(Homily for the 1st Sunday of Lent Year C)
Every first Sunday of Lent we read the Gospel passage of the temptation
of Jesus, which in turn serves as a reminder for us to always say “No” to Satan
and his promises as Jesus did. Secondly, it reminds us that in our lives
temptations must come, but we are called to resist as Jesus did. Jesus’ experience
of temptation evidences that we humans are not immune to temptation. The author
of the letter to the Hebrews was firm on this fact when he affirms: “we do not
have a high priest who is incapable of feeling our weakness with us, but one
who has been tempted in all things like us, but has not sinned” (Heb. 4:15). So, the Devil will
continue to tempt us, but God does not, He only tests us. St. James in his
letter says that “God tempts no one” (Jm.
1:13). The purpose of temptation is to make us bad, but the purpose of test
is to make us better. One thing we have to bear in mind is the fact that
condition favors Satan in his antics and temptations, he saw Jesus in the
desert, hungry after 40 days fasting.
In the Gospel reading (Lk. 4:1-13)
we see the threefold temptation of Jesus. This account is
found both in Mathew (Mt.
4:1-4) and in Luke, although there is a little difference in their manner of
presenting the temptations, while Mathew
has bread-temple-mountain, Luke has bread-mountain-temple. It does appear
that Mathew’s intention was to bring together the two questions pertaining to
Jesus as Son of God. As such, for Mathew
the temptations of Jesus are messianic in character. On the other hand, Luke’s ordering is suggestive of his desire
to emphasize that Jesus is the new Adam, the antitype of the first Adam,
who fell when tempted by the serpent. Also Luke’s choice has a theological
reason, namely, the climax of Jesus’s temptation will take place in the Holy
City on top of the temple, for the ultimate victory of Jesus will take place
there. The attempt of Satan to make Jesus abandon his mission will be rejected
by Jesus, but the final victory of Jesus will be accomplished three years later
on the Cross. As a matter of fact, given that we are reading the Lukan version,
we are going to thread the line of St.
Luke, therefore, seeing Jesus’ temptation as the temptation of the new Adam. St.
Luke in his account affirmed that the devil left Jesus “until an opportune
time” (v.13), this is of great
importance to the theology of St. Luke. St. Luke links the temptation story
with the event of the Passion. The three temptations condense the three
fundamental relations of man:
●Towards oneself (stone or bread)
Concupiscence of the body
●Towards others (power and science)
Concupiscence of power
●Towards God (God at my disposition)
Concupiscence of the eyes
The first temptation was the demand of the Devil to Jesus to change
stone to bread. Even though it is true
that bread is good, but the word of God is best. It is also true that we need
“bread” to survive, but what keeps us in being is the word of God. His “word
are spirit and they are life” (Jn. 6:63),
so also man “lives of every word that comes out of the mouth of the Lord” (Mt. 4:4). This is the temptation to use his power to His material and personal
advantage, to satisfy his hunger, after 40 days of fasting, but the real
word that satisfies is the word of God. Till
today we are still faced with the temptation of turning everything to “bread”
just for personal satisfaction. Little wonder, greed, selfishness and
insatiable desires for material things is erupting the foundation of our world.
The second temptation was the Devil’s open challenge to Jesus. He took
Jesus up to a height and showed Him all the Kingdoms of the world, and then the
Devil tells Jesus (God) to worship him. The
devil invited Jesus to succumb to his logic, for him to have everything. What
an irony! Here we see the logic of the devil: “I give you, you give me”. This
is the temptation for power (to have power over others). This temptation for
power has dealt with our present world. This indeed is the exact contrary of
God. God in His logic loves us first, and gratuitously too. He loves and gives
without asking for anything in return. The
devil’s logic is “nothing goes for nothing” and God’s logic is “something goes
for nothing”.
The third temptation was the devil’s attempt to put Jesus to his
disposition. He took Jesus up the pinnacle of the temple, and challenged Him:
“If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here; for it is written,
‘He will give his angels charge over you, to guard you…” And Jesus to the
devil, “You shall not tempt the Lord your God”. Here, the devil asks Jesus for
a miracle. The devil used the written
word of God to tempt the Incarnate Word of God. Peter made a similar
request to Jesus at the episode he saw Jesus walking on water. “Lord, he said,
if it is you tell me to come to you across the water” (Mt.14:28), and Jesus allowed him, but after three steps, he became
afraid and started to sink. Indeed, miracles are not necessary for one to have
faith. We remember Jesus performed so many miracles in Galilee and Samaria, yet
his people wanted to throw Him down from the hill in Nazareth (cf. Lk. 4: 22-30). It is not miracle that gives faith, it is a supernatural gift. This is
the temptation to make God succumb to the devil’s will, sometimes also we are
like the devil, when we want to bend God’s will to our will, when we command
God for miracles because we want them, not because He willed them. Some of us
tempt God with: Give me, do this or do that etc. We want God to act when and how we desire.
