PRAYER FOR ILLUMINATION

That truth has been inscribed into our heart and into the heart of every human being, there to be read and reverenced, thanks be to you, O God.

That there are ways of seeing and sensitivities of knowing

hidden deep in the palace of the soul, waiting to be discovered, ready to be set free, thanks be to you.

Open our senses to wisdom’s inner promptings that we may give voice to what we hear in our sou and be changed for the healing of the world, that we may listen for truth in every living soul and be changed for the well-being of the world.

– JP Newell

Luke 4:1-13

The Temptation of Jesus

4 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, 2 where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over, he was famished. 3 The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” 4 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”

5 Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6 And the devil said to him, “To you I will give their glory and all this authority; for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 Jesus answered him, “It is written,

‘Worship the Lord your God,
    and serve only him.’”

9 Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, “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.’”

12 Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” 13 When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.

Pulling away is so important to do…for our very being really!  I try to practice this…as many of you know, it’s hard to reach me on the morning of my day off, Fridays.  I try to stop and be still and listen to my body, my soul.  I also practice getting away on personal retreats and pilgrimages…set aside times for a change of pace, scenery, and for self-reflection, rest, and renewal.  

This morning’s gospel lesson is about Jesus being away…as Jesus followers, it’s good to follow his example and pull away from time to time.

A special place for me is the holy island of Iona, where there has been an Abbey for 1300+ years and where pre-Christian Celts also revered…it’s an island made of the oldest rock in creation, did seem quite remote and austere…as well as the Island of Mull which you pass through to get there.  

I have been there a few times now, and I’m looking forward to taking a crew from here there this fall.  Each time I’m there, I feel like I could have stayed longer, even 40 days…it is a time and place of intense and wild beauty, as well as good journalling and thinking…and lovely walks and vistas.  I’m kind of jealous of my daughter getting to work there this summer!  

In this morning’s passage, we don’t know if Jesus was actually away for 40 days…40 is simply a biblical number given to say he was gone for a while.  

While there, he was tempted.  Now, we all face temptations, don’t we?

I know that we all struggle with some temptations.  There are certainly temptations such as eating too much chocolate or going into excess on something.  But, what’s the root of temptation?

A temptation for me, is that I sometimes fantasize about winning the lottery, getting lots of money and funding some of the things that I think are amazing, but seemingly never have funds.  Of course, I always think I’d save a bit of the money to pay off the bills, travel, pay for kids college…and that list kind of grows…of course, then I also realize that I’d spend most of the money before I gave it away!

Noted author, speaker, theologian and philosopher, Henri Nouwen talks about the temptations of Jesus in his book on Christian Leadership, In the Name of Jesus.  He says that Jesus, like all leaders are tempted in three ways and that we can practice certain disciplines that will help us move towards a better sense of wholeness and health:

1. The first temptation of turning stones to bread is the temptation to be relevant.  We want to do something that is related to our experiences or others.  Yet, that’s a trap, it’s like me winning the lottery so I can fund the world’s great projects…you can spend so much time on that, that you lose sight of yourself.  Yet, Jesus wants us to know that we are loved and that we can return that love…as we grow in our understanding of God’s love for us, we don’t have to be relevant, yet, we can become confident.  Nouwen goes on to say that the key work or practice for us to move towards a deeper sense of awareness and confidence, is contemplative prayer.  Spending time listening to God’s love for us.  
2. The second temptation of jumping of the roof only to be caught is the temptation to be spectacular.  Can we impress others with something.  Yet, God calls us to practice the simple work of serving others, of being with people, listening to their stories, encouraging one another, and living authentically.  Our discipline that leads us away from the temptation of wanting to do something spectacular is to be able to confess to others and ask forgiveness.  That’s hard to do, to yield to others, yet that gives us the humility to grow and to mature.  On a side note, our church is practicing this service to others in humility, not only with our local mission partners, but with our church’s giving to humanitarian relief efforts in our country and around the world.
3. The 3^rd temptation of being given the world is the desire to be powerful, to get others to do what we tell them!  To get at others before they get you…really, to have others bow before your wishes, to get your way.  Yet, Jesus tells us that, in order to lead, one has to follow.  And you have to trust others to take you where you may not want to go.  We aren’t given the world, but we are given each other.  Our discipline or practice is to think about God’s actions, God’s word to us, to look at Jesus, to have theological reflection.  That allows us to look at our motives and to be shaped inwardly which moves towards outward actions. 

Temptations lure us in to something innocently enough and with seemingly good intentions.  This season of Lent is meant to be a time of recognizing and resisting temptations, and to take on practices or disciplines to help us to have perspective and grow.  To give us space to pause, reflect, and re-wire our brains and hearts. 

Author and speaker, Dr. Brene Brown, in her book Rising Strong, says that our brains get stuck in particular patterns that are hard to break.  The only way to move out of those patterns is by creating a new practice, a healthier practice.   Oftentimes those new practices require courage.  It’s easy to give into the temptations around us, but moving towards a new practice can lead to our thinking patterns being changed and a new way of being.

The early church understood this.  They didn’t have a lot of the dogma that we have today.  For a few hundred years before Christianity became sanctioned by the roman government, practice was more important than doctrine.  Folks knew that they needed community and that they wanted meaning in life and a new way of being.  Christians practiced welcome, grace, hospitality, a sense of equality was practiced between ethnicities and gender, all were one, and there was deep commitment.  When someone joined the church, it was a huge commitment; it could cost you your life.  Yet, the rule of love was so compelling that folks were drawn in…the early church folks didn’t ask new members of the faith a lot of questions about belief, but they took time to be in the practice of loving one another.  It created new patterns of being and doing.  

Our Christian forefathers and foremothers had an understanding of God’s relational nature, which gave birth to the concept of God as trinity, and that Jesus entered into this world, and became sin for us, for all of humanity.  That understanding of trinity was actually embedded in humanity even before Jesus.  Ancient Israelites believed that God was community, check out the first chapter of Genesis where the author states that creation was made in “our image”, God being referred to in the plural.  The ancient Celts also had an understanding that things came in threes, and the concepts of circles…that we need relationship and we can be held together in a circle, in a community.  Jesus’ response to temptation even is our response, we may fail, often, but ultimately, we win because of Jesus’ work for us and in us….and as we practice loving in the way of Jesus, we begin to fall deeper in love with God, we become more of our true selves, even as our overwhelmed with God’s love for and of us.