March 9, 2025 – First Sunday of Lent
Jack Belsom
I don’t know about you, but over the last few years, I have felt like we have been wandering in the wilderness. My wilderness involves how I will use my skills, my time, and my resources. Will it be in line with what I believe or not? For the church, the wilderness looks like dwindling worship attendance, lack of young people in the church, very few people willing to serve as leaders, and difficulty maintaining buildings. The church is not alone in that wilderness. Seminaries, colleges, and non-profit organizations are also struggling. Will we stay true to what we believe is our calling, or will we follow the world’s plan for success?
While it is enticing to picture the “devil” as a red angel with horns, a tail, and a pitchfork, the tester—what the bible tells us is “Satan’s” function—is most often among us as familiar voice and a genuine desire. Some ask, “If Jesus was alone in the desert being tempted, how do we know what happened?” Mark only says, “12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 He was in the wilderness forty days, tested by Satan, and he was with the wild beasts, and the angels waited on him” (Mk. 1 12–13). Matthew and Luke expand that with details that any good storyteller would fill in. Storytellers always have a purpose, and sometimes it is difficult to figure out what that purpose is.
First, Matthew, Mark, and Luke all report that at Jesus’ baptism, God makes clear he is God’s beloved, chosen one. Second, all three also agree, that the Spirit immediately drives Jesus into the wilderness to be tested. They do not say Jesus sought trials and temptations, but they agree that Jesus accepted them because of his mission. They also agree that the “testing” went on for a long time…even on the cross.
And, there is something else they tell us. Jesus wasn’t abandoned by the Spirit. We pray, “lead us not into temptation,” and that is what we desire.
However, we also pray, “But deliver us from evil (or ‘the Evil One’). For thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory.” Encountering temptation is a given; getting through it without selling out is not.
Evil works through distortions and lies. It presents wants as needs, falsehoods as truths, and distrust as faith. Sometimes Satan’s second pitch—that all the kingdoms of the world have been given to him—sounds as if it could be true. It is false. That is false, and that falsehood demands that we worship something or someone other than Ke Akua—the One Holy God. Who or what are we willing to trust and worship? [Kimberly M. Van Driel, Feasting] Choices between good and evil are not so difficult. Choices between one good and another or one evil and another can steal our souls. New Testament scholar, Sharon Ringe puts it this way:
These are not “temptations” to do things that are desirable but not good for him (like our“temptation” to eat an extra piece of cake). Rather, these are tests to see whether even good things can lure Jesus from a focus on God’s will—or can lure believers into following a more comfortable messiah. [Feasting on the Word Commentary, Year C, Vol 3.] [The following examples are based on Sharon Ringe’s commentary.]
The devil’s challenges are not to do bad things. What’s wrong with turning a stone into a loaf of bread? Jesus was hungry after his long fast. What’s more…why not turn all those stones into food for the hungry of Judea. In a land dominated by an empire that placed first claim to all food for its elite and left the poor starving, Jesus could be quickly acclaimed as the new Moses to lead the people out of slavery and into the promised land. Bread is good but not sufficient to define Jesus’ mission.
In the second test, Luke has the devil in the role of “ruler of the world.” Just as Rome established Herod’s rule, the devil is tempting Jesus with power to rule. This could be the long-awaited regime change from foreign domination to local rule. The price: worshiping the devil. Every Jew learns the Shema: “4 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord alone.[a] 5 You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might” (Deut. 6:4–5). All authority belongs only to God. Even playing the world’s game of seizing power at any price is to risk serving something less than God.
There is a movement in the United States and around the world called the New Apostolic Reformation. Based on “prophecies” of current charismatic “prophets,” it wants to have its “apostles” in positions of power in government to establish God’s kingdom on earth. The movement wants to call it establishing a “Christian nation.” To me it sounds like worshiping power over others and not the God who liberates and invites all to live under God’s rule—not domination.
In the third challenge, the Devil quotes scripture. Jesus is placed on the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem. “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’11 and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” A better translation would be “Since you are the Son of God.” There was no doubt about it. The Temple and its system often technically supported the foreign domination because to do otherwise would put the temple, the priests, and the religious leaders out of business. Surely, reform was in order; so, why not demonstrate your identity and mission dramatically in Jerusalem. Jesus answers for the third time quoting Deuteronomy, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test” (Deut. 6:16).
The temptation was always to lure Jesus away from focusing on God’s mission and his role in that, or to lure believers into following a more comfortable messiah…Though he refused to turn stones into bread, he does feed the hungry (Luke 9:10–17). Though he refused political power, the proclamation of God’s empire of justice and peace is the focus of his preaching and teaching. Though he refused to jump off the temple to see if God would send angels to catch him, he goes to the cross in confidence that God’s will for life will trump the world’s decision to execute him. Game, set, and match to Jesus! [Sharon Ringe, Feasting on the Word Commentary, Year C, vol. 3]
In following Christ, in confronting temptations, may God grant us enough faith and trust to resist following comfortable messiahs. Amen.