Temptations

By

Reverend Litton Logan

February 25, 2007

Scriptures:

Luke 4:1--13 (NRSV)
¹ Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness,  ²where 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. ³ The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” ⁴ Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”

⁵ Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. ⁶ 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. ⁷ If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” ⁸ Jesus answered him, “It is written,

    ‘Worship the Lord your God,

      and serve only him.’”

⁹ 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, ¹⁰ for it is written,

    ‘He will command his angels concerning you,

      to protect you,’

¹¹ and

    ‘On their hands they will bear you up,

      so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’”

¹² Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” ¹³ When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him

Sermon:

I don’t know if any of you have seen the movie “Chocolat” based on the book of the same name, but the film tells the story of a small French town during Lent.  Everyone is trying hard to avoid rich foods but what should open in town during Lent--a chocolate shop. It was agony for the town’s people to walk past the shop emanating its wonderful chocolate smells and boasting its beautiful window displays.  It is obvious that the town’s folk had missed the point of Lent--especially when one of the most self-righteous characters in the movie breaks into the shop and gorges himself on chocolates.  Also, when people gave in to the temptation to eat chocolate, they found that they were open to consider other indulgences contrary to their Lenten traditions.

Lent is not so much about giving up stuff, as it is a concerted effort to set aside the psychological space and spiritual commitment to evaluate one’s life in relationship to the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  Said another way, it is a time when we resist the usual to find the unusual in our Christian faith.

          The Season of Lent traditionally begins with the reading of the temptation story of Jesus or like passages of scripture.  For many modern readers this Lenten story in Luke is far too tame. We’ve seen too many horror movies, read too many stories about the demonic, and the satanic to be impressed with these mild images of a gentlemanly devil in our scriptures today. 

          Besides, most of us are not usually tempted to do either good or bad, holy or evil things.  For most of us, we are more often tempted to choose between the lesser or greater good; the lesser ethical or the more ethical. For example, to choose a chocolate bar over an apple for a snack; read a good book or watch a trashy TV program, or tell a white lie to protect someone’s feelings as opposed to telling the whole truth offending them.  Or, possibly the temptation to yell an obscenity at an inconsiderate driver rather than just shake your head and go on. 

To some, this story of a supernatural temptation of Jesus may appear to be nothing more than an Old World paradigm for what modern people call the psychological, ethical, and moral dynamics of choosing between the lesser or greater good or the lesser or greater ethical.  Jesus is simply experiencing an internal struggle to understand lesser goods in the face of possibly greater and more divine goods for his ministry. 

I would hasten to add that such modern explanations of Old World ideas about the demonic and satanic are naïve and childish.  It is important for us to see that the crucial component of Jesus’ temptation is that he is not tempted to do bad things, evil things, but rather to use his power to do okay things for the wrong reasons.  Doing good for the wrong reasons and reversing ends and means I believe are the truest marks of evil, the demonic, or satanic.   I fear that to many sermons and Sunday school lessons have focused on the sensational, Hollywood portrayal of the devil in this Lukan scene than on Jesus, his words, and his example.

The devil may be understood in a couple of ways.  One, the devil may be understood as the voice or voices; if you will that each one of us hears inside our heads when we struggle with our lower natures and what is right versus what is wrong; with what is expedient versus what is moral and ethical.  Not unlike the cartoon images of a little-devil-self on one shoulder telling us to do one thing and a little-angel-self on the other shoulder telling us to do another.  The voice or voices are the whispers of self-interest, creature comfort, power, lust, and human pride that urge us to take unethical or immoral actions or choose the easy way out of spiritual, moral, or ethical dilemmas rather than to trust scripture and the Holy Spirit’s leadership.

