Lenten Reflection: Luke 4:5-8

February 27, 2013

The Slanderer (Diabolos) knows his target well. He has some understanding of the mission to which Jesus has been called. He knows why Jesus is here.

The key terms are kingdoms, authority and glory. The Slanderer offers Jesus what he seeks; he offers Jesus a similar vision but a different mission. The price? A new allegiance.

Kingdom is at the heart of Jesus’s ministry. Jesus was sent into the world to herald the good news of the kingdom of God which subverts the kingdoms of the world and bring the whole earth under his reign of God.

Authority is an issue in the ministry of Jesus. He has authority to cast our demons, forgive sin, and to heal diseases. His authority subverts the authorities of the world that oppose his mission. It is a contest between the “power (authority) of darkness” and the kingdom of God (Luke 22:53).

Glory is the high stake of this contest. Jesus anticipates the glory of the Son of Man when he comes again which was pictured for him in the glory of the transfiguration. But it is a glory that only comes after first suffering (Luke 24:26).

Kingdom, authority and glory. The Slanderer offers what the ministry of Jesus will achieve. The key, however, is that the Slanderer offers it without suffering. His only condition is worship. If Jesus would only bow down before the Slanderer, then he could have all he desires–everything his accomplished mission would achieve for him–without suffering. Jesus could be king without a cross.

Worship is about allegiance. Switch allegiances, and you can have your heart’s desire without carrying a cross. The Slanderer will give it without cost, without pain, without struggle.

Ambitions can turn our allegiance. The easier path often seems like the better one. Forks in the road demand a choice, and Jesus has the choice to secure his reign through a pledge of allegiance to the Slanderer or fulfill the mission given by God.

Lent reminds us that the mission is more important than the cost.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Lenten Reflection: Luke 4:3-4

February 26, 2013

God tests Jesus in the wilderness and Satan tempts him to satisfy his desires by inappropriate means.

One need is hunger. It would seem that satisfying hunger should not be characterized as inappropriate. Food is a created good to be enjoyed.

The Slanderer (Diabolos) suggests that Jesus should create his own food. If he really is the Son of God then he should provide his own bread. He should satisfy his hunger. There is nothing that prevents him from doing this if he really is the Son of God.

Jesus does not respond by saying, “I could make bread from these stones if I wanted to.” Rather, he addresses the Slanderer’s presumption about what the purpose of his wilderness experience is. While the Slanderer wanted to minimize the wilderness experience by reducing it to physical hunger, Jesus reminds him about its real purpose.

The purpose of the wilderness is not a physical endurance test as if acetic practices are about how much a human being can physically endure. Rather, the wilderness is about a hunger for God; it is about depending on God for strength for the soul. Jesus is in the wilderness to clarify his mission and deepen his dependence on the Father.

The wilderness reminds us that we can’t live on bread alone. Our material ambitions–from food to clothing to housing to video games–cannot satisfy the deepest longings of the human soul. When we live at this level we ultimately feel empty and this emptiness will kill our souls. When we live at this level, the mission of God takes a back seat.

In the wilderness we hunger and thirst for God. Fasting reminds us that the fullness of life is not found through pizza and beer, but eating the bread of God. Authentic life feasts on communion with God and embraces, by God’s strength, the mission of God.

Fasting leads to feasting. When we fast from the idolatry of  instant gratification, we learn to feast on God for true life.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Lenten Reflection: Luke 4:2

February 25, 2013

Led by the Spirit Jesus follows Israel into the wilderness for a period of testing and humbling. It is time to prepare for ministry.

Confronted by the Diabolos (Devil) Jesus is tested/tempted three times. God tests Jesus, but the Diabolos tempts him. While God tests the Son’s obedience, the Devil preys on Jesus’s desires and needs.

The Diabolos (Devil) is a slanderer. Diabolos is derived from the verb “to slander” (diaballo). His intent is subversive. He seeks to sabotage a submissive life. He defames God’s people through subterfuge.

God may lead us into circumstances where we are tested just as he led Jesus into the wilderness, but temptation arises from within us as our desires conceive a way to satisfy themselves in disobedient ways.

The Diabolos dangles a carrot in front of Jesus that targets his distressed situation. Jesus is tempted because there is the potential for immediate gratification of his desires. These are real temptations as the desires and needs are real and Jesus had the option to satisfy them in sinful ways.

God tests us to refine us. The Diabolos tempts us to destroy us.

Lent is a time of testing but it also opens us to the potential for self-destruction. Any test can become a temptation.

Warning! Lent can make you or break you.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Lenten Reflection: Luke 4:1-2

February 22, 2013

Only Luke says that Jesus “returned” to the wilderness. Returned? That is something about which I would like to know more.

