I thought about putting the title of the sermon into a question, like “Are we tempted like Jesus?” or “Does Satan still speak today” and then, I thought, that’s just silly—a question with such an obvious answer that asking it is downright redundant. Let’s be honest here, temptations are something we run from or, in some cases, run to, and if you think that there are any of us sitting here who have never been tempted to do less than the right thing, think again. So how does this story resonate with our lives? That is the question worth asking. Most of us have never seen this Satan and we don’t know whether or not Evil appeared in fleshly form before Jesus either, but, without a doubt, most of us have heard that voice inside us urging us to answer the call to temptation with a resounding “YES!”
Now Jesus returned from the Jordan filled with the Holy Spirit after His baptism by John. This same Holy Spirit led Him into the desert for forty days. This desert does not seem to be the beautiful, romanticized version of the desert we see in stylized paintings of the Southwest. In fact, theologically speaking, “desert” has a very special meaning. And we are called to find ourselves in that barren and lonely place that the Holy Spirit led Jesus. William Loader, from the Uniting Church in Australia, has this to say about the wilderness that we encounter in this story: "Wilderness was the wild place, the waiting place, the place of preparation. It also connected then, as it does now, to very basic spirituality: a place to grapple with God, a place to learn dependence on nature and its provisions, a place of extremes or contrasts, of wild beasts and desert. It is the Lenten space par excellence." It is into this “Lenten space par excellence” that we bring our attention, indeed our very selves, into this day.
There are hundreds of books written on the “temptation of Jesus by Satan” and over the years, I have managed to look at a few of them. This year, however, I have searched for new meaning in the temptations of Jesus, in light of the call we each face to be all that God intends for us to be. I believe that, fundamentally, the temptations Evil placed before Jesus, and similarly before us, are appeals to the easy ‘fix’, or shortcuts to fullness, power and security (in that order), rather than engaging in the quite hard work of growing into spiritual maturity and walking a daily life being led by the Spirit of God.
So, we start in a bare and naked place, a place full of discomfort and dis-ease, a place none of us would surely have decided to go. But Jesus is already there and has been there for 40 days. He has eaten nothing and he is hungry—famished, according to scripture. In this barren and deserted place, a hungry Jesus is confronted by Evil—We hear Evil say: “If you are God’s Own, command this stone to turn into bread.” And why not, we might ask—Jesus was hungry—Evil offered him respite from hunger, but, instead this Jesus says: “Scripture has it, ‘We don’t live by bread alone.’” Jirair Tashjian, of The Christian Resource Institute has this interesting comment on the first temptation: “ It is doubtful whether the devil would have suggested that Jesus turn the stone to bread had Jesus not been hungry. The source of our temptations is almost always our own legitimate, normal, natural desires. The desire for food, sexual intimacy, approval of others is not from the devil. These are wholesome, normal, legitimate desires.”
So, we must ask, and I ask you: How do these normal desires—the desires that lead to a feeling of fullness—get caught up in the excessive, unhealthy pursuits some of us experience in our quest to be filled. The temptation for Jesus was for instant gratification, and, oh, can I identify. But Jesus calls us to a deeper understanding. Notice that Jesus does not say that we don’t need to eat at all. He calls us to see the varied and many things that we need in our lives along with the “bread” that fulfills the natural desires of our bodies and hearts. It is the unasked and unanswered question that we must confront: if we do not live by bread alone, what else do we need to live? This leads us into the dark and hidden places of this Lenten space—but we are not alone, Jesus is already there. We must discover what we truly need to be satisfied and, then, bravely look at what we have used to fill those holes instead. Barbara Brown Taylor, in The Christian Century, challenges us: "That hollowness we sometimes feel is not a sign of something gone wrong. It is the holy of holies inside of us, the uncluttered throne room of the Lord our God. Nothing on earth can fill it, but that does not stop us from trying. Whenever we start feeling too empty inside, we stick our pacifiers into our mouths and suck for all we are worth. They do not nourish us, but at least they plug the hole." Evil tempts Jesus to “plug the hole”. He shows us the way to refuse.
