Sermon for February 22nd

Sermon for February 22nd

How do we resist temptation? How do we live a righteous life? Much ink has been spilled and many sermon hours have been spent to make exactly that point. How can we be more like Christ? How can we deny the powers in our life that would destroy us, if we were not ever vigilant? How can we be imitators of Christ and not imitate our progenitors, the ill-fated Adam and Eve?

We’ve struggled with that for the entire course of human history. Paul himself speaks to this in Romans:

I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. But in fact, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.

Paul recognizes the struggle. When we want to do what is right, then we fall short, even with a will and a drive that should propel us to do otherwise. We can’t seem to get it right.

And it is not something we can practice our way out of. Lent is often a time to create a new discipline in our lives, something that will pull us from the ways of the world and re-connect us with God. But like the oft-doomed New Year’s resolutions we endeavour to follow at the dawning of a new year, these practices don’t always have much traction in our lives. Sometimes these practices stick, but often they don’t. We can not “practice” our way into righteousness.

For all the well-intentioned sermons about denying temptation and how to better follow Jesus, it is never that easy. There have been so many sermons that talk about turning and offering our heart to God, and about gathering our will power so we can put sin behind us, and the reality is, none of that has ever been in our power. If the effort of our conversion, or our re-commitment to God, or our endeavour to live a righteous life rests solely on us, then we are doomed to fail and no amount of written material, inspired sermons, or the like can change that.

Perhaps we get fooled on this issue because this first Sunday of Lent includes a Gospel reading about temptation. We have this provocative conformation between Christ and Satan wherein a great battle of wits ensues. Satan offers up a scenario, seeking to lure Christ into an ill-advised action and Jesus very deftly steps out of the trap that Satan has set for him. The plain text reading of this passage has often yielded the idea that just as Jesus was able to avoid these temptations, so should we. We need to follow the example of Christ in this moment. But that interpretation, as we have already referenced, is what leads us into all of the theological fallacies mentioned previously. If we see this as simply a road map that we need to follow in order to have success, we have already failed, not just because we can never live into this call, but also because we miss the reality of the gift that is being given to us.

The reason that Lent starts here, with this temptation text, is not to put us on notice. It is to show us that the battle, which we seek to fight on our own, has already been fought by our Saviour. Ours is not to try and follow, with our own strength, where Jesus is leading. Our is to realize that the battle was never ours to fight. Jesus has paved the way, through his life, his teaching, his death, and his resurrection. And through Christ, the Spirit is always with us.

It can be an odd thing to say that Jesus already struggled against the same forces that challenge us day in and day out. It is odd to say that he won, when we will still face the same pressures, the same struggles, the same temptations and the same failures. There does not seem to be any kind of victory when our own defeat seems to occur more often than any “victory”. Yet, this again turns us to where our focus lies. On our own, we can not stand against the powers that would seek to undo us. But with God, we can. When those moments of struggle and apparent defeat occur, it is not because God has left us. It is not because what we know is somehow wrong. It is because we once again turned to ourselves to try and stand up, to do the right thing, and to follow Jesus. We haven’t internalized, regardless of how many times we may have heard this message, that Christ is with us and in Christ, in the power of God, we can do things we cannot do otherwise. But we forget. Or we don’t trust. Or we, like so many before us, hear something like the story of the temptation and immediately believe that this is a challenge to us, and we must prove we are up to the challenge. If we don’t, how can we truly be worthy of God’s love? If we don’t stand up and do this ourselves, then we have failed God. We know that we cannot stand alone. We know that we don’t stand alone. And yet, we feel we still must stand alone. It’s a weird conundrum that we create for ourselves.

Amid this tangled knot, I think that what we need is to hear again the same story that we used to tighten that knot to begin with. The temptation narrative. Satan is offering Jesus the world and more than the world. He is offering Jesus food when he is hungry and an opportunity to show how loved he is by God his Father. Jesus denies Satan all three times. Jesus does. Not me. Not you. Not Paul. Not the holiest of saints. Jesus. Anyone else in that situation would have fallen. Anyone else in that position would have succumbed to the temptation. Anyone else. We are not meant to hear that story and then say to God “I can do the same”. We are meant to hear this story and realize how powerless we are to stand for what is right and against what is wrong. And in so doing, we are reminded that this story does not stand in isolation, leaving us in despair. We are not alone. We know that the Spirit is with us. We know God is giving us strength. When we are faced with difficult moments, God is there, right beside us. It is not up to us to earn this gift. It is up to us to realize that God is there, and to let go. We need to let go of the desire to be strong enough, the desire to be good enough and just let God come into the moment. Then, and only then, can the knot we have tied for ourselves unwind and we can come to know that in all things, God is there. We are never alone. God will help us overcome what we must face. Thanks be to God.

Amen