Another way of understanding the devil is just as scripture portrays him--a supernatural creature, who opposes God.  However, in this case the devil opposes God not by trying to get Jesus to do horrible, awful immoral, or heinous things but rather to do good independent of God’s will and ways.  A lot of what has been called the demonic and the satanic is really bad press for the forces that oppose God.  Those who oppose God’s will don’t want to build some fantasy kingdom of darkness and evil whose out come is like some medieval Hieronymus Bosh painting.  Rather those who oppose God want to build a good world full of prosperity, justice, and wholeness according to human accomplishments alone.  As if to say, God we don’t need you, we can do it on our own.  As the tempter, the devil seeks to misdirect Jesus’ ministry by trying to get Jesus to bring in a good kingdom on earth by doing things his way, the world’s way.

However one chooses to understand the devil in these scriptures, the truth of the scriptures and its outcome will be the same.

Let me first point out that in Jesus’ temptations we see a recapitulation of the heritage of Israel--Israel’s temptations in the wilderness and the people’s tendency to lean to their own understandings and devices rather than to trust God to protect, provide and lead them.  Furthermore, this temptation story also points out that Jesus’ ministry is to be understood as the fulfillment of Old Testament Scriptures.  The only words Jesus speaks during his temptation is to restate the Hebrew Scriptures.  This then becomes a model for Jesus’ followers to resist temptation by (a) relying on the Spirit’s leadership and (b) living by the word of God as revealed in Scriptures

Now, let’s revisit the scene: Jesus is lead by God’s Spirit out into the wilderness—symbolic of uncertainty--for a time of prayer, discernment, and divine strategizing if you will.

Jesus is in this spiritual struggle for a rather lengthy time--forty-days or an indeterminate time--sorting out and discerning the “how’s” and “why’s” of his calling and his ministry.  He fasts; he foregoes his physical needs in order to obtain spiritual insights.  For Luke, this fasting is very important.  Luke is anxious for Jesus to identify with the hungry and desperate Christians of his day, who also face the temptations of compromise and accommodation because of their hunger, suffering, and uncertainty. 

          Jesus is first tempted to use his power to provide for his physical sustenance—turn stones into bread so he can eat.  Jesus’ response is to point out that his power is not a means to personal gratification but a divine end to be used in service of God’s kingdom.  Turning stones into bread is not a bad thing at all, if one is hungry, is it.

A modern example would be seen in people that use the Christian ministry or even Christian symbols for personal gain—to feed themselves if you will.  I’ve told you about Joe Bob’s Bail Bond’s sign coming into Oklahoma City that uses Jesus’ quote from Isaiah on his billboard—I’ve come to set the captive free—to promote his business.  Let me share another story along these lines.  It is a story about a Stroud, Oklahoma beauty pageant contestant and her “Jesus” pin.

The town of Stroud, OK sponsored a “Miss Stroud” beauty contest as one of the regional, feeder pageants for the “Miss Oklahoma” contest. 

          The interview portion of the Miss Stroud Contest was usually held in the fellowship hall of our church.  As pastor, I was invited to meet the contestants, welcome them to our facility, and to say a few words of encouragement to the young women.  Naturally, all the young women were attractive, articulate, and poised.  One young woman, however, stood out.  She was a very attractive, blue-eyed blond, whose hair looked like a peroxided-blond helmet instead of hair.  She wore a bright red, simple, but conservative power dress. What struck me the most about this young woman was what I mistook as a rather large, gaudy, rhinestone pin on her dress that spelled “Jesus”.  I say I mistook because I later learned that the pin was a diamond pin that said, “Jesus.”

          When I first encountered this young woman, I had the urge to run from her and her pin.  Everything about her demeanor and presentation was offensive and disingenuous.  I greeted her, shook hands, and then went on to welcome the group with very few words.  The young woman with the Jesus pin did not win the Miss Stroud Contest, but she did strike a large note of discord in me.

          I cannot comment on the young woman’s character or the sincerity of her faith; I would never do that.  I reacted to her artificial appearance and apparent superficiality, and to her “Jesus” pin; all of which epitomized what I despise about people using Christian symbols—the cross, the fish, the cross-eyed fish, or the name of Jesus for commercial exploitation or personal gain.

