On Wednesday, we officially entered the season of Lent. Lent is our
40 day journey to Easter, mirrored on the forty days Jesus spent in the
Wilderness. On Wednesday, we celebrated the day of Ashes, when we were marked
on our foreheads or hands and were reminded that we were made from Dust and
will return to Dust. Now we are in the
process of walking with Jesus to the cross. In this season, we focus on Jesus’
sacrificial love for the people of God. And, we consider what we must sacrifice
in turn.
Since this season
is based on Jesus’ time in the Desert, it is appropriate that we turn to his
desert journey for our scripture reading this morning. Please turn with me to
Matthew chapter 4 verses one through eleven:
Proclamation of the Scripture Matthew 4:1-11
Then Jesus was led by the
Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.
After fasting forty days and
forty nights, he was hungry.
The tempter came to him
and said, “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.”
Jesus answered, “It is
written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from
the mouth of God.’”
Then the devil took him to
the holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple.
“If you are the Son of
God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:
“‘He will command his angels
concerning you,
and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’”
Jesus answered him, “It
is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
Again, the devil took him to
a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their
splendor.
“All this I will give you,”
he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.”
Jesus said to him, “Away
from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve
him only.’”
Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him. Amen
One of the big
questions that young people and old people alike ask is “Why does God let bad
things happen?” There is a whole branch of theology, called Theodicy that works
to study this question – Why does God permit evil?
I am more of an
armchair theologian than one of the great thinkers of our world, but my answer
when this comes up is that we are not androids. We are not clones. We are not
robots. If God didn’t permit free-will, and allow us to have a variety of life
experiences both good and bad, and God didn’t allow us to make choices for
ourselves, then we would all be perfectly perfect and perfectly bland.
But, when our
world is falling apart and everything is broken, it is natural to want God to
fix our problems and restore what was destroyed.
When Jesus was in
the wilderness, he was tempted by Satan. Satan is an entity from the Abrahamic
religions that seduces humans into sin or falsehood. In Judaism, “the Satan” is
a heavenly prosecutor who is subordinate to God and tests the loyalty of God’s
followers in the heavenly court. When Satan visited Jesus in the wilderness, he
was testing to make sure Jesus remained loyal to God and to the mission he was
sent to accomplish. We believe Jesus had both human attributes and Godly attributes
– Satan was testing Jesus to make sure the Godly attributes were keeping Jesus’
human nature in check. Satan used the temptations to confirm Jesus was
resilient and ready for his future work.
The three temptations
were all things that would have created a “perfect” life for Jesus. Jesus was
hungry; Satan tempted him to turn stones into bread. If you don’t want to feel
hungry or ill or craving, then instantly make food to feed yourself. Jesus
responded no – “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes
from the mouth of God.”
Satan tempted
Jesus to throw himself off of a tall building, to let the angels protect him
from going “splat.” Jesus could command the angels to wrap him in the 1st
century equivalent of bubble wrap and protect him from fear. But Jesus
responded no to Satan and said: “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.”
Satan showed Jesus
all of the kingdoms of the world. He tempted Jesus to never experience shame
and have the opportunity to rule the world, but only if Jesus bowed down and
worshipped Satan. Jesus could have all the political power in the world. But,
no – in response Jesus said “Worship the Lord your God, and serve God only.”
Jesus could have
attained perfection – but he chose to fulfill God’s plan for him, which was
anything but perfect: Jesus experienced pain, encountered broken and smelly
people, felt hunger and thirst, became overwhelmed when people asked him to do
too much, got irritated and angry, and suffered a death in the cross that was agonizing
and harsh. Jesus could have attained perfection, but instead chose to be like
us – broken and vulnerable.
We will never
attain perfection. We try to arrange our lives in ways that are happy and
healthy. We work to make good choices for our health and our diet. We work to
include among our friends people who are loving and supportive. We try to find
fulfilling careers and fun activities. But, no matter what choices we make,
many things happen to us that are not under our control. Our bodies do things
that surprise us. We have accidents. People we love become ill. Sometimes our
best laid out plains are missing a key detail that make everything go awry. No matter
what we accomplish, we can’t make our lives perfect.
When Jesus faced
temptation, he chose to go with imperfection. At Satan’s bidding, Jesus
actually had the power to make his life perfect. But, he chose to live out his
calling and not turn his life into a little bubble of perfection. Jesus told
Satan to go away, that Jesus decided to trust God. Jesus knew his limitations – perfection was
not possible. Instead of striving for perfection, we are reminded in this story
that we need God. We need God’s grace. After his 40 days of struggle, Jesus was
sent angels to comfort him in his weariness, to comfort him in his loneliness
and pain….he wasn’t sent angels with bubble wrap to protect him from all future
wrongs, but to tend to Jesus in the midst of his fatigue and hunger. God didn’t
leave Jesus, his beloved child, to figure everything out on his own. After
Jesus overcame the temptations flung at him, Jesus accepted God’s love and
help.
We are also called
to remember to learn to accept God’s love and help. God blesses us through our
imperfections. God did not make us perfect to begin with. God made us all
different. God doesn’t expect us to have everything in our lives perfectly
figured out and perfectly under control. God knows things will go off the
rails. And, when they do, and messiness happens, and life happens, it is our
calling to turn to each other for support and to turn to God for love and help.
Let us trust in
the Lord our God, who blesses us in our imperfection. Amen.
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