Lent 1 Year A

Genesis 2;15-17; 3:1-7 Psalm 32 Romans 5:12-19 Matthew 4:1-11



Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

It really matters where this story starts. That first word matters. “Then” connects this story with what has happened before into a sequence of events. And just before this story Jesus has been baptised. A voice has named him: “This is my Son, the Beloved.” That matters. It also matters that the main actor right at the start is the Spirit. Jesus ends up in the wilderness, in solitude because the Spirit has led Him there.

The details matter. So often we come to this story at the start of Lent as though it were a hard start in Jesus’ life. We talk about Him being tested at the beginning of His ministry. As this time in the wilderness as an ordeal, a hardship to get through and come out the other end the victorious winner. Or as His own personal spiritual bootcamp, teaching Him the skills He needs to survive the rest of His ministry, or perform well in His ministry. It’s so seductively tempting to fall into an image of Jesus as a hero figure, a superhero, even perhaps a warrior tested and trained for a hard-fought victory in the battle to come.

But this isn’t a hard start in Jesus’ life, it’s a following on from what has gone before. As Matthew tells it in his gospel, His birth into a long line of faithful Jews, His presence as a challenge to the cruel and insecure leadership of the day, His public recognition by a family friend turned preacher man and His baptism. All, so far culminating with that naming “This is my Son, the Beloved”. Jesus’ time in the wilderness, is time for Jesus to continue to get used to what that actually means, time to continue to understand what lies at the heart of who He is. It’s about His identity, His vocation, how He lives His life, what sort of person He is. And in the rest of Matthews gospel, Jesus deepens that sense of identity and calling through the decisions He continues to make in what He says and what He does.

Some of what happens in that wilderness place we hear about in the form of temptations. Like many tempting things, they aren’t full blown enticements or compulsions to do something really evil and wicked. Like many tempting things they are about real-life problems, almost ordinary conundrums. Here’s how to find food when you are hungry, better still, here’s a brilliant way to solve the food insecurity of the people around you. Here’s a way to end the speculation about who you are, clarify your status and stance with something spectacular and impressive. In a world where power is exercised badly and tyranny rules, become a leader, in fact, here’s a way you can take over completely in order to ensure the world is run properly. And all of them temptations for Jesus to find ways to validate who He is. “If you are the Son of God..” do this. And yet, the real story is not the temptations, but that Jesus finds ways to resist that drive towards validation and simply hangs on to, rests in, sits with, those words He has already heard “This is my Son, the beloved, in whom I am well pleased.”

The late theologian Rachel Held-Evans one said “Jesus did not simply die to save us from our sins; Jesus lived to save us from our sins. His life and teaching show us the way to liberation.” Jesus does feed people, there is bread later, but it a taking of what is already there and a sharing of it. Jesus does reveal who He is but there are no stunts and spectacles, there are acts of solidarity and vulnerability. Jesus does invoke and imagine a new way of doing power and authority, but it is grounded in love, deep love and compassion.

There’s a narrative deep within the psyche of us all that tells us to be free we must find ways to secure ourselves; we must be in control; we must act immediately and decisively in ways which impress others. These are some of the great temptations of humanity and, I think, sadly, we are currently seeing them played out by some of the most powerful people in the world around us. Liberation, freedom for us as individuals and us as communities, does though, I believe, come from following the way of Jesus. It comes with sharing and generosity and service to others. It comes with solidarity and vulnerability. It comes with acts of deep love and compassion. It comes with being faithful to that deep sense of call and identity as children, beloved of God.

All that said, I am still a little bit stuck on that first line “then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil”. There are times in life when we are in places and situations not of our own choosing. Places we are led to or life leads us to. Sometimes, if we are honest, it’s not the leading that we focus on, its’s the leaving. These are places that we feel we have been dumped in, or left in. And these are places that feel like a wilderness, lonely, dangerous and sparse. Sometimes this happens as part of the whirlwind surrounding a life event, some major life drama we didn’t expect. Sometimes, perhaps more frequently, these are times in the daily course of living and working and relationships and community and life, where we have to make decisions and we feel the loneliness of that responsibility. These too, are times about our identity, our vocation, how we live our life, what sort of person we are.

It takes courage to accept that we are in a situation we haven’t chosen. It takes courage to stay in that place and not immediately run away. It takes courage to decide over and over again in small ways, as well as big, to live as children loved by God, and, crucially, with the compassion that recognises that everyone is a child beloved by God. It takes courage to be quietly faithful, to live with a deep sense of integrity, to do the work in decision making that no-one else knows about or sees. And yet, perhaps, the word is “then” this is exactly how God’s story continues. It is how our story connects with and adds to, that great story of freedom and liberation.

I want to end with a poem by the writer Alice Taylor I found this week, a longing, a prayer, for Lent that talks about this work we do in wilderness spaces, spaces we haven’t chosen, spaces which form our identity and what sort of people we are:

Give me space
To roll out my mind
So that I can open
Locked corners
Where lost thoughts are hidden.
I need time
In a quiet place
To walk around
The outer edges
Of my being
To put myself
Back together again.