I auger through the overhead in disgust when I see big-corporate religion and television-evangelist raising millions of dollars to support fat-cat life styles to the detriment of those who support their ministries. Don’t get me wrong I think Christian ministries and Christian workers have a right to competitive, living wages and benefits. However, those in ministry who either choose ministry as a means to exploit and profit from people’s spiritual and psychological needs or loose sight of the Christ way in their ministries are, I believe, demonic.  They do not live by the Spirit of God or the Words of God.

Jesus is next tempted to compromise his spiritual integrity and trust in the word of God by consorting with earthly powers as a means of defining his ministry and kingdom development.  We frequently refer to this type of thing as the Church or Christians getting into bed with the devil—compromising with political and commercial forces for mutual gain or success usually at the expense of others.  I believe Jesus’ ideal was for people and their governments to operate in accordance with God’s word as administered by a holy priesthood of informed believers. 

Jesus here affirms that compromising with the rulers of this earth in order to establish God’s kingdom is contrary to God’s will for him.  The spirit that underwrites human governments is the mediation between divergent interest, be those interest good causes or economic or political special-interest groups through compromise  The spirit of God is justice, mercy, compassion, prosperity, and wholeness for all not just a few and this is not open to compromise.  Jesus did not compromise God’s truths in his ministry.

          I think in our modern world we can find many examples wherein the greater religious community and its leadership have compromised God’s spiritual rules for the sake of political harmony and economic prosperity. This kind of political and religious compromise for the so-called greater good and social harmony is as demonic as hell.

          The third temptation was for Jesus to use a crass display of sensationalism—throw yourself off this roof and the angels will catch you and this will get people’s attention; it will definitely impress them, and then they will flock to follow you.  Jesus rebukes people who need constant affirmation of God’s power and presence in his life through sensational and miraculous signs.  People are to live by faith in God and trust scriptures in the ordinariness of life.

Coming from the Deep South, I have seen and heard of so-called faith healers all my life.  Yet, I have never met anyone who has been healed permanently by one of these people.  I’ve seen the TV programs of snake handlers as well as those who drink poisons as a testimony to their faith. They use such things to impress and recruit people into their so-called Christian way of thinking.  I also know the science and the art of deception in such things.

I believe that God acts in a variety of ways to promote healing and wholeness in our lives.  I will never discount the power of prayer in healing, nor will I every limit the possibilities of God. However, according to our scriptures today, we are never to use religious sensationalism as a marketing tool for evangelism and church growth.

Jesus soundly rejects the temptation to use sensationalism to impress and attract people to his way.  Therefore, we as his disciples are not to push the envelopes of cause and effect as a testimony of our faith in God.  God’s power and our relationship to God are not to be played with and turned into parlor tricks or made into a circus sideshow for kingdom building.  I believe to do so is demonic. 

          Jesus says we are to trust the Spirit’s leadership and not lean to our own understandings.  We are not to turn our relationship to God in Jesus Christ into a three-ring circus to impress the masses or recruit believers.  We are to internalize God’s will for our lives and live that will out in every aspect of our lives—intrapersonal, interpersonal, politically, social and religiously.  Moral, ethical, and caring people bring true and lasting change in the world and are far more convincing of God’s love and power than all the religious sideshows in the world.

So, I want to remind you today that in those times when we are in the wilderness, trying to find our way through the how’s, why’s and wherefores of our life; we feel assailed by temptations of lesser goods that offer us wrong answers; the wrong use of power; the wrong way to popularity; the wrong kind of economic, political, and social partnerships, we must remember to trust God to lead us out of the wilderness and into a life of joy, hope, and peace—trust God’s will and ways as revealed in scripture and the Holy Spirit’s leadership.  Let us build our lives, our Church, our community the right way, God’s way, just as Jesus did, no matter what the costs.