every day to challenge even the best of people in law firms, financial institutions and corporations. If there is a common thread to most corporate and political fraud, it is primarily not a desire for money and power but a consuming desire that the only person that matters is the perpetrator. That is why there is so little contrition by such folks in the face of the shattered lives of those whose jobs; pensions and careers have been lost on the shoals of such fraud. The final test is in many ways the cleverest of the three. Why shouldn’t Jesus believe God will do what God has promised to do “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here …” Why because God has promised that you will be unharmed. Can’t you hear Satan or that inner voice saying to Jesus or to us “what’s the problem? Why not confirm that he is really there, all knowing and all powerful and up to it.” If we think about it – it’s really a test of faith. How often in our lives do we want control, to be secure in our faith, to be absolutely sure, to have hard proof – that God is real. We want God to be at our bidding, not the other way around. Like Satan we want God to prove himself by doing miracles for us. So the Jesus who struggles in the desert is to me a flesh and blood human being. The temptations he faces are fundamentally similar to the ones we grapple with in life. Those tests that Jesus passed and we sometimes fail. The questions he faced are the ones we face. What are we to put at the center of our life – accumulating material things or perhaps amassing power and authority. Moreover, are we really able to trust in God -- to have faith without proof certain? Don’t we want God to show himself at our bidding? Lent has traditionally been a time in which believers engage in penitence. It is said that penitence is good for the soul – perhaps. But I think it is not enough. The time in the wilderness reveals that Jesus shares our humanity – our pain and suffering – was fully human but also in his steadfastness faith and obedience -- in his success in defeating these temptations – he points the way forward for us. In passing each of the three tests Jesus invokes three passages from Deuteronomy, “one does not live by bread alone,” “worship the Lord your God, and serve him only,” and “do not put the Lord your God to the test.” (Luke 4: 4, 8, and 12) These responses highlight for us the fundamental challenge of faith – putting God at the center of our life. Each of Jesus’ answers shows how to love and be obedient to God. So as we reflect on our tests in Lent – it is important to focus on the fact that so much turns on what we put at the center of our lives. For Jesus the temptations were perhaps real but not hard. For us they are real and hard and we fail at times. What Lent is about is not simply penitence but about the message that obedience to God as embodied in the life, death and resurrection is the basis of faith and our salvation. In Jesus we have been given not simply a paradigm that is a “how to” primer but even more profoundly grace that enables us to face our future tests with confidence even when we fail now and again. So what are we to do? What does it mean to be obedient to God? Paul provides us with some help but not what we expect. One would think the answer might be that we just need to act better. Help the poor; be kinder to family and friends and even those we don’t like. But Paul says that is not where we are to begin. As Paul suggests, “For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved.” As we contemplate during Lent the tests and temptations that are put before us, we need to focus on our beliefs. What Paul is telling us is that one starts with faith in the heart not works. What we do in life is important – heaven knows! But what Paul is saying is that the order of things is critical. We do not obtain grace and salvation through good works. Rather they are gifts that come to us through faith and belief in God as mediated to us through his son Jesus Christ. We do not overcome our temptations by will power alone and doing the right thing. Any one who is a cook or a chemist will tell you that the order of putting ingredients into a recipe or compound makes all the difference. So it is with our lives. We are justified – that is we are in right relationship with God because in our hearts we believe. That belief, however, is not held in silence but requires the confession of the lips. Belief thus guides and compels our actions and our good works. Barbara Brown Taylor, the Episcopal priest, has written, our relationship to God is not simply a matter of what we think or how we feel. It is more comprehensive than that, and more profound. It is a full-bodied relationship in which mind and heart, spirit and flesh, are converted to a new way of experiencing and responding to the world.[2] Belief in the heart -- that combination of thinking, feeling and imagining -- are the starting point. You may be asking but what if I have doubts – what if I wrestle constantly with my beliefs. Does that mean that I have failed somehow? Thomas Merton’s words in his book, No Man Is An Island, are an apt description of unlocking the knot of faith, it is not “a sphinx’s riddle, which we solve in one guess or perish.”[3] Indeed, in an ironic way – the need for certainty is a manifestation of our very need for proof and control. That is Satan’s view of belief not God’s. Faith is a dynamic and changing and at times uncertain reality. That’s OK. There is no need to skip that step in the recipe. The wonderful message of Jesus Christ -- Son of God and yet one who was fully human -- is that no matter how uncertain our beliefs we receive the gift of grace and of forgiveness for those tests and temptations we confront along the way. Amen |
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