Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7
Psalm 32
Romans 5:12-19
Matthew 4:1-11
1st Sunday of
Lent
Temptation
Today is the first Sunday of
Lent. Lent is traditionally a forty day
season in which the Church seeks a closer walk with God through repentance and
fasting as we prepare for Easter.
Originally, this season of fasting and repentance was intended for new
members of the early Church. At one
time, new converts to Christianity had to go through a two year "new
members' course" before becoming full-members in the Church on Easter
Sunday. The season of Lent was
originally a time of intense preparation for these new members and was marked
by fasting. Over the years, the rest of
the Church started to observe a Lenten fast in
support of these new members. As the
Church grew and became more established there was less need for this type of
"new members' class" because more and more people were growing-up in
Christian homes and entering the Church through infant baptism and confirmation
type classes as opposed to converting to Christianity as adults. However, Lent continued to be observed
because it is just as powerful for people who have been Christians all their
lives to take time to focus on their walk with Christ through fasting and
repentance as it is for new members.
The season of Lent begins with Ash
Wednesday, which was this past Wednesday, and goes to Maundy Thursday, the
Thursday before Easter. I mentioned that
Lent was a forty day season of fasting and repentance. If you count all the days, you will notice
that there are actually forty-six days.
That's because Sundays are not counted as part of the Lenten fast. Every Sunday is a celebration of Christ’s
resurrection. That’s why the early
Church worshiped on Sunday. In a very
real sense, each Sunday is a “little” Easter.
Since every Sunday is really a celebration of Christ’s resurrection,
every Sunday is considered a feast day; a day in which we should celebrate and
therefore, we do not fast on Sundays. Instead,
we may have whatever we’re fasting from in celebration of Christ.
As we proceed on our Lenten journey,
we will discover that each Sunday has a different theme attached to it. This Sunday’s theme is temptation. Temptation is an aspect of human nature that
has been with us from almost the beginning.
It is something that we all experience.
We can even experience it on a daily level. Although temptation has a negative context to
it; that is, we think of temptation as being enticed to do something bad; temptation
is actually being enticed to do something that you’re attracted to – bad or
good. Sometimes you can be tempted to do
something good. For instance, the
Christmas season typically tempts people to give more to charities. Today, we’ll explore aspects of temptation;
both good and bad.
Our reading from Saint Matthew’s
Gospel is one in which we have the opportunity to see Jesus as being very
human. Jesus is out on a prayer
retreat. You will notice in the Gospels
that Jesus is often on prayer retreats.
I’m convinced that if we are truly serious about becoming more Christ
like, we too must not only spend more time in prayer, but also intentionally go
on more prayer retreats. Anyways, this
is a very special prayer retreat that Jesus is on. He went out into the wilderness; to a very
secluded place. In addition to prayer,
Jesus also fasted. At the end of forty
days of fasting, the devil came and tempted him. He first tempted Jesus with food. Oh, the devil was rather crafty; he didn’t
simply offer Jesus some bread, but instead tempted Jesus to not only break his
fast, but tried to get Jesus to make the bread himself! This wasn’t just about the devil tempting a
hungry man, but also trying to get Jesus to prove who he was. “If you are the Son of God, command these
stones to become bread.” He was trying
to tempt Jesus with pride as well. Let’s
face it, when we’re hungry we like food and when we’re special, we like people
to know it.
Then, the devil takes Jesus to the top
of the
Finally, the devil takes Jesus to a
very high mountain where he showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the earth and
offered them to Jesus if only Jesus would bow down and worship him. Again Jesus uses God’s Word as well as an
understanding of God’s nature to turn the devil away.
I mentioned that we get to see a very
human Jesus in this passage. Although
Jesus refused to submit to temptation, the things he was tempted with were
things that human beings would be attracted to: food and special identity,
physical protection, and worldly power.
The truth is, we are tempted with things that we like. I assure you, I have never been tempted by
Brussels sprouts, but pizza on the other hand…
Now, this passage from Saint Matthew’s Gospel makes overcoming bad
temptation sound easy. After all, devout
Christians would most likely turn down anything that the devil offered them if
the devil appeared before them and offered it.
The problem is we’re not often tempted by anything that we recognize as
the devil.
In our reading from Genesis, we hear
the story of the first temptation. The
devil isn’t even mentioned in this reading.
Yes, there has been a tradition of identifying the serpent as the devil
or at least an agent of the devil, but no where does scripture state that the
serpent was the devil or his agent.
Scripture does state that that “the serpent was more crafty than any
other wild animal that the Lord God had made.”
What’s unique about this passage is that the serpent was crafty not
because it was able to tempt Eve, but that the serpent tempted Eve with
something that Eve wasn’t initially interested in. Adam and Eve were cool about not eating from
the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
It seems as if the thought never crossed their minds. But the serpent drew Eve’s attention to
it. Notice that it was only after the
serpent approached Eve about the tree that scripture says, “So when the woman
saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and
that the tree was to be desired to make one wise;” only then do we understand
her as being tempted. Eve had most
likely seen that tree many times without giving it one thought. It was only after the serpent pointed it out
and said that the tree was something special that Eve started to covet it. Even though we may realize what we like
initially, we are nonetheless tempted by what we like.
In these two stories, we hear of
temptations; desires of grandeur in the case of Jesus being tempted by the
devil and desires of things that were not initially tempting in the case of Eve
being tempted by the serpent. In both
cases, the temptation was intended to bring about a negative consequence. Yet I mentioned earlier that temptation is
not always bad. I mentioned that we can
be tempted to do good things. We can
also use temptation as a reminder to draw closer to God. During our Lenten fast, we intentionally
allow ourselves to be tempted by the things we are fasting from. Since we are intentional about our fast, we
are more sensitive to temptation. For
instance, I am fasting from meat during Lent.
When it comes nearer to meal time, I’m tempted to cook or order a plate
with meat on it as that is what I’m used to.
However, since I’m conscious of the fact that my Lenten fast is meat, I
learn to recognize the cravings as temptation.
I’m therefore reminded to take time to pray, to ask God for strength, to
thank God for being able to have meat just about whenever I want the rest of
the year. In this way, temptation that
normally is used to try to separate me from God is now being used to draw me
closer to God.
Temptation is a normal part of the
human condition. It has been used in the
past to separate us from God. Temptation
can be overcome by turning to God.
Because of this, temptation can also be used to draw us closer to
God. Our Lenten fast is like an exercise
where we practice our response to temptation.
Our response can be away from God or toward God. I urge you this Lent to take up fasting and
practice turning toward God in the face of temptation.
SDG