Every year, on the First Sunday of Lent,
the gospel of the temptations is read. Mark’s gospel is the shortest, telling
us briefly that Jesus was in the desert for forty days being tempted by the
devil. Luke and Matthew, from whose gospel we read today, tell a more detailed
account. In both, the devil appears to Jesus in what appears to be material
form, and presents him with three temptations. In each, the devil tries to
convince Jesus by quoting scripture to Him. In each case, Jesus rebuts the
devil with his own quotations from scripture.
What is the meaning of these temptations
for us? One very important point is that Satan does not always tempt us with a
stark choice between good and evil. In fact, this rarely occurs. He is more
likely to tempt us to what may seem little compromises of our faith, then to
lead us progressively further away from the truth in little steps that seem
almost harmless in themselves, but which mount up and gradually increase our
distance from God, until we have lost sight of Him. Satan does not particularly
want us to become mass murderers or armed robbers or spectacularly evil people;
in fact, this might blow his cover. Anything will do for him, no matter how
small, so long as it separates us from God, and little step by little step will
suit his purposes just as well as dramatic breaks with God, as long as he can
draw us progressively away from Him. In fact, this suits him better; the less
his work in separating us from God is noticed, the more chance he has of
succeeding.
He tempts Jesus like this. To compromise
His powers to feed himself, that is, to use them for his own comfort rather
than the purpose for which God has given him. To perform a spectacular feat of
power by jumping off the Temple wall and letting the angels save him; in other
words, to take a superficial short cut to winning people to God. To be given
the whole world for one small act of worship, for Satan is the Prince of the
world; as King Lear puts it, what if one could gain the whole world for one
small sin? But Jesus knows that even the smallest act of worship of Satan is a
betrayal of God, and a deadly one, and refuses point blank.
The gospel shows us that scripture can
be misused; the devil can quote the Bible with the best of them. But he abuses
it for the purposes of damnation,
whereas Scripture is for our salvation.
But most of all, it shows us how dangerous are even the smallest compromises of
God’s truth: “Man does not live by bread alone…you shall not tempt the Lord
your God…worship the Lord your God alone.” This Lent, let us search our hearts
for all the small (and large) compromises we make with God’s truth, and let us
come back to Him and serve Him, and Him alone.
Fr Phillip.
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