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+ + + In Nomine Jesu + + +
Please join me in prayer: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be pleasing in your sight, O Lord, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ.
Recently I listened to several of our congregation’s members—members who do not live way out in the country—talk about their close encounters with foxes and other wild animals near their homes. Their stories reminded me of when bears would show up in the towns where the first parish I served was located and warnings would go out to everyone in the towns to take precautions because of the wild animals. Not foxes or bears but more probably lions were among the wild animals uniquely mentioned by the Divinely‑inspired St. Mark in the Gospel Reading about the temptation of our Lord on this, the First Sunday in Lent. This day’s having such a Gospel Reading centering on Satan’s temptation of our Lord in the wilderness dates back more than 15‑hundreed years (Pfatteicher, Commentary, 229), though more traditionally St. Matthew’s account was read (Matthew 4:1-11). As we heard, however, St. Mark mentions three things about Jesus’s forty days in the wilderness, where the Spirit drove Him immediately after His Baptism: (1) Jesus was being tempted by Satan, (2) He was with the wild animals, and (3) the angels were ministering to Him. This morning we will consider each of those three things in turn, as we reflect on the part of the Gospel Reading centering on Satan’s temptation of our Lord under the broader theme “In the Wilderness”, and we will realize that we, like Jesus, (1) are tempted, (2) are with the wild animals, and (3) have God’s messengers minister to us.
Before we get to those three things, however, please permit me to say a few general words about Jesus’s forty days in the “wilderness”. The “wilderness”, in keeping with the prophecy of Isaiah (Isaiah 40:3), was where John the Baptizer appeared, baptizing and proclaiming a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins (Mark 1:1-8). That “wilderness” likely was the barren, stony downward eastern slope of the Judean mountains towards the Dead Sea and lower Jordan Valley (BAGD, 309). All the country of Judea and all Jerusalem were going out to John there and were being baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. So also, as we heard on the First Sunday after the Epiphany and again today, Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized—with God the Father speaking from heaven, God the Son coming up out of the water, and God the Holy Spirit descending on Him like a dove. That Spirit immediately drove Jesus presumably further out into the wilderness—the wilderness where not only prophets worked but also where revolutionaries and even demons were thought to make their homes (Matthew 12:43). There, as prophets such as Moses and Elijah had done before Him, Jesus apparently without went at least food for forty days (Exodus 24:18; 34:28; Deuteronomy 9:19, 18; 1 Kings 19:8; Matthew 4:2; Luke 4:2). While Jesus was fasting in the wilderness, St. Mark’s relatively simple and brief account mentions happening the three things to which we now turn.
First, then, Jesus was being tempted by Satan. Although St. Mark does not give us the details that Saints Matthew and Luke do, he does tell us that Satan actually tried to solicit Jesus to commit and be evil. More than some mere moral infraction, such evil in Jesus’s case ultimately would have meant His giving up or renouncing His work of being the Savior. Satan’s temptation of Jesus was real, just as Satan is real, and as he really tries to tempt us, too. Too often we give in to Satan’s temptations, perhaps in part because we do not take Satan seriously. Maybe we think of Satan more as a cute caricature, a little cartoon sitting on one shoulder telling us to do something fun, while a little angel sits on our other shoulder telling us not to do it. Or, maybe we think giving in to temptation has no bearing on the state of our soul for eternity. Or, maybe we think of Satan only as an allegory, a way of telling the story of the negative outcome of human kind’s originally free will. The current head of the Roman Catholic church Pope Francis reportedly has even come under fire for, more than any other pope in a generation, treating Satan as an actual supernatural entity commanding the forces of evil. To be sure, God permits Satan to tempt us, and God Himself may test us, as He tested Abraham in today’s Old Testament Reading (Genesis 22:1-18). But, God tempts no one, as we heard in today’s Epistle Reading (James 1:12-18). In that Reading, James says each of us is tempted when we are lured and enticed by our own desire, which gives birth to sin, which sin, when it is fully grown, brings forth death. No “The devil made me do it” there! As James describes temptation, we have no one to blame but ourselves. The devil, the world, and our own sinful flesh tempt us, but, no matter the source of the temptation, we are each responsible when we give in to it, as we all do.
