First
Sunday of Lent – February 21, 2021
On Wednesday we began the season of Lent. We have 40 days of
Lent until Holy Thursday. The gospel reading for the first Sunday is always the
gospel reading of the temptations of Jesus. Mark’s account of the temptations
of Jesus is the shortest. We are given no dialogue between Jesus and Satan;
temptations are not spelled out in any way. We are told that Jesus is directed
to go into the wilderness. Though he offered no residence, this journey into
the wilderness was not his choice.
We can all be ‘driven’ into the wilderness we don’t choose.
It might be the sudden onset of ill health. It might take the form of some
experience of loss – the loss of a loved one, the loss of a job, loss of
freedom, or simply the realization that something we have wanted with all our
heart, we will never have. There may also be times when we find ourselves in an
inner wilderness. At the material level, everything may be going quite well for
us, but spiritually we feel impoverished, disconnected from God. We can find
our best convictions, our deepest values, being put to the test. The values of
the gospel are not always at home in the world in which we live. We can find
ourselves in something of a moral and spiritual wilderness where there is very
little appreciation for or understanding of the gospel message. Indeed, we can
feel very alone as Jesus must have felt very alone and vulnerable in the
wilderness.
Mark tells us that Jesus was “with the wild beasts; and the
angels waited on him.” We could think of wild beasts and angels as two opposing
forces. The wild beasts could be understood as servants of Satan, putting
Jesus’ relationship with God to the test, enticing him to put himself rather
than God at the center of his life. The angels, in contrast, are servants of
God, supporting Jesus in his time of struggle, giving him the strength to stand
firm in the test, to withstand the assault. There is some parallel between
where Jesus found himself in that wilderness at the beginning of his ministry
and our own lives.
At such times we have to remind ourselves that we are not
alone, no more than Jesus was really alone in the wilderness. The angels are
ministering to us. The Lord’s ministering, empowering and comforting presence
is always at hand. That was the opening message of Jesus as soon as he stepped
out of the wilderness: “The kingdom of God is close at hand.” Jesus had come up
against the kingdom of Satan during his forty days in the wilderness. However,
he emerged from that testing time knowing that the kingdom of God was stronger
than the kingdom of Satan, proclaiming that the reign of God was present for
all. In his letter to the Romans, Saint Paul would put that conviction in a
very succinct fashion, “Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.” That is
why Paul could say to the members of the church in Corinth: “God is faithful,
and he will not let you be tested beyond your strength, but with the testing he
will also provide the way out so that you may be able to endure it.” There may
indeed be wild beast out there, forces that seek to undermine our faith in the
Lord and the way of life that flows from that. However, today’s gospel reading
assures us that there is an even more fundamental reality, and that is the
reality of the Lord’s empowering presence. The angels will minister to us; the
Lord will stand by us. God is constantly at work among us and within us. Like
Saint Paul we can say, “I can do all things in him who strengthens me.”
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam were all born in the
desert. It was through the desert that Moses led the Israelites from slavery in
Egypt to the Promised Land. It was from the desert that John the Baptist came
to herald the Messiah. Jesus entered the desert before his public ministry. He
came out of the desert proclaiming: “The time is fulfilled, and the
kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.” We
are all children of the desert. If we are prepared to engage in the struggle to
be faithful (desert), as Jesus was, the Lord’s grace, the Lord’s presence, will
see us through to the end.
Fr. Don, C.P.