Lent 1C
February 21, 2010
St. Dunstan's
The Rev. Patricia Templeton

"Jesus, Tiger, and the Tempter"

I was sitting at home Friday morning reading about today’s gospel, when the words from the TV in the next room caught my attention.

“I thought I could get away with whatever I wanted to,” a voice said. “I felt I had worked hard my entire life and deserved to enjoy all the temptations around me. I felt I was entitled.”

The temptations of Tiger were playing out against the temptations of Jesus.

Jesus, Tiger, and the Tempter. You don’t have to be a biblical scholar to know who wins that match up.

We all know the story of Tiger Woods’ spectacular succumbing to temptation.

Jesus’ story is just as spectacular, the temptations he faced just as alluring.

Just about every time we gather to worship we say the Lord’s prayer, with it’s familiar words “lead us not into temptation.”

It is hard to think of God leading someone into temptation; we more likely think that God would lead us away from those things that beckon us from the path of faithfulness and righteousness.

But scripture says that God’s Spirit deliberately led Jesus directly into the wilderness, specifically to be tempted.

The Spirit leaves Jesus alone and hungry in the wilderness, engaged in a difficult struggle about what it really means to be about God’s business.

After 40 days without food, when Jesus is famished, tired, and vulnerable, the real struggle begins.

The Tempter, perhaps sensing weakness, points to a stone and taunts Jesus. ‘If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.”

As hungry as he is, Jesus does not take the challenge. He does not have to perform tricks to prove who he is.

Next, the devil shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world, and promises him glory and authority over all of them if he will just bow down and worship him – just one time.

Again, Jesus refuses to take the bait. He does not need that kind of fame and power; he is secure in the power he knows he has from God.

Finally, the devil takes Jesus to Jerusalem, to the pinnacle of the Temple and dares him to throw himself off. “If God really loves you, God’s angels will protect you,” he taunts.

But Jesus, perhaps remembering the words that rang out from heaven at his baptism, “This is my son, the beloved, with him I am well pleased,” does not succumb to the temptation to prove he is loved.

Three times the Tempter tries to get Jesus to prove himself. Three times Jesus resists the temptation.

Writer Mary Gordon says of this story, “One of the rare human achievements is to be so sure of oneself that one resists the temptation to prove one’s own worth to someone else.”

It is a rare achievement, indeed. Fame and fortune do not protect one against this need to prove one’s worth – as we have seen time after time with sports and political figures, who either are trying to prove to themselves they are loved, or who have a sense of entitlement, that the rules do not apply to them.

Jesus shows us another way.

Before he performs his first miracle or attracts his first follower, before anyone has an inkling of who he is, he feels no need to prove himself. He knows who he is, but that knowledge does not give him a sense of entitlement.

We’ve heard this story of Jesus being tempted in the wilderness so many times that it is hard to recognize its importance, hard to take it seriously.

We have no trouble at all believing the Tiger Woods succumbed to temptation, but who believes that Jesus ever seriously considered any of the Tempter’s allures?

We’re not very comfortable with the idea that Jesus might be susceptible to the seductions of another way of life.

And yet, that’s exactly what our gospel reading today does say. That Jesus is human; that the devil’s offers are attractive and alluring, are tempting.

If temptation had no allure for Jesus, like it does for all of us, then he would not truly be human, would not be our redeemer.

There are, of course, different kinds of temptations. Some we know from the beginning are wrong – unfaithfulness to a spouse, stealing, bribery. We may succumb to those temptations, but we know we are doing wrong when we do.

Other temptations may not be so obvious at first glance. Real temptations can be deceptively attractive, can beckon us to do something that can be seen as good.

We are not tempted to do what we cannot do, but what is within our power. Real temptations are not always black and white choices between good and evil, but are often gray and ambiguous.

After all, why shouldn’t Jesus turn stones into bread? When the people of Israel were in the desert God provided them with water from a rock and bread from heaven.

Why shouldn’t the Son of God do the same?

Why not compromise just a little, and pretend to submit to Satan just once? Isn’t that a small price to pay for political power over the whole world, power that could be used for good and justice.

And why not leap from the pinnacle of the Temple? Wouldn’t that be the ultimate leap of faith? Wouldn’t it show how powerful God is, a display of power that might convince others to believe?