Jesus, on the other hand, did not give in to temptation, although St. Mark does not explicitly say so. After first telling us that Jesus was being tempted by Satan, the second thing St. Mark tells us is that Jesus was with the wild animals. That Jesus was with the wild animals is often taken to mean—and may well mean—that, by resisting Satan’s temptations in the wilderness and by His greater victory over sin, death, and the power of the devil on the cross, Jesus restored paradise. There certainly seem to be paradise connections. In writing to the Corinthians, St. Paul says, “For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive” (1 Corinthians 15:21-22). Adam, the first holy man, had perfect dominion over the animals (Genesis 1:26), and, though that perfect dominion was lost in his fall into sin (Romans 8:19-22), Jesus Christ, the second holy man, has and restores that perfect dominion—even we have it in Him. Through Old Testament prophets God often described the age of the Savior as one of peace with otherwise threatening wild animals; through Isaiah, for example, God said such things as “The wolf shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the young goat” (Isaiah 11:6-9; confer Isaiah 65:25; Ezekiel 34:25-31; Hosea 2:18; Job 5:22-23). Such a restoration of the peace paradise is achieved in Jesus. The Second Person of the Blessed Trinity from His conception in the womb of the Virgin Mary on was so personally united with the man Jesus that He was both sinless and unable to sin. Nevertheless, as we are, He was really tempted throughout His life: in the wilderness, in the Garden of Gethsemane, and even on the cross (for example, Matthew 27:42). Without His own sin (Hebrews 4:15), He could be the perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world. When we repent—turn in sorrow from our sin—and believe—trust God to forgive our sin for Jesus’s sake—then God forgives our sin. God forgives our sin through His messengers who minister to us.
After first telling us that Jesus was being tempted by Satan and secondly telling us that Jesus was with the wild animals, the third thing St. Mark tells us is that the angels were ministering to Jesus, most likely after His fast feeding Him with food for body and soul (Kretzmann, ad loc Mk 1:12-13, 167), as some think that angels fed Adam in paradise (Jeremias, TDNT 1:141; 5:772). The heavenly messengers were subject to Jesus, as the victorious Son of God (confer John 1:51), and they ministered to Him, as others did throughout His life, such as Peter’s mother‑in‑law (Mark 1:31), Martha (Luke 10:40), and other women (Mark 15:45). Their ministering to Jesus was important, but more important is the ministry that Jesus did for them and does for us. Jesus was equipped for His ministry in His baptism and immediately dealt with the devil, and His followers do the same. Yet, when Jesus through His ministers baptizes us, He not only forgives sins and gives eternal salvation to all who believe, but He also rescues us from death and the devil. Through His ministers He likewise gives us food for body and soul, in the Sacrament of the Altar giving us bread that is His body and wine that is His blood, for the forgiveness of sins and so for life and salvation. His body and blood are really, physically present on this Altar, distributed by me, and received by you; they are our food for our way through this life—not only for our forty-day Lenten fast but for all the time that we spend in this wilderness.
“In the Wilderness”, (1) Jesus was being tempted by Satan, (2) He was with the wild animals, and (3) angels were ministering to Him. As we have considered each of those three things, we have realized that we, like Jesus, (1) are tempted, (2) are with the wild animals, and (3) have God’s messengers minister to us. When we, unlike Jesus, fail to resist our real temptations, as even we believers will fail, we confidently draw near to His throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need (Hebrews 4:16). For, we do not have a High Priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but One Who in every respect has been tempted as we are (Hebrews 4:15). And, because He Himself suffered when tempted, He is able to help those who are being tempted (Hebrews 2:18). In Him, if not fully now then at the end, we have restored dominion over wild animals—not merely foxes, or bears, or even lions, but also over whatever animals persecutors might release at us and even over supernatural beings (BAGD, 361), such as the devil, who, St. Peter writes elsewhere, prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour (1 Peter 5:8). As we are ministered to by God’s messengers through His Word and Sacraments, God, in the words of today’s Collect, guides the people of His Church that, following our Savior, we may walk through the wilderness of this world toward the glory of the world to come.
Amen.
The peace of God, which passes all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
+ + + Soli Deo Gloria + + +