Jesus in the threefold temptation teaches us to always put God first in
our life. The responses (Man shall not live by bread alone, you shall worship
the Lord, your God, and Him alone shall you serve, you shall not put the Lord,
your God to the test) of Jesus to the devil manifest that Jesus put God first
in everything. Who is first in your
life?
These three temptations are the three ways through which man deserts the
way of God:
●temptation of idolizing material things
(selfishness)
●temptation to grab power for the sake of
domination
●temptation to desire for success and
personal prestige
We too, are constantly tempted to deviate from God, but Jesus indicates
to us through his experience a major road in order not to fall into temptation.
We should avoid a type of an
accommodating Christianity that tends to please man, rather than God.
Jesus was led into the
desert by the Spirit, and he was tempted. He felt that there is an obscure
power in the world he has to wage war against. And at the end of the temptation
the devil left him, but St. Luke added: “the devil left him, until the
opportune moment” (Lk. 4:13). And
truly he did return, when instead of the
pinnacle of the temple he took him (Jesus) to the pinnacle of the Cross and
says to him: “if you are the son of God come down from the cross” (Mt. 27:40). Satan departed only for a moment, he waited for another chance, as
such, we must never be complacent to his antics, a Christian need to always be
on the tiptoe. In the episode of today’s passage Jesus started his fight
against sin and against Satan the Instigator. Through his victory over Satan He created a new possibility for us:
that is the possibility of overcoming temptation and sin. He is the
antithesis of Adam. He (Adam), man
wanted to be like God; but Jesus even though God became man to save man from
his evil inclination and desire. St. Paul says of him: “Who, being in the
form of God, did not count equality with God…But he emptied himself, taking the
form of a slave, becoming as human beings are; and being in every way like a
human being, he was humbler yet, even to accepting death, death on a cross” (Phil. 2:6-8). The temptation of Eden has not ended, for there are still many serpents
who continue to lead man astray and make him deviate from the divine will,
but Jesus has opened a new possibility for us, he won Satan and his temptations
in the desert, we too can win him in the desert of our human existences.
In the first reading (Deut.
26:4-10) we see the confession of faith of the chosen people, but prior to
their confession of faith they strayed. This
passage reminds us that whenever we sin, is as if we forget who we are and what
God has done for us. Here, the Jews remembered who they are and what God
has done for them, by liberating them from the hands of the Egyptians, to Canaan.
They Israelites fell into temptation and
sinned when they loosed sight of what God has done for them (we can say that
the greatest sin of the Old Testament is forgetting the greatest miracle of the
Old Testament, the Exodus). Likewise, when we lose sight of what God has
done in our lives, we fall into temptation and sin, we forget the pivotal
element of our faith: Jesus’ death and resurrection.
According to some exegetes this passage from the book of Deuteronomy is
fundamental in the whole of the Old Testament, or precisely in the Pentateuch. Deuteronomy 26:4-20 occupies a similar position to that of 1Corinthians 15:3-8 in the New Testament. As such, what Christ’s death and resurrection are to
the New Testament, the exodus is to the Old Testament. Therein, the mighty
acts of God prompted a confession of faith, and a recall of those mighty works.
The second reading (Rm. 10:8-13)
presents the confession of faith of the believers in Christ. St. Paul presents
a New Testament confession of faith (cf.
v.9), which corresponds with the Old Testament confession in the first
reading. Therein, St. Paul declared the
fundamental truths to be believed in order to be saved:
●to believe that Jesus is Lord
●to believe that the Father raised Him
from the dead.
St. Paul went further and affirmed that
whoever that invokes the name of the Lord will be saved. Here it is not all
about believing and professing our faith in Him with “the mouth”, it is
necessary to believe and profess it “with the heart”.
As we reflect on
the episode where the Devil tempted Jesus for three good times, the tempter had a sort of a formula:
“if you are the Son of God, command that these stones become loaves of bread” (v.3); “If you are the Son of God,
throw yourself down” (v.6); “I will
give you all these, if you fall at my feet and do me homage” (v.9). The “if question” was something
recurrent in the life and mission of Jesus, indeed, the part of the struggle he
had to contend with was that of doubt and challenge, even upon the cross: “If
you are the Son of God come down from the cross” (Mt. 27:40). Peter was caught up with the same question, upon
seeing Jesus walk on water, “Lord, he said, if it is you tell me to come to you
across the water” (Mt.14:28). The
same question was addressed to him regarding his identity at the beginning of
his public ministry. In our own experiences today, despite our human frailty
and sins, we are invited to put the “if question” into the hands of God, and
allow Him to fill us with the assurance of his presence and divine grace.
Above
all else however, the Lenten season brings to our consideration the necessity
to evaluate our faith. Whether our faith is full of only words and
inconsistency, or is concretized in good works and in love. We are indeed
invited to follow the way of Christ in dealing with temptations and the
tempter. Remember do not let the Devil win! May
He who was tempted in the same way we are, and yet remained without sin
continue to strengthen us in our daily struggle to resist the devil and his promises. We pray earnestly in this season of Lent that we may
experience more deeply God’s mercy, goodness and love! Amen!!
(Fr. Vitus
Chigozie, SC)