Perhaps Jesus went into the wilderness to contemplate his future, to reflect on his decision to be baptized, or to decide whether to embrace the mission into which God had called him. The wilderness, perhaps, is where Jesus decided to go into the water and embrace the ministry of the kingdom.

Coming up out of the water, he returns to the wilderness. He goes there to prepare for ministry. But he does not go there as an autonomous act of his will. Rather, he is led there by the Holy Spirit with whom Jesus had been anointed at his baptism.

“Full of the Holy Spirit,” Jesus follows the lead of the Spirit to experience the wilderness.

Jesus re-enacts Israel’s experience. Just as Israel was brought through the water into the wilderness for forty years of testing, so Jesus is led out of the water into the wilderness for forty days of testing. For “forty years in the wilderness” God humbled Israel in order to “test” them that he might “know what was in [their] heart” (Deuteronomy 8:2).

God tested Israel. So, now God, through the prompting of the Holy Spirit, leads Jesus into a period of testing.

Following Jesus into the wilderness during the 40 days of Lent, we, too, open ourselves to a period of testing. It is a time for introspection, devotion and humbling.

The 40 days of Lent are an intentional entrance into the wilderness. Here we have a renewed opportunity to reprioritize our needs, remove our presumptions about God, and evaluate our ambitions in the light of the mission of God.

During Lent we follow Jesus into a time of testing.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

Mark 1:12-13 — Jesus in the Wilderness

August 30, 2011

Sink or swim? Sound familiar? Some learned to swim by a parent throwing them into the pool. Perhaps that is not a good idea, but it appears analogous to what God did with Jesus…or maybe not.

Rising from the waters of baptism, Jesus is anointed with the Holy Spirit. The Father affirms him, loves him, and expresses his pure delight in him. And, then….

“immediately the Spirit throws him out into the desert” (Mark 1:12, my translation).

No waiting. No down-time. No pampering. Jesus went “immediately” into wilderness bootcamp.

Indeed, the Spirit of God drove him there.  ”Sent” is too watered-down for the Greek verb here (éκβáλλει).  It is mostly used in Mark for casting out demons (Mark 1:34, 39; 3:15, 23, and many other places), but also for tearing/plucking out an eye if it cause offense (Mark 9:47) and expelling someone from a place (Mark 12:8), including the money-changers from the temple (Mark 11:15). It has forceful overtones. Jesus is thrown or driven into the wilderness.

What was the purpose of this experience, of this “thrownness”? Given Mark’s theological purpose to locate Jesus in the history of Israel–Jesus is the suffering servant (a new Moses) who will lead Israel out of exile into abundance–we might find help in the story of Israel’s wilderness sojourn.  Mark has already interpreted John’s ministry as one that belongs to the New Exodus (earlier quoting Isaiah 40). Jesus has passed through the water, just as Israel passed through the sea, and just as they spent 40 years in the Sinai wilderness, so Jesus spends 40 days in the Judean wilderness.

We can see the meaning of the wilderness experience for those who entered the promised land with the help of Deuteronomy 8–a text that Jesus quotes in the wilderness, according to Matthew and Luke. The text describes Israel’s experience as a testing, humbling and discipling one. Israel was tested to reveal what is in their hearts. They were humbled in their dependence upon God. They were discipled in the wilderness.

This, I think, is the meaning of the wilderness for Jesus….and for us. Jesus is tested in an hostile environment–Satan is present as well as wild animals. Only Mark mentions the wild animals which probably reflects not only the hostility of the environment but also connects with Mark’s Roman readers who themselves would endure wild beasts in their own testing (persecution). Jesus is tested, humbled and discipled in the wilderness.

And so are we. Mark’s Roman readers probably saw themselves in this same situation–persecution was their wilderness.  That wilderness continues for many Christians across the globe today, but there are also many different kinds of wilderness experiences. Those experiences test us as they reveal our hearts, they humble us as we recognize our powerlessness and dependency on God, and they disciple us as they train us for the mission of God.

And, yet, we are not abandoned in the wilderness. We are not left alone. Angels ministered to Jesus, and they minister to us as well (cf. Hebrews 1:14). God is present with us in the wilderness and that presence strengthens us and empowers us to endure the wilderness.

The wilderness story of Israel is also Jesus’s story, and Jesus’ story is our story. Just as we followed Jesus into the water, so we follow him into the wilderness….or perhaps, God will throw us out into the wilderness if we don’t follow him there. And God will be there, too.

If God “throws” us into the water, he does not idly watch us struggle. On the contrary God joins us in the pool and helps us swim to safety.

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Posted by John Mark Hicks

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