Today is the first Sunday in Lent. We can say a few things about Lent. It is a season of darkness, we've just come from Christmas and epiphany, both joyful,bright seasons now we are in a season filled with many more valleys than mountain tops.
Lent is a season of self-denial, when we are called to live with less, maybe to remind us of what we have, maybe to remind us of what we have and have not done to deserve what we have. Maybe to remind us that what we have comes from God.
It is a time when we are told that we should fast, deny ourselves rich food, when we should repent, examine our sinful ways and return to the Lord. It is a time when we prepare for the painful story of Jesus' death on the on the cross.
Because of that part we often describe Lent as a journey where we travel to the cross. And it is a journey that starts in the wilderness. That is why in our gospel lesson today we find Jesus in the wilderness being tempted. During Lent we are meant to put ourselves in the midst of a wild place. And when you think of wilderness, don't think nice serene forest by a stream but a place filled with snares and dangers. I was recently talking to someone who was telling me about a snowmobile trip that he took where he had maybe ten miles of gas left in his tank, he was lost and he had been wandering so long that it was dark outside and the temp was steadily dropping to well below zero. That was terrifying wilderness.
Or living near the desert like I did for a while growing up, every year there a few stories of some hapless hikers who thought that they could make it through a day with no shade or shelter in the 110 degree sun and only one water bottle, who collapse or get lost from the trail. That is terrifying wilderness. Our text said that Jesus was famished he was tempted, he hadn't eaten or had any companionship for forty days. He was lead out by the Holy Spirit and tormented by the devil, that is terrifying wilderness. And that is where we are meant to begin our Lenten Journey.
So the next question, the obvious question if you really think about it is why? Why would the church which is apparently the instrument of God, who apparently loves us no matter what, want us to travel through this wilderness? I think that answer isn't that it wants us to travel through the terrifying wilderness but that it knows, God knows, that we already do.
Maybe not on schedule, maybe not always the 40 days before Easter. And maybe it doesn't look like you are picturing it, Freezing dark forest or scorching hot empty, dry desert. If it did you wouldn't go there. That is part of the problem it looks like nothing you'd ever know or even be able to avoid. It looks like a hospital waiting room. It looks like a lawyers' office, it looks like the principals office or the police station, it looks like your dining room table, it looks like your desk as work, it looks like the mortgage payment or the electric bill. Maybe it doesn't look like anything but it feels like your racing heart, your short breath, your empty home, your broken heart. All these things that feel like they could overwhelm us, just swallow us up. We don't label these things very often anymore but we could and if we did we could call them satan, evil, the devil in our lives. Our text does. And Jesus encounters them in it.
Jesus is baptized, he hears the voice of God say, this is my son with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him. So immediately everyone around knows that he is the Son of God. And then before he has a chance to say or to do anything he is lead into the wilderness. And he stays there for forty days, being tempted and tested. It says he was hungry, he was powerless, he was broken and he is tempted to do all sorts of things to overcome that for himself but he doesn't, he waits it out, he calls on God and ignores the voice of evil. And once he is done he leaves he desert, and he can declare to all people that he has overcome evil.
That he has good news, that he is Good News that he is the son of God sent to be baptized like us, to walk through the wilderness like us, to live and die like us and in the midst of it all to overcome evil for us. He started with the wilderness, and then he got on the road to death. The text says that after tempting him satan departed from him until an opportune time. Well is that what it says? It actually says he departed from him until an opportune time. No one, even still, is sure what Luke meant when he wrote that. There is a good argument that Jesus is the one who departed until an opportune time.
I like that reading better. All that evil, all that brokenness, all that wilderness, Jesus left it until, well scripture tells us until Good Friday. Until the end of Lent, until he died and descended into Hell overcame evil once and for all and was resurrected to tell us about it. Death and the devil, endless wilderness were overcome for our sake. Jesus replaced the death that should come at the end of the deepest, coldest darkness with new life. Overcoming evil for all time. So that we are no longer alone in the wilderness, no longer left to be tormented by the evil one in our lives but rather walking with God, his rod and staff to comfort us, his hand to feed us, his arm to save us from our enemies and finally his love to let us rest in green pastures and beside still waters. Desert is transformed into meadow and pasture and wilderness is transformed to a place of life and refuge where we are reminded that we are never alone even when life wanders with us in its grasp.
That is why we wander in the wilderness during Lent. Lent, believe it or not actually means life, it means spring, the time when all growing things begin to come to life.
At the beginning of this little reflection I talked about what Lent is and why, it is a season that we strive to walk through the wilderness, that we live without, that we live in the darkness, maybe to remind us of our brokenness and need to return to God. But more than that to show us that because God has turned to us, walked through the wilderness for us, we can live through the wilderness. Lent is always a journey. But it is always a journey to Easter. To joy and new life in the living Lord Christ. Thanks be to God. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment