‘THE DESERT ROUTE’

Deuteronomy 26:1-11

Luke 4:1-13

            Before looking more closely at today’s texts, one question comes to my mind.  “Is there anyone here who has never been tempted?  (Or perhaps I should ask, Is there anyone here who has been tempted?)

            The subject of temptations is always a major theme during Lent.  What most of us encounter, in our own lives, however, would usually be called “choices.”  Few, if any, of us are planning to commit grand larceny, or murder or espionage.  But, from the moment we awaken each morning, we are faced with choices.

Cheerios or oatmeal?  Casual clothes or dressy?  A walk with the dog or some time spent reading the morning paper?

            And then we move onto more critical choices:  How should I structure my day?  What are the highest priorities on which to expend my energy?  How will I best nurture my relationships with other people?  When and how will I pay attention to God’s guidance as I make all these and more choices?

            Thanks to the great gift we call “free will,” many of us have to make more decisions, on a daily basis, than we might like to make.  And that puts us in a position to empathize with one young man who went to an appointment with his psychiatrist.  The doctor listened empathetically to his patient and then offered his insight.  “It appears to me you have trouble making decisions.  Would you agree?”  The young man pondered for a moment, and then responded, “Well, yes and no.”  (Braude’s Treasury of Wit & Humor, p. 51)

            The ambiguities of life are ever with us! And, if you were here last Sunday, you’ll remember that Lisa Domke spoke very clearly about how we’re even faced with choices concerning Lent….what we will or will not do to observe this season.  And while we’re not usually transported from place to place, in a physical sense, as Luke says Jesus was transported, still we experience daily the need to choose between bad and worse or between good and better.  We tell ourselves that we intend to make good choices, but then find that living up to that standard can be difficult.

            There was, for example, a road contractor who wanted to stay in the good graces of a certain elected official.  To do this, he offered to give the official a new car.

            The official said, “Sir, the ethics of my office and my personal integrity would never allow me to accept such a gift.”

            “I can understand how you feel about that,” the contractor said.  “So instead of me giving you the automobile, suppose I sell it to you at a greatly reduced price—say for $25.00”

            The official thought a moment and then said, “In that case, I’ll take two.”

                                                            (Complete Speaker’s Galaxy, p. 49)

            The Season of Lent always brings us back to the spiritual basics!  It is a season in which we are encouraged to look at life honestly.  But I would hasten to add that Lent is not a time of “bad news” that precedes the “good news” of Easter.  Instead, it is a time of grace, when Christians can reflect on several important matters….our mortality and our tendency to sin, certainly, but, also, God’s love and saving power. Jesus, himself, was tempted as the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke all declare. Therefore, we can face looking at how we handle temptations and choices with renewed hope and strength knowing that He has walked a similar path ahead of us.

            Having said all this, however, let me acknowledge that we sometimes struggle with whether or not Jesus – the Son of God – could have experienced a real struggle against evil.  Could he possibly have felt like we do when he was faced with difficult choices and competing loyalties?  The Gospels say that he did.

            Luke, however, points out that Jesus went out into the wilderness, after His baptism, “filled with the Holy Spirit.”  That part was good, for he would have needed all the protection possible in the desolate area around Jericho.  That area contains a high hill traditionally known as the Mount of Temptation and most of us would be severely tested being there just one day and night.  Living in that austere location for more than a month would seem impossible!

            The reference to 40 days in that testing place reminds us, of course, of the forty years the Israelites spent in the wilderness as well as the forty days and nights of the Flood.  It is a symbolic number all through Scripture.  And it does not surprise us that the locale in which Jesus’ temptations occurred was the wilderness, for – in Scripture – the area that is uninhabited is seen to be a potential habitat of evil spirits.  The wilderness was often viewed as an uninviting and formidable place, and those who went there were almost certain to be tested to the utmost.

            Luke’s account is crucial in another way, for in the first century it was important that a teacher’s deeds match the teacher’s words.  Those who resisted temptation verified that they could practice what they preached.  I choose to believe that Luke’s earliest readers spotted the correlation between Jesus’ words and his actions and I give thanks that we can still see that correlation today.  And we see that the fight against the powers of evil in which Jesus was engaged as he began his ministry was a battle that continued until his overcame his death on a cross.

            As we read Luke’s account, we give thanks that the Holy Spirit was with Jesus in a powerful way as the temptations kept confronting him, one by one.  And we see that the first temptation, to make bread out of a stone, was a test to see if Jesus would use his power to create immediate gratification.  After all, Luke tells us, Jesus was famished!  But words of wisdom, from Deuteronomy, form Jesus’ response:  “One does not live by bread alone,” something Jesus’ own people had known since their days of wandering in the desert.

            Well….even if physical hunger did not cause Jesus to make the wrong choice, the devil must have thought that maybe the promise of political power would cause Jesus to give in.  So, becoming a sort of “cosmic real estate agent,” the devil promised to give Jesus “all the kingdoms of the world.”  There was one price, of course, which was to worship the devil, himself, instead of God. 

            Would Jesus switch his allegiance away from God?  Would he compromise how he felt God wanted him to use power?  The struggle was real, but Jesus, relying once more on the wisdom in Deuteronomy answered, “Worship and serve only God.”

            Having now lost two stages of the contest, the devil then tempted Jesus to perform an act of heroism by leaping from the pinnacle of the Jerusalem Temple.  And this time the devil resorted to quoting from Scripture, using the words of Psalm 91.  “God’s angels will bear you up and protect you, so what have you to fear, Jesus?”  But Jesus refused to participate in an act of foolish endangerment and once again used a quote from Deuteronomy as his defense.  “Do not put the Lord your God to the test,” for God’s protective power was not to be used for superficial reasons.

            Jesus was armed against the devil’s arguments because he knew the story of God’s faithfulness in the life and history of his own people, a story of their ancestors’ journey that had been told and retold:  “A wandering Aramean was my father,” referred back to the time that Jacob and his family went down to Egypt to find relief from famine.  In that sojourn, all went well until a time came when the Egyptians in power felt threatened by the great numbers of Hebrew people in their midst.  Then it was that God intervened in a powerful way and brought Moses and the people out of Egypt, through the desert and into a land filled with good things.

            And it is in Deuteronomy 26 that we hear the advice given through Moses about what the people were to do when they settled into that Promised Land.  There was a danger of temptation there, just as there had been temptations in the desert. 
Would the people forget how they had grumbled against God (“What shall we eat and drink?”) or the fact that they had quickly turned to worshipping the Golden Calf?  Once they were settled, would they become complacent and not remember how good God has been to them?  As a guard against such behavior, they were told to give back to God the first fruits of all they received.  For then they would be reminded that all they had came from the God who had delivered their ancestors from the difficulties of their desert journey.

            In a similar way, God calls all of us to remember the story of Jesus as we seek to  resist temptation and not take the easy way out.  We are called to be faithful to the One who came to “bring good news to the poor, release to the captives, recovery of sight to the blind and freedom for the oppressed.”  We are summoned to follow the One who did not take shortcuts in fulfilling God’s call in his own life…the One who walked by the desert route, even though that path led to a crown of thorns and death on a cross.

            The power of Jesus saying ‘yes’ to God gives us new power and strength to say ‘no’ in the face of our own testing.  Knowing this, and allowing this truth to penetrate our lives each day, is one of the gifts of renewal offered during this Lenten Season.  Humbly, let us receive this gift as we offer a heartfelt acclamation, “Thanks be to God!”