February 18 2024

The assigned Gospel reading for the first Sunday in Lent is always a retelling of the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness.  And in Mark’s Gospel it is a very, very short story, only two verses.

¹²And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. ¹³He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.

In Sunday school, most of us were taught there were three temptations.

First, Satan tempted Jesus to turn stones into bread.

Second, Jesus was tempted to throw himself from the highest point of the temple and finally, Satan asked Jesus to bow down and worship him.

But Mark’s Gospel includes none of these details.  The Gospel simply reads that Jesus was tempted for forty days.  There are no dialogs, no details, no descriptions.

It is much easier to preach on this text when you have the three temptations to work with- and yet, despite the lack of detail, Mark has still given us something to ponder today.

What do we know about temptation?

(pause)

First, temptation comes from our desires.

James 1:14-15

 ¹⁴ But one is tempted by one’s own desire, being lured and enticed by it; ¹⁵ then, when that desire has conceived, it gives birth to sin, and that sin, when it is fully grown, gives birth to death.

Temptation comes from us wanting something we don’t have, whether it be status, or power, or material things.

Desire is conceived.

Sin is born.

Some might say we can be tempted by peer pressure or in our desire to keep up with the Jones.  But the root of both comes from our own desires. Our desire to fit in, our desire to appear successful.

As a young person, I wondered about the reason why God commands us “You shall not covet” in the Ten Commandments.  As an adult, I understand the seriousness of coveting.

Not only does our desire for things we do not own occasionally cause us to make bad decisions, but desire can also make us feel inadequate in comparison to those around us.

Desire for something beyond what we own often means we do not value the things we do own.  It is ungratefulness.

And yet we are all guilty of wanting something more.

We are subject to advertisements day in and day out which declare we cannot be happy, or successful, or attractive unless we buy into the products and ideals they are selling.

Second, temptation is never from God. God does not tempt us.

In 2019, Pope Francis authorized a translation change within the English version of the Lord’s Prayer. This is part of a larger conversation that has been happening in the church.

It was only one line that Pope Francis changed, and it is not something that all English-speaking Roman churches have even accepted.

Rather than praying “Lead us not into temptation,” the new authorized translation reads “do not let us fall into temptation.”

Pope Francis expressed concern that people may hear those words and believe that God is the one who tempts us.

And what kind of God would tempt people, lead people into sin?

Luther himself wrestled with this question and wrote in the Small Catechism: “God certainly tempts no one to sin, but we pray in this peti­tion that God would guard and keep us so that the devil, the world and our own flesh may not deceive us nor lead us into misbelief, despair and other shameful sin and vice; and though we be thus tempted, that we may still in the end over­come and retain the victory.”

According to some biblical scholars, the change that Pope Francis authorized is a reasonable translation, and may be closer to the original Greek.

And the change is scripturally sound.  No where in scripture does it say that God tempts us, and in fact the Book of James is very clear that God does not tempt us.

James 1:13 reads: No one, when tempted, should say, “I am being tempted by God”; for God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself tempts no one.

I would struggle to trust God if I believed God tested us by placing temptation in our path. That kind of behavior is abusive and manipulative.

 

This change made within the Roman tradition is neither radical nor unfaithful but stems from an honest desire to better communicate the nature of God.

Lord, do not let us fall into temptation.

And yet despite our prayers, we still fall.

Despite our desire to live a life of gratefulness and joy in God, the desires of the world overpower us.

But we have these promises from God through Jesus:

We are never alone in our temptation.

Paul in his first letter to the church at Corinth writes: “No temptation has overtaken you except what is common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so that you can endure it.”

In other words, God will provide us with a way out.

And second, we have the promise of God’s grace and forgiveness.

Even if we fail, if we falter, even if we lose our way, God will not abandon us.  God has named us and claimed us as beloved children and there is no sin so great that could ever undo the love that God has for us.