February 13, 2005; The First Sunday of Lent, Year A
The Rev. Harold "Skip" Comer, Rector
Did you ever do something after you were told not to? I remember one Sunday afternoon when I was about twelve years old. I was bored so I decided to play catch with a solid rubber ball by bouncing it off the side of the house. My mom came out of the house when she heard the noise and told be to stop before I broke a window. Well, I stopped for a while, by throwing the ball up in the air. But that wasn’t as much fun, and soon I was bouncing the ball off the house again. On the first throw the ball smashed through a hallway window. My first instinct was to run because I knew I was going to get it. For some reason I decided to face the music and went inside. My mom was not very happy to say the least. After being scolded I had to clean up the mess and was then informed that I would not only have to pay for the window, but that I was expected to fix it.
Our readings for this morning have to do with sin – doing something that we are not supposed to do. From Genesis we have the familiar story of Adam and Eve eating the forbidden fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. Surely this was not the only tree in the garden that had fruit on it. And I would find it hard to believe that God would make the fruit on this tree so inviting that Adam and Eve would not be able to resist it. But then the story is not about the fruit, it is about disobedience and maybe even greed.
But the devil made me do it! According to the story a serpent, who we identify as the devil or Satan, is the one who plants the idea of disobeying God into the heart and mind of Eve. Let me say up front that there are all sorts of theological reasons that the story is told in this manner. I do not believe that all fingers point to Eve. I believe that Adam and Eve share the blame and guilt for their action.
It is a wonderful excuse, “the devil made me do it.” But in reality, the serpent, devil, or Satan cannot make us do anything. All that the devil can do, if he can do anything, is to introduce temptation.
Our Gospel reading of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness by the devil makes that perfectly clear. In this story the devil presents three different temptations to Jesus. These three temptations have been classified as temptations of the flesh, the devil or evil, and the world.
Let’s take a look at them. The first temptation was to satisfy Jesus’ hunger. He had fasted for forty days, and as Matthew describes it, Jesus was “famished.” So the devil presents a temptation to satisfy Jesus’ hunger, or his “flesh”, by turning some stones into bread. While the temptation seems innocent enough, behind the temptation is the use of faith and the power of God for Jesus’ own use.
An extreme example of this would be the proclamation used by David Koresh at the Branch Davidian authorizing him to have sexual intercourse with all of the females, married or single, old or very young, that were his disciples.
The second temptation urged Jesus to demonstrate his faith in God by jumping off the pinnacle of the temple. If he really was the Son of God, God would rescue him. Jesus’ response is pretty straightforward, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” We live in a world where we continually test one another. Sometimes it is to prove that we are strong, like North Korea developing a nuclear bomb. The thinking being that now nations, especially America, will treat us with fear and respect. Then there are other times when we are more subtle, perhaps saying something like, “If you really care about me you will ________ (fill in the blank). What kind of faith would we have if we continually needed to test God to see if he really cared about us? And what kind of sensational acts would God have to perform in order for us to believe. Jesus realized that one of the dangers in performing miracles is that people would come to believe that he was the Son of God solely by the miracles that he performed. When he quit doing miracles, or didn’t do one spectacular enough, the people would leave because they had no real faith.
Finally the devil promised the whole world to Jesus if he would just fall down and worship him. What was at stake for Jesus was his identity. Was he the Son of God or the Son of the world? This temptation would be repeated several times in Jesus’ life. Should he be and do what the people wanted or should he remain loyal to God’s purpose for him. If Jesus had compromised his identity and purpose at this or any other point, the Gospels would never have been written and we would not be here today. What do we think of athletes who use steroids and other drugs to build muscle and enhance their athletic ability? They have only done it in order to be the best and to win, yet in the process they have compromised themselves and the sport they play in. They are no longer respected as a super star because they have given into temptation; they have cheated, in order to be the best, to win.
Most of us will not face temptations on the same level as Jesus. Yet the real danger is believing that because our temptations are not of the same magnitude, that they can be easily dismissed, or that they really do not matter. All temptation is serious, because it can lead to sin. And sin is what separates us from the love of God.
There once was a couple whose marital relationship had become kind of ho hum. They loved each other, but they did their own thing. One day the man helped another woman whose marriage was falling apart. He gave her a shoulder to cry on and before you knew it they were spending a lot of time together. They ended up sneaking around to be with one another, not for sex, they claimed, but because they enjoyed each others’ companionship. What do you think happened to their marriages? When our loyalty turns to someone or something else, we can lose what we originally had.
The gift of our redemption in Jesus Christ asks for a response, and that response is summed up in the two great commandments: an absolute love of God, and the love of all people. May we as we face temptation embrace this love, and call upon the grace of God to help us remain loyal followers of his Son Jesus Christ.