c. 1000 CE, Munich, Bayerisches Staatsbibliothek
Tests in the Desert
First Sunday of Lent (Year C)
7 March 2022; 10 am Said Mass
Homily Delivered at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Sutherlin, Oregon
The Rev. Fr. Tony Hutchinson, SCP, Ph.D.
Genesis 9:8-17; Psalm 25:1-9; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:9-13
God, take away our hearts of stone and give us hearts of flesh. Amen.
Thank you for having me here again as celebrant and preacher. I appreciate the trust your welcome shows.
Seeing the news from Ukraine has been hard on all of us. What evil can grow in the hearts of those who love power, control, and wealth? Vladimir Putin and those who counsel him have committed great atrocity, war crimes, and deep violations of humanity and all decency. Putin’s counselors include not only billionaire oligarchs, but also, sadly, church leaders. Kyrill, Patriarch of Moscow and all Rus, the Russian Orthodox Primate, who has nurtured Putin’s urge to reclaim the Greater Russia of the Romanovs and the Soviets in return for preferential treatment of the Church. So I feel the need as a servant of Christ to lend a voice to what Kyrill has been silent on. Putin and these counselors even now continue on their wicked course. The world has been revolted by its savage atavism. But we are also inspired by the courage of the Ukrainian people and their leaders, including President Volodymyr Zelensky, who have been forced to defend themselves, their families, and their homeland. We in the West look on, horrified and feeling constrained in what we can do in response, for fear of greater violence: world war or global economic collapse.
Putin can tart up his wanton evil, and even kiss an icon of the Blessed Virgin. He can appeal to east-west geo-strategic necessity and to the sacred traditions of his tribe, the Rus, and even claim that he is only killing Nazis in Ukraine. But Zelensky is a Jewish Ukrainian whose grandfather was the sole surviving member of a family with four brothers, all murdered by real Nazis.
If honest, we in the West should also be convicted at what our own geostrategic jockeying and increasing military pressure on the Eastern frontier of the Russian Federation has helped bring about through the law of unintended consequences. We too appeal to the most noble of ideals—security, prosperity, and national self-determination—but our global strategy, if we are honest about it, at times is driven by our own unbridled passion for wealth, power, and control.
Regardless, the great immediate evil here is not ours, but Putin’s.
The Prayer Book defines sin this way: it is “seeking our own will instead of the will of God, thus distorting our relationship with God, with other people, and with all creation” (p. 848). Distorted, twisted relationships are a symptom of sin, whether on the grand scale of international politics, or on a personal scale.
The horror we are seeing in Ukraine right now—brother and sister Slavs, most sharing the same Christian faith, killing each other on a massive scale—comes from seeking one’s own will and interest first.
So what does all this have to do with our Gospel for today, in the Western Church the First Sunday of Lent?
We all know the story of Jesus in the desert. It is told in all three Synoptic Gospels: Jesus is tested by fear that questions his true identity and would distort or destroy all his relationships.
Mark’s version is short and sweet: after Jesus is baptized, he hears God’s voice, “You are my son. I love you.” Immediately, the Spirit drives Jesus into the wilderness where he remains for forty days, tested by the Accuser, living with the wild beasts, though “angels ministered to him.” That’s it.
Matthew and Luke expand this story into a fuller narrative presenting three tests questioning the voice Jesus heard at baptism.
“If you are the Son of God, why hunger? God says he will give food to his chosen in the desert. Command this stone to become a loaf of bread.”
“If you are the Son of God, why are you so powerless and poor? Bow down to me and I will show you my love by making you rich and powerful beyond imagination.”
“If you are the Son of God, then prove it. Scripture says God will protect his chosen. Throw yourself from the top of the Temple, so that all may see God save you and submit to you.”
Jesus’ temptations are also ours. If you are beloved of God, make God act like he loves you. Do not act on the basis of trust and love in God. Rather, try to manage things. Do whatever you need to make money; focus on bread and your security. Cozy up to the “real” powers-that-be. Force God’s hand and try to make him do what you want on your schedule. Do whatever you need to do to be a winner.
I once had a spiritual director who told me that healthy spiritual life come from two affirmations: There is a God. And I’m not him. This means we must “Let go, let God,” i.e., not tightly hold onto things to keep control. Loosen up your grip with the assurance that God, who loves you, will provide.
Jesus answers each temptation by quoting scripture.
“Do not live only by bread.” Fear about our material well-being should not make us doubt God’s love and providence.
“Worship God alone.” Know that anything you set up in God’s place because it might be more reliable than God—it is an idol, a false god. False gods always turn out to not love us, and not provide.
“Do not put God to the test.” Don’t think you can manipulate or control God into conforming to your desires. Trying to do so destroys relationship with God.
We have all sorts of ways of convincing ourselves that we should act as if we are not beloved by a trustworthy God: “God helps those who help themselves.” “God blesses the righteous and punishes the wicked. So I need to obey the commandments to get God in my debt so God will give me what I desire.” “Bad things come from the failures of others, not from me. I need to punish them.” How far away this is from “forgive so that you can be forgiven” and “not as I will, but as you will.”
Since my wife’s death in early December, and since I left full time parish ministry in early January, I have become acutely aware how much our identities are a construct of our relationships with others. With my relationships so drastically changed, I now find myself reaching forward to find new ways of being me, groping to find an authentic me in this new landscape in which I find myself.
The sacraments and rites of the Church are all about finding a new identity (baptism, matrimony, holy orders, the burial office) or reaffirming it (confirmation, holy eucharist, renewal of vows, reconciliation). For identities must be periodically reaffirmed, and sometimes renegotiated. This can be challenging, but invigorating.
Absent “There is a God and it’s not me,” we distort relationships, build false identities, and pursue twisted, broken lives in horror. We have war in our nations and in our own lives.
Sisters and brothers, Lent is about stretching ourselves and reaffirming or sometimes renegotiating our identity. It is about listening hard to hear once again that voice of God in baptism: You are my child. I will take care of you. I love you.
How could this not be so? God is love.
In Lent we turn aside from the things that falsify this great truth and destroy the beauty of life lived in accordance with it.
In the name of Christ, Amen.
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