Mar. 13 Sermon: First Sunday in Lent
Sermon, First Sunday in Lent
Holy Covenant UMC
March 13, 2011
Rev. Kate Hurst Floyd
Matthew 4:1-11
Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.
Take these stones and turn them to bread.
Jesus is weary, isolated, and most of all hungry. For 40 days and 40 nights, led by the Spirit, he’s been wandering in the wilderness. Praying, fasting, preparing for his ministry. 40 days ago he was bathed in the water of baptism; now, in the heat of the desert, he can’t even quench his thirst. He worships God, fortifying himself for what’s ahead. His soul is strong, but his body is weakened by a lack of food.
His stomach begins to growl, and over the grumbling sounds he hears a voice: take these stones and turn them to bread. Tempting, tantalizing: turn and taste! The devil continues: If you’re really the Messiah, you don’t need to spend time in denial or abstinence. You can create more than you would ever want to satisfy your own needs. This whole mountain could be covered with bread. And what’s wrong with bread? Does God not want you to eat? Why don’t you just feed yourself, take a break, focus on your own abilities, stop straining and suffering. Just give in.
Take these stones and turn them to bread.
Over our cell phones ringing and computers blinking, we hear the devil whispering these same words in our ears. For we’re in the wilderness, weary from the news: devastating natural disasters in Japan, workers’ rights being stripped in Wisconsin, Muslims on trial in D.C. It’s exhausting to carry around so much heaviness. All we want is to be nourished. To end any and all pain we feel. The devil speaks through the advertisements on our TV screens: satisfy your own needs, quickly: Just consume more electronics and turn your isolation into connection; Have one more drink and turn that anxiety into peace; buy the right outfit, get the right haircut, and turn that insecurity into self-confidence. Just turn these stones into bread.
Put God to the test. Throw yourself down and let God’s angels catch you.
Jesus is about to head out into the world, to be the Messiah who teaches, heals, transforms, and saves. Hoping and praying in that wilderness that people will believe in him; that he can bring about the kingdom; that through him, the world will trust in God. So how wonderful would it be, if before he even began his ministry, he started by proving his supernatural power…what if the world below saw him jump off a cliff and angels swoop in and save him, like a scene right out of a James Cameron movie. It wouldn’t take nearly so much time and energy to prove he’s the Messiah; nobody would doubt him. Just jump, says the devil, test God—see if angels will catch you. Prove to the world, right here and now, who you are.
If you really believe in God, put God to the test, the Devil says to us, in the guise of a quick-fix culture, prosperity gospel preachers.
Are you struggling with an addiction? Why go to meetings and counseling…just say to God: if you’re really there, why can’t you take this away from me? If you’re loved one is facing a devastating disease, just say, God…catch her. Keep her from dying if you really love me. Bargain with God; ask for what will make you comfortable, right here, right now. If you’re really a faithful Christian, why isn’t your life perfect already, free from pain and suffering? Jump off of a cliff and see if God will really save you.
Jesus, you can have all the earthly power you want if you worship me, says the devil. You will be king of every kingdom. You can set the laws of the land. People will have to bow down and submit to you; everybody will be obedient. Just imagine what you could accomplish; everyone would know your name and encounter you with fear and trembling as their sovereign monarch. That’ll show Caesar. You’ll have twice as much power as he does.
Do things God’s way, and you’ll end up on a cross; do things my way, and you’ll be king of the world. It’s a no brainer, Jesus. Just worship me.
I’ll tell you what you need to put first, says the devil, seducing us through our desire for bigger, better, more security. You want earthly power? Keep on working 60-70 hours a week, worshipping your job. You’ll be rewarded by more money in a profit-driven environment; you’ll be rewarded with more prestige, bragging rights, a sense that you’re saving the world in the non-profit environment. Rest, Sabbath, isn’t going to get you anywhere. You want power? Don’t dare to speak up for human rights. Play on your own team; don’t show weakness; never expose your vulnerability; be tough. Rely on your own strength, seek greater security, achieve comfort. And power will be yours.
