From the Daily Lectionary for Thursday in the Third Week of Easter
Matthew 4: 1-11
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. The tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.’ But he answered, ‘It is written,
“One does not live by bread alone,
but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” ’
Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written,
“He will command his angels concerning you”,
and “On their hands they will bear you up,
so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.” ’
Jesus said to him, ‘Again it is written, “Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” ’
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendour; and he said to him, ‘All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away with you, Satan! for it is written,
“Worship the Lord your God,
and serve only him.” ’
Then the devil left him, and suddenly angels came and waited on him.
Being acquainted with life in the desert throughout their history, it is understandable that the image of the desert takes on metaphorical resonance for the people of Israel and their scribes. On the surface the desert is forbidding, lifeless, dangerous. In order to survive one must pay rapt attention to the extremes. It is said that one can hear literally one’s own heartbeat in the desert. But also true of the desert is that it is teeming with life, hundreds of species of plants and animals; life that has adapted to the extremes: blazing heat during the day, and bitter cold at night. W.H. Auden calls the desert the “kingdom of anxiety.”
Matthew tells us that after Jesus’ baptism he is led by the Spirit into the desert. Mark is more blunt about it. Marks says, “Immediately the Spirit ‘threw’ (εκβαλλέί) him into the desert.” What is common to these writers is that the life of the baptized must endure the trials of the desert, which is to say a trial between life’s extremes; amid the ambiguity of heat and cold; dark and light; life and death. Being initiated into the life of faith is not about retreating into comfort apart from the trials of life, instead it is being thrown into the vortex of life’s passion, into the undulations of life’s anxiety. There is no place for illusion in the desert; our survival depends upon the truth…. And the truth is costly.
For us humans there is always a choice between illusion and truth. Reminiscent of Israel’s forty year sojourn in the desert of Sinai (again, typology), Jesus in his forty days in the Judean desert is confronted with a choice; and the choice is between the seductive illusion of self-interest, and the call to servant ministry, which we know to be “the fulfillment of justice.” Jesus is the obedient son in the desert; Israel in the desert of Sinai was the disobedient one. For the human community, justice is essential for survival and a dignified life, salvation in short. Later in this Gospel Jesus will equate the figure of Satan with the emperor, “I saw Satan fall like lightning.” So this account of the baptism of Jesus is in no small way subversive; bearing witness to the fact that the Jesus movement was radically counter-cultural, and very much about resistance to the status quo of imperial occupation, and its abuse of power.
Baptism in the precincts of the affluent West has become a platitude, a sepia moment, if you will. We, the First World church, have abdicated the, dare I say, messianic weight of what it means to be the Baptized. Our ministry, the choice before us, is the salvation of the left-out of our world, the ones who hunger and thirst after justice. That is our life’s work. Our ministry will be opposed, and ridiculed. Just post on Facebook an argument for justice in healthcare, and prison reform, and immigration rights, and equal pay, and see what you get! Our vocation, brothers and sisters, our anxiety notwithstanding, is to stand in the ambiguous desert landscape bearing life, and life abundant in the face of death’s myriad guises. It won’t be easy. The Gospel writers call it taking up one’s cross. We’ll need courage. We’ll need allies… all the help we can get… maybe even a few angels.
Collect for Social Justice (BCP p.260)
Almighty God, who created us in your own image: Grant us grace fearlessly to contend against evil and make no peace with oppression; and, that we may reverently use our freedom, help us to employ it in the maintenance of justice in our communities and among the nations, to the glory of your Holy Name; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
