Lent is upon us. It’s a holy season for looking again at our excess baggage. Yours may be different than mine, which would include pride, success in material things, arrogance, anger…. This is an especially designated time for housecleaning: we should be doing this all year, of course, but we need a holy nudge to examine our values–and to discard those things which are not of God! Readings for this First Sunday in Lent call us to confront our bad habits and to claim that which is Godly within us.
DEUTERONOMY 26:1-11 is the proscribed annual remembrance of how the ancestors were wandering in the wilderness, yet YHWH eventually led them to a fertile land. The enumeration of the First Fruit of harvest is an acknowledgment of human need for a Divine Presence, and also a confession that we can’t design our own Promised Land. “Then you…shall celebrate with all the bounty that the Lord your God has given to you and to your house.”
The Letter to the ROMANS is Paul’s encouragement to the Citizens of the Empire to accept the Gospel–and also his laments about their slowness to do so. In 10:8b-13 we read that this Gospel is available to all the world when its people affirm it by 1) confessing that Jesus is Lord; and 2) believing in Jesus’ eternal life. Simple? NOT! To confess Jesus as Lord means to pledge full allegiance to his Kingdom by relinquishing other gods and values; f’rinstance vengeance, money or fame… I guess I’m meddlin’.
Jesus knew where to turn when he was tempted in the desert, according to LUKE 4:1-13. He had heard the Voice at his recent baptism and went to Where the Wild Things Are to work this through. Please notice that the tempting devil was internal, not Old Horns & Pitchfork of evil! Jesus was tempted to be Relevant by turning stones into bread and feeding the world’s hungry. (Nah, not enough) He was tempted to be an Enlightened Despot by showering beneficient rule to the world. (Who needs it?) And he was tempted to be Spectacular by jumping safely off the highest point in town. (But there are no supermarket tabloids yet…) [Thanks, Henri Nouwen] All of these partial successes were turned down because they would’ve stood between Jesus and God.
And us?? Are there values that sound pretty good but would inhibit a holy relationship? The really evil vices can be seen for what they are; but the powerful ones are the inner habits that indicate that we’ve sold our souls to the surrounding culture. Lord Jesus, give me strength to name you as the only God!
In the process of unfolding, Horace Brown King
Join me every Tuesday at horacebrownking.com as together we can examine the scripture to be read on the upcoming weekend.
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