Why, during Lent, do we willingly enter the wilderness? It’s a tempting place to reside. With the devil as our companion, we begin to think: what’s so bad about bread, anyway? We need to eat, after all. And who’s ever turned down a miracle? I’d take one any day of the week. And surely, power, if we use it for good….can help us and the world. The devil’s presenting a pretty cozy, satisfying picture of what it means to live a worthwhile life. Who needs heat, hunger, pain, powerlessness?
What good can come from staving off temptation in the wilderness? Important questions, ones we rightly ask at the beginning of Lent, and ones Jesus asked himself during those long 40 days and 40 nights. In the wilderness, Jesus questioned everything.
Ultimately, he questioned the devil. He pushed back on the temptations of the world, readily at his fingertips. And as a result, when he entered ministry, he did things his own way. He transformed bread, miracles, and power—changing the world forever.
Jesus, worshipping God, moves out of the wilderness and enters his ministry feeding people. Sharing meals with the physically and spiritually hungry. When a crowd shows up to hear him preach, needing an evening meal, he turns a couple of loaves into baskets of bread for thousands. He dines at the home of Zaccheus, a hated tax collector who gives his money to those in need. He eats with sinners and prostitutes. On the last night of his life, Jesus takes bread, blesses it, give thanks to God, breaks the bread, gives it to his disciples and says: take, eat, this is my body given for you. And when the powers of the world killed him on a cross, and he rose from the dead, he appears resurrected to his Disciples, cooks them a fish breakfast on the beach. And they knew him in the breaking of the bread.
Jesus questions hunger and turns the world into the body of Christ.
As he ministers on earth, Jesus performs miracles—not jumping off a cliff as a test, but : healing the sick; opening the eyes of blind Bartimaeus; raising a girl from the dead; giving Lazarus new life; walking on water before his disciples. And when the powers of the world killed him on a cross, he rises from the dead, destroying death forever.
Jesus questions self-righteous faith and turns the world into a place of healing and transformation.
Ultimately, Jesus spreads the power of God, shunning the powers of this world. In a place where Caesar’s face is on coins, Jesus encourages the rich to share their wealth; he teaches his Disciples to travel with what they can carry on their backs; he provides dignity and human rights to those who live below the poverty line. In a world with strict divisions based on gender and ethnicity, Jesus is friends with Mary and Martha, and includes them in his ministry; he encounters the Samaritan woman at the well and empowers her to be the first evangelist; he teaches us about love of neighbor through the parable of the Samaritan, who we can no longer dehumanize. In a world that carries out might by military power, Jesus says in the face of violence, turn the other cheek; blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall inherit the earth.
Jesus questions earthly power and ushers in the kingdom of God.
In the wilderness, through the power of questioning, everything changes.
The people wanted a Messiah who would feed them, show them miracles, and take on earthly power. Too often, this is what we, too, want from religion. Safety. Security. Power. Comfort. An escape from pain and suffering.
But what the devil knew all too well, is that these quick fixes and self-satisfying desires never lead us to life.
To truly follow Jesus, to claim the Messiah as our savior, is to question everything. Everything that tells us safety and comfort are our ultimate desires. For when Jesus does things his own way, over and against earthly power, he is killed by the powers of the world. To follow Jesus is to walk the path of the cross. To question leads us to death.
After all, we begin this season on Ash Wednesday, marking our mortality on our foreheads. Receiving the chilling words that from dust we came and to dust we shall return. Death is our reality, and only by staring this reality in the face, for forty honest days and nights, while resisting the temptation to quick fixes and numbing pain, will we truly rely on God.
For when we rely on God, we, alongside Jesus, question everything. And in this questioning, our Messiah transforms death into new, abundant, and everlasting life. Ushering in the power of the kingdom where nobody goes hungry, mourning and pain will cease, and death will be no more.
As we enter the wilderness of Lent, in our daily disciplines, may we be a people who ask questions of ourselves and the world. In our fasting, from food or alcohol or technology, may we question our systems of hunger and drugs and isolation; In our taking on practices of prayer and scripture reading, may we question the messages of the world about what will make us happy, and search deeper for hope; As we are more mindful about our choices—choosing sustainability in our consumption of food, clothing, furniture, may we question a world that tells us that we’re not connected to one another.
How do questions change the world?
Let’s start asking, and find out. Be willing to be changed. This Lent, may we have the courage to question.
Amen.
Tags: Kate
