Luke 4:1-13
Jesus returned from the Jordan River full of the Holy Spirit, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. 2 There he was tempted for forty days by the devil. He ate nothing during those days and afterward Jesus was starving. 3 The devil said to him, “Since you are God’s Son, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.”4 Jesus replied, “It’s written, People won’t live only by bread.” (Deut 8:3)
5 Next the devil led him to a high place and showed him in a single instant all the kingdoms of the world. 6 The devil said, “I will give you this whole domain and the glory of all these kingdoms. It’s been entrusted to me and I can give it to anyone I want. 7 Therefore, if you will worship me, it will all be yours.”
8 Jesus answered, “It’s written, You will worship the Lord your God and serve only him.”(Deut 6:13)
9 The devil brought him into Jerusalem and stood him at the highest point of the temple. He said to him, “Since you are God’s Son, throw yourself down from here; 10 for it’s written: He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you 11 and they will take you up in their hands so that you won’t hit your foot on a stone.”(Ps 91:11-12)
12 Jesus answered, “It’s been said, Don’t test the Lord your God.”(Deut 6:16) 13 After finishing every temptation, the devil departed from him until the next opportunity.
Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.
Today is the first Sunday in Lent.
Lent is Latin for spring, and observing the Church season of Lent began sometime around the Council of Nicaea in the year 325. At first Lent was a time of learning and preparation for those seeking to be Baptised on Easter, and only those who were candidates for Baptism would fast.
Then in middle ages Europe, in order to prevent people from eating their livestock during the spring famines, the practice of everyone not eating meat was introduced. Catholics not eating meat on Fridays is a relic of that practice.
Now there is a modern Lenten practice of fasting or giving something up for Lent. Often something not very good for you, like coffee or chocolate, or fasting from social media for the duration of Lent.
This year, I’m giving up anxiety.
And I’m inviting you to give up anxiety with me.
During Lent, Christian tradition has held the view that every Sunday is a little Easter, even in the middle of Lent. So every Sunday, just like we did today, we will start with Confession and Absolution, and then do our prayers, so we can release all of our anxieties to God.
And I would like all of you to memorize this verse:
Philippians 4:6-7
Don’t be anxious about anything; rather, bring up all of your requests to God in your prayers and petitions, along with giving thanks. 7 Then the peace of God that exceeds all understanding will keep your hearts and minds safe in Christ Jesus.
So maybe you take your bulletin home and cut out Philippians 4:6-7 and tape it to your bathroom mirror. Or take a picture and read it every time you start to feel anxious.
So why fast from anxiety?
Anxiety is actually a useful part of our nervous system’s alert system.
If you’re in a situation that feels unsafe, that’s anxiety telling you to escape the danger.
However, our brains cannot tell the difference between the immediate need to get out of traffic, and the existential dread inspired by current events.
Anxiety that is for immediate threats that require immediate action is healthy and very necessary to keep ourselves safe.
It’s the anxiety that is for long term creeping dread that we can’t necessarily take immediate action on, that I’m giving up for Lent.
Because that long term creeping dread with no clear actions, kind of anxiety, can be overwhelming to the point that we kind of shut down and stop caring.
And we cannot stop caring and still be obedient to God’s call to love our neighbors.
So I guess, you could say that I’m inviting you to give up, giving up for Lent!
This awful ongoing anxiety is usually rooted in 3 basic human desires. And it just so happens that these 3 desires are exactly what Jesus was tempted with in today’s reading from Luke chapter 4. So please open your bulletin and keep the scripture handy!
So after Jesus’ baptism, Jesus does a full 40 day, Lent style fast. Which is why this scripture is so often used for the first Sunday of Lent.
Jesus has been fasting, so the first temptation is bread.
In the Lord’s prayer, and just generally in the Christian tradition, the phrase, our daily bread, is often used to represent our basic physical needs. Give us this day our daily bread – means more than just bread, it means food, water, shelter, clothing — the things we need to keep body and soul on speaking terms!
The reason our daily bread, that is, our basic needs are a temptation, is because the idea of not having our basic needs met feels like a pretty immediate threat, doesn’t it? When the price of groceries goes up, we start to wonder if we will have enough to feed our families. Then we start to feel like maybe we can’t afford to share.
And if things get bad enough, desperate people tend to react in one of two ways:
- Some people will say, everyone for themselves. and do whatever they think they can get away with to get their needs met.
- Other people form community and work together to share what we have and create more resources together.
I like to call this the Star Trek option. Since I just returned from Star Trek the Cruise! There’s an episode of Star Trek Voyager where a bunch of ships are trapped in a space bubble. The ships who choose the, every ship for themselves path, resort to pirating every new ship to come through the entrance. Captain Kathryn Janeway takes the second path and forms a Federation of ships where they all share their resources and ideas for the good of everyone in the group. Guess which group succeeds at breaking out of the space bubble? The Federation.
I think that is exactly Jesus’ point when he quotes Deuteronomy 8:3 “People won’t live only by bread.” That whole section of Deuteronomy is about how God saved the people when they were escaping slavery in Egypt, and that we should continue to keep the commandments of God by walking in God’s ways… The Way that Jesus taught us. The Way of sharing resources, welcoming the immigrant among you as if they are native born, (that’s Leviticus 19:33-34) and continuing to invite people into Beloved Community with us.