The story continues: Then Evil took Jesus up higher and showed Him all the nations of the world in a single instant. Evil said, “I’ll give you all the power and the glory of these nations, the power has been given to me and I can give it to whomever I wish. Prostrate yourself in homage before me, and it will all be yours.” In reply, Jesus said, “Scripture has it: ‘You will worship the Most High God; God alone will you adore.’” Power: who among us does not desire some kind of power? The desire for power or the abuse of power already had, has led many formerly fine leaders down a very steep path of destruction, sometimes bringing entire companies, churches, and even nations down with them. Henri Nouwen, priest and theologian, asks: “What makes the temptation of power so seemingly irresistible? Maybe it is that power offers an easy substitute for the hard task of love. It seems easier to be God than to love God, easier to own life than to love life.”
Nouwen, in his deeply challenging look at the temptations of Jesus, continues: “One thing is clear to me: The temptation of power is greatest when intimacy is a threat.” He goes on to suggest that, many of us, when called to live our lives with integrity, opening ourselves up to the risk of allowing others to see who we really are, will take the road of assuming power in relationships rather than jeopardize our image of ourselves. Loving God, adoring God alone, means that we bring this love to bear on all we do, making us vulnerable to the pain and struggle of living as we really are in this world.
Thirdly, Evil leads Jesus to Jerusalem, the center of power in those times, and sets Him up high on the Temple, on a parapet (part of the fortification of the Temple) and challenges Him one last time, “If you are God’s Own, throw yourself down from here, for scripture has it, ‘God will tell the angels to take care of you; with their hands they’ll support you, that you may never stumble on a stone.’” Jesus said to Evil in reply, “It also says, ‘Do not put God to the test.’”
Evil, by now, has caught on and so quotes scripture to Jesus in one last attempt to get Him to fall prey to his taunts. Jesus, using scripture to combat Evil’s quotation of scripture, simply shuts Evil up. You can almost see the frustration, and tiredness coming through—the authenticity, the humanity, if you will, in Jesus’ terse, yet efficient response. “Do not put God to the test!” Jesus needs no demonstration that He has security in God and barely tolerates Evil at this point. At that, Evil departs, defeated by Jesus’ steadfastness and faithfulness. Jesus completes what some have called “the final exam” of His 40-day preparation period. And, He passes. But we will see Evil come again, several weeks from now, as Luke tells us, “The Devil awaited another opportunity.” But that will wait for later.
So what then, does Jesus passing His final exam have to do with us? Surely we are not facing something akin to what lie ahead for Jesus. Returning to my original suggestion for a moment, let’s look again at the three temptations:
First—the temptation to “fullness”. We don’t want to be ‘empty’. In fact, emptiness has taken on a pathetic and hopeless face and so we grasp at many things to keep from feeling empty. But emptiness makes room for God to fill us up with ‘godliness’ and pure love. There is a contemporary worship song with a line that is relevant here. The singer sings, “Empty me so I can be filled with You!” I would suggest that this emptying ourselves of all that is out of line with God’s will and purpose is appropriate for this time.
Second, we see Jesus (and in Jesus, ourselves) tempted to assume power that is not ours to assume. Jesus, in His answer, shows that He understands that you cannot worship God alone if you have taken power that was not yours to have. Henri Nouwen challenges us to remain open, vulnerable, and to strip down the walls that we have erected around us to protect our power.
Finally, Jesus grapples with safety and security. Jesus is empty and trusting in God’s power, Evil moves in and suggests that safety and security would be quite helpful at this point. Jesus, without hesitation, says “forget it, don’t test God”. Most importantly, Jesus shifts our focus away from ourselves to God. We are tested, oh yes, but Jesus stands, looks to God, and trusts.
It is in our hungry, empty, naked, frightened times, that we, like Jesus, are most open to the leading of God. Let us, like Jesus, stand strong in those times, turn to God, and, like Jesus, be filled with the presence and Spirit of God. Like Jesus, we will not fall prey to the call to be less than God intends for us to be, to fall short of our calling, our very destiny as the people of God. Like Jesus, we stand in those difficult times, firmly rooted in scripture and surrounded and inhabited by the Holy Spirit of God. Amen.
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