Lent, the springtime of the Church, situates us between two gardens-- the garden of Eden, that lush middle Eastern paradise where the first Adam lost his innocence and the garden of the Resurrection on Easter morning where Jesus the new Adam wounded and resurrected will walk in peace restoring our lost innocence. In between we spend forty days with him in the desert.
Named by the Father, Beloved Son at his baptism, Jesus is now led by the Spirit into the desert to be tested by Satan. The ache of hunger, the lure of cheap, empty success, the enticement of having all nations under his control by misuse of his power. These temptations are all about the nature of Jesus’ vocation and his ministry, and the Evil One’s determination to have Jesus deny his identity as Beloved Son and to doubt the mission he has received from the Father. As if to say: “Just forget this Incarnation thing. Why bother? It will be too messy. Why trouble yourself? Just be God, you know, heavenly, far away. I’ll take care of things down here. Leave it to me. But now, turn stones into bread. That’ll be easy for you. You’re God after all. Be super-Jesus. Fly. Fall off the cliff and have angels come and rescue you. You can do it in a flash. Why pretend? Just show your sensational power; show us who you really are.” But worse and most insidious of all is that middle temptation: “Deny your true identity as obedient Son of the Father and worship me, and I’ll share all my worldly power with you. Isn’t that all you really want?” Thank God, Jesus will have none of it. He stands his ground, well aware of Satan’s lies; he holds on to the truth of who he is and why he’s come.
My sisters and brothers, the incarnation drives Satan crazy, this mingling of divinity and humanity. For the Accuser knows it is his undoing - God and our flesh forever one. Jesus absolutely refuses to deny his identity as fully human, fully divine, for his humanity is the sacrament of his divinity; the full, real expression of God’s love for us. Satan wants him to deny the self-forgetful Love that he enfleshes. But Jesus wants so much to be like us - in all that is ordinary, obscure and laborious. And so this morning the battle lines are set. Two rival kingdoms. Power and prestige vs compassion and humble service. Satan’s counter kingdom vs the kingdom of God.
As his ministry begins, Jesus makes clear his determination to deliver us from the Enemy, who always wants to lead us away from God. In obedience to the Father, he comes to heal, to feed and to wash our feet. His power revealed in weakness, humble self-offering and compassionate love. Satan wants him to forget this Love that will lead to his excruciating self-emptying even unto death, death on a cross. True enough, Jesus will struggle in Gethsemane, even sweating blood out of fear, but he will continue to surrender to the Father’s will for him. The cross will be his final answer to Satan. For on the cross God will let Himself be murdered for our freedom from all accusations against us, and death will die in Him. Jesus’ victory over sin and death, will be accomplished through his exquisite suffering in quiet trust and obedience to the Father. Satan suspects that something’s afoot, and he’s trying his damnedest to fight back, and he won’t ever give up. Luke assures us that having been dismissed by the Lord, Satan departed from him only “for a time.” The battle this morning is only the first movement in the drama of our redemption.
Jesus’ temptation by the Accuser was to be other than he is, God with us, God for us, God’s most beloved Son. Our temptations are perhaps a zillion variations on a similar theme- to be less than who we are- dearly beloved children of God. Like Jesus we live with beasts, our own inner demons. We are day in day out persecuted, beguiled and tempted but never, never abandoned for we carry about in ourselves the dying of Jesus so that his risen self may also be revealed in us also. This is our hard and beautiful destiny, our baptismal truth. We are in Christ. And this morning he teaches us how to embrace our identity with him as God’s beloved children and to hold fast to our call to serve God and not self. He who is our refuge in all temptations is tempted today and is victorious to reveal to us our power as baptized members of His Body.
Perhaps all this talk of the evil spirit makes us uncomfortable, too spooky, superstitious. But doesn’t our experience tell us that he is very real? For if we desire God, deeply desire Christ Jesus, desire to belong to him, to choose his way, then simple logic will tell us that the unclean spirit, the evil one, will always want the opposite; want to confuse us and draw us away from Jesus. But rest assured Jesus’ power in us through the Spirit is utterly opposed to the power of the demonic; and his self-offering on the cross will mark its ultimate defeat.
We have great power in Christ Jesus, more power than perhaps we realize, to make the grace-filled choice and dismiss the unclean spirit; a power given to us at our baptism, when faith in Christ Jesus was entrusted to us. But it is a power we need to keep asserting, that’s why we will renew our baptismal promises at the Easter Vigil. “Do you refuse to be mastered by sin? I do. Do you reject the glamor of evil? I do. Do you reject Satan? I do.” Jesus is crazy in love with our humanity; longing always to rescue us and bring us home to his Father. And so once again this morning, he will mingle his flesh with our flesh in the Holy Communion we are about to receive.