Those who are seeking to do evil things for profit want us to be afraid and be selfish. They want us to believe that there is not enough to share and that strangers are enemies.
God wants us to share the joy of being in community together.
The second temptation is Power and Popularity. Look at verse 6
6 The devil said, “I will give you this whole domain and the glory of all these kingdoms. It’s been entrusted to me and I can give it to anyone I want. 7 Therefore, if you will worship me, it will all be yours.”
Domain and glory. Domain as in dominion and domination — that’s power.
Glory – that’s popularity.
Once again, power and popularity in and of themselves are not bad things. Power can be used for good and popularity can be leveraged to elevate the voices of marginalized communities, like when a celebrity backs a charity. Power and popularity are how we get things done in this world. So power and popularity can feel like a need. We can become anxious if we feel like our power to defend our rights is being threatened, or if our reputation is being slandered. We may even be tempted to collaborate with evil in order to have access to power and popularity. Or even to just keep our heads down and go along to get along, but look at how Jesus responds in verse 8.
“It’s written, You will worship the Lord your God and serve only him.”(Deut 6:13)
Once again, Jesus is quoting Deuteronomy in another passage about not forgetting to obey God after moving into the promised land after escaping slavery in Egypt. To Jesus’ Jewish audience this would have been a very serious reminder of their covenant relationship to God. God their savior… God our savior, is reminding us all, that our Most Important Ally in life is God. And God commands us to love one another. Not throw one another under the bus to curry favor with villains.
Those who want to do evil, want us to be afraid of them and seek their favor.
God is telling us the only one whose favor we need is God.
And we’re already popular with God!
So don’t be afraid, God’s got us!
The third temptation is about safety, starting in verse 9.
Notice how the devil uses scripture out of context! Psalm 91 is a song praising God for all the ways that God holistically saves us – in body and spirit, instructing us to “not be afraid” and “take refuge in God our fortress.” There’s nothing in Psalm 91 that specifically says that God will preserve the Messiah from all harm. It’s just not in there!
Like most people who take scripture out of context to manipulate others, the devil has used one verse taken out of context to say something that the whole Psalm was never meant to say!
God has never guaranteed any of us that nothing bad will ever happen.
Jesus specifically said in the sermon on the Mount from the gospel of Matthew, chapter 5, verse 45, that God,
“Makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”
And the context of that verse is talking about loving our enemies, “ 45 so that you will be acting as children of your Father who is in heaven. He makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”
We all want to be safe. Nothing is more anxiety producing than feeling unsafe.
Or feeling that our loved ones are unsafe.
What wouldn’t we do to protect the people we love the most?
But look at Jesus’ response in verse 12
12 Jesus answered, “It’s been said, Don’t test the Lord your God.”(Deut 6:16)
Which is from Deuteronomy chapter 6 again. Again talking about how to live after escaping from slavery. But the specific context of Deuteronomy 6:16 is a warning about not following other God’s. There’s nothing in Deuteronomy 6:16 about avoiding risk. And this is so interesting to me because growing up, what I was taught in Sunday School and heard in sermons, was that don’t put God to the test, meant don’t try dangerous things to test if God would save you. But that isn’t the context for Deuteronomy 6:16 at all! The context for Deuteronomy 6:16 is don’t test God’s patience by following other Gods! And perhaps this could be understood in this context of: don’t test God’s patience by following those who misuse scripture to manipulate you.
Which reminds me of the way my Black clergy sisters will say, “don’t test me!” or “Not today, Satan!”
Because the truth is that nobody is actually safe in this world.
God, “Makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous.”
Bad things happen. People get cancer. People lose jobs. People die in completely unexpected accidents.
But if you look like me, you may have grown up with the expectation that most of the time, you will be mostly safe. Most of the time, the law is on your side. Most of the time life feels mostly fair.
But for people who don’t look like me, for many minoritized groups in this country:
- for physically disabled people,
- for those with mental illness and addiction disorders,
- For people of color
- For LGBTQ+ folks, especially trans folks
Most of the time the law has not been on their side.
Most of the time life is demonstrably unfair.
They grew up with an expectation that life was not mostly safe.
And yet, you will never experience anything more joyful than Sunday morning in a Black Church. They sing with JOY about God’s salvation and deliverance as if God’s Kingdom has already come and God’s will is currently being done here on earth as it is in Heaven.
They have JOY because for one day a week, at least on Sundays, they fast from anxiety.
Look at Philippians 4:6-7 in your bulletin as you follow along.
They rejoice in the Lord every Sunday because they choose to not be anxious about anything, but instead bring their prayers and petitions and thanksgivings before God. And Trust that God is really going to do something good!
In these anxious times, I’m asking you to fast from anxiety with me every dang Sunday and as much as you can in the weeks between. When evil tries to crush us with its onslaught of lies and doom, we will rejoice in the Lord!
Everytime we feel anxious. Stop and pray.
And if you’re struggling to pray, phone a friend or your Pastor and we’ll pray together. Because sometimes we don’t have enough faith in us, but Matthew 18:19-20 tells us that whenever two or more are gathered in God’s name Jesus is with us.
Friends, we need God to keep our hearts and minds safe for the joyful work of being the Federation of Beloveds who share both our needs and our resources in these crazy times. So let’s rejoice and be glad!
