Lent brings us through death to resurrection. It is remembrance and recall and participation in the preparation and persecution, torture and death of Jesus, and his joy-filled resurrection. We try to join with him in his journey, our Lent of 2020 – it seems easier to join in this year of the Novel Coronavirus.
This virus is the cause of uncertainty about our health and our lives. I am uncertain about my health and my life. Today is Tuesday of Holy Week and I invite you to circle back to the message of the First Sunday of Lent, when we started this journey with Jesus. The gospel reading that Sunday was from Matthew 4: 1-11: Jesus experiences 40 days in the desert and is tempted by the devil.
Today I hear this story as a message of freedom, a message to go forward, a message of hope. So often our experience of the past can leave us wounded, afraid, stymied. We can be over-cautious: delaying, denying, procrastinating, or the opposite: anxious and reckless. But we have gotten stuck and don’t grow further from that experience. We fear; we are afraid.
Jesus is tempted when he is at a moment of significant weakness. He is tempted to be contained, to get stuck, to stop here, in the ways of this world. But he resists. He has the inner freedom to resist being contained; he continues to grow.
The story says that after a lengthy time of deprivation Jesus is tempted. What a moment! He has just come through a transforming experience in the desert of life. He sees within him what is most important, he sees the meaning of his life, he sees within him what he has to do. Each of us wants to see this. He sees the temptations for what they are, the drives of ego: to be satisfied and satiated in body when all around his people are hungry; to have a false sense that no physical harm can come to him when all around his people are sick in body or mind or spirit. He can feel the allure and isolation of greed or extreme wealth and the grandiosity of power over his people. We too can feel these temptations.
Jesus the Christ, stir up your Spirit in us. Grant us the wisdom to recognize these powers, see their power, the strength to resist them, and the courage to grow in You.
So, I, we, have traveled this Lent with Jesus. I ask myself: From where I started on March 1, have I grown in the ease of saying “no” to myself each day? Am I able to tolerate ambiguity a little more and surrender a little more to accept what I don’t know or can’t control? Do I more readily see my desire to have more of what I do not need?
I’m reflecting this Holy Week. The temptations of Jesus are radical: turn stones into bread, jump like a superpower and be saved by God’s messengers, possess and control all the nations that exist in this world? The temptations of Jesus are radical: Jesus’ message is radical. Have I grown this Lent toward living that radical life of the gospel?
We invite you to visit our recorded
Stations of the Cross
. You can pray with us any day and any time beginning today. Our three communities have joined together to celebrate Holy Week with you
.