We are not just tempted to do things that are obviously wrong. We are often tempted to do what on the surface appears to be good.

In the movie Broadcast News, the Tempter appears in the person of Tom, a broadcaster who is handsome and charming, but has few scruples about the ethics of journalism. Tom will do anything to get a story, and to promote himself in the process.

When Aaron, a dedicated and honest reporter, realizes that his friend Jane is attracted to Tom, he is appalled. He tells her that Tom is the devil.

“What do you think the devil is going to look like?” Aaron asks when Jane protest. “Come on, nobody is going to be taken in by a guy with a long, red, pointy tail.

“He will be attractive, he will be nice and helpful, he will get a job where he influences a great God-fearing nation, he will never do an evil thing, he will never deliberately hurt a single living creature.

“He will just bit by little bit lower our standards wherever they are important,” Aaron says. “Just a tiny little bit; just a tiny little bit.”

Just a tiny little bit. That’s where the real danger lies. We know the obvious evils, and even if we occasionally engage in them we at least know we’re doing something wrong.

It’s the “little bit” that gets us. The compromises we make in our work or family life, convinced that compromising our principles just a little is OK if it accomplishes a greater good.

We convince ourselves it’s OK to cut the corners a little, to bend the truth a little, to keep quiet in the face of a little injustice, to neglect our faith a little.

It happens on a national level, too. It’s OK to ignore the Constitution a little at Guantanamo Bay. It’s OK to kill a few innocent people in Iraq or Afghanistan. It’s OK to lie a little if it helps our national interests.

And then suddenly we wake up one morning and we’re not the people we thought we were. Little bit by little bit we have strayed until we don’t even know who we are.

Jesus begins his ministry by going into the wilderness to discover who he is, what it means for him to do God’s work, to struggle with what kind of messiah he is meant to be.

He is offered the chance to be a superstar, but he chooses to be a servant. The superstar package is alluring and seductive – it would allow him to do many of the things one would think a messiah should do.

But by listening to God’s Spirit that filled him at his baptism, by being attentive to God’s word in scripture, Jesus is able to turn away from the temptation to be a superstar. He is able to discover who God created him to be, what the real purpose of his life is.

If even Jesus struggled with temptations, then we can be assured we are not exempt from the modern-day devils with all their attractive packaging and seductive come-ons.

We, like Jesus, must be willing to be led by the Spirit into the wilderness where we can wrestle with those temptations and discover who God has created us to be, what the real purpose of our lives are.

Lent is the season the Church has traditionally set aside for us to do just that. It is a time to examine our lives, to listen to which voices are calling us, to wrestle with how we should respond, to pay attention to those “little bits” of sin.

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Readings

Deuteronomy 26:1-11

Moses said, “When you have come into the land that the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance to possess, and you possess it, and settle in it, you shall take some of the first of all the fruit of the ground, which you harvest from the land that the Lord your God is giving you, and you shall put it in a basket and go to the place that the Lord your God will choose as a dwelling for his name. You shall go to the priest who is in office at that time, and say to him, ‘Today I declare to the Lord your God that I have come into the land that the Lord swore to our ancestors to give us.’ When the priest takes the basket from your hand and sets it down before the altar of the Lord your God, you shall make this response before the Lord your God: ‘A wandering Aramean was my ancestor; he went down into Egypt and lived there as an alien, few in number, and there he became a great nation, mighty and populous. When the Egyptians treated us harshly and afflicted us, by imposing hard labor on us, we cried to the Lord, the God of our ancestors; the Lord heard our voice and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression. The Lord brought us out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm, with a terrifying display of power, and with signs and wonders; and he brought us into this place and gave us this land, a land flowing with milk and honey. So now I bring the first of the fruit of the ground that you, O Lord, have given me.’ You shall set it down before the Lord your God and bow down before the Lord your God. Then you, together with the Levites and the aliens who reside among you, shall celebrate with all the bounty that the Lord your God has given to you and to your house.”

Romans 10:8b-13

“The word is near you, on your lips and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim;) because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For one believes with the heart and so is justified, and one confesses with the mouth and so is saved. The scripture says, “No one who believes in him will be put to shame.” For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; the same Lord is Lord of all and is generous to all who call on him. For, “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

Luke 4:1-13

After his baptism, Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, 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. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’” Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. 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. If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’” 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, for it is written, ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’ and ‘On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’” Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.

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