Deuteronomy 6:13-16
Luke 4:1-13

We began our Lenten journey last week exploring Jesus’ commitment to God and how our commitment is a similar process.  What I am suggesting during this Lenten season is that we explore carefully some of the events that are pivotal in Jesus’ faith journey and examine how our journeys intersect with Jesus’ journey. 
           
The Gospel writers are clear in their presentations that there was a correlation between Jesus’ commitment and his temptations.  Not only was this a way to show that Jesus experienced and dealt with life like all human beings but also that his disciples could expect to be confronted by temptations in the context of their commitments to God. 
           
Having made a conscious decision about the direction of his life, Jesus went into the wilderness to explore and formulate both how he would minister and what his methods of ministry would be.  In the midst of that exploration the temptations of security, power, and popularity presented themselves.    
           
As Jesus told his disciples about his wilderness temptation experience, he said that being human involved searching out one's limitations.  In this search a person may try to be more or less than he was created to be.  To go either direction is to be less than human and is to sin.  Perhaps Jesus had this view in mind when he said that straight is the way and narrow is the gate that leads into the reign of God.   
           
Life is filled with temptations, and we cannot avoid them.  To live life is to be confronted with choices.  Temptations do not come from God in order for God to know the stuff of which we are made. God already knows.  Temptations afford us opportunities to grow or chances to regress depending upon our decisions.  A tempta­tion is a crisis.  In the Chinese language two characters meaning danger and opportunity are united to form the word crisis.  A temptation is either a danger or an opportunity, depending upon how we respond to the temptation.  We must evaluate where the path of each tempta­tion seems to lead and determine which is the direction we need to move in order to be faithful and consistent in our commitment to God.
           
Serious consideration of Jesus' wilderness temptations reveals that they were growth opportunities for him.  Jesus' wilderness endeavor was one of personal struggle.  The scriptural accounts of these temptations indicate that Jesus was alone.   
           
He was seeking direction to the question, "How do I bring people to God and God to the people?"  This was the mission to which he committed himself at his baptism.  After making his commitment, he then sought routes to take in accomplishing the mission.   
           
Being alone for an extended period of time often results in plumbing the depths of one's life.  The written accounts of the temptations describe Jesus' struggle as an inward one.  There was no mountain in the wilderness from which all the kingdoms of the world could be viewed.  The terrain where Jesus was is the lowest elevation on earth, near the Dead Sea.  Few animals can live there.  The air is thick and smells like rotten eggs and it about 95 degrees in the shade most of the year. (Richard Wolf, “The Devil and Tiger Woods,” 2/21/2010, 1st Congregational Church, LaGrange, IL)  As Jesus wandered in this area, in his mind, he pictured the kingdoms of the world and contemplated how he might rule them
           
During his contemplation Jesus was tempted by the evil one.  The term translated devil means adversary, obstructer, or one who is the antithesis of God (Werner Foerster, "Diabolos," Theological Dictionary of the New Testament, Gerhard Kittel & Gerhard Friedrich, eds. (Grand Rapids: William G. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1964) Vol. 2, pp. 72‑ 81).
 One form the evil one takes is the dark side of ourselves.

As Jesus wandered in the wilderness he wondered how he could persuade people to follow him.  A natural method came to mind‑‑ food.  Why shouldn't he think of food?  He had been fasting for a long period of time.  His fasting stirred his hunger and the stones around him reminded him of bread.  Jesus thought, "Aha!"  This is the way to bring people to God: give them bread."  An aspect of arrogance is contained in this temptation.  The suggestion was for Jesus to give no thought to limits at all.  Jesus was tempted to bypass the laws of reality that included planting, cultivating, reaping, grinding, and cooking.  The arro­gant temptation is to disregard the limitations of being human.
           
Double trouble is wrapped in the shortcut to security in bringing people to God.  First, it is bribery.  To offer bread to people in exchange for their willingness to come to God was to obtain followers for the sake of what they would get out of it.  God calls people to a life of giving rather than getting.  Many modern testimonies are filled with descriptions of material possessions, accomplishments, and successes.  The implication is direct and clear that the testifier is propagating his payoff for following God. The person is saying, "See what I got for following God."  We resist seeing that crucifixion may be what authentic disciples receive from following God.
           
The second mistake in the shortcut of security is that it deals with symptoms rather than the disease itself.  Providing bread for the hungry is an emergency measure to keep them from starving; however, this is only a first step.  To do nothing more is to make the hungry more dependent and indebted while the causes of hunger and other insecurities run rampant, ravaging the lives of millions across the globe|

Jesus was tempted to be a cheap leader, to begin with security rather than to end with it, to bring outer abundance rather than inner holiness and wholeness. We know that this temptation is part of life today.  Last Friday (2/19/10) the sports and media world stood still at 10 a.m. when Tiger Woods said: “I desired to enjoy all the temptations around me.  And because of money and fame I had access to them. I convinced myself that normal rules didn’t apply to me.”
           
An early event in my life was instructive to me later in understanding Jesus' resistance to shortcuts.  Robert Percy was my fifth grade Sunday school teacher, a fine man, the father of four beautiful daughters (I noticed later); but he was a lifeless teacher.  Strangely, I do remember one statement he made, "The longest way around is the shortest way home."  The statement raised more questions than it provided answers, and so I filed it away under "Confusing Statements I Do Not Understand."  A year later the confusion was cleared from this statement.  I was invited to Ronnie Shearer's birthday party.  Ronnie's parents dropped us off at the movies and we were to walk to his house after the movie.  After the movie, we began our walk to Ronnie's house for cake and ice cream.  We were in view of his house when we came to a fork in the road.  The long way was to the left, but the short route was to the right and went down by the creek.  Being intelli­gent boys, knowing that three heads were better than one, we chose the shortcut by way of the creek.  When we arrived at the creek, there were numerous things beckoning‑‑rocks to be skipped across the water, puddles to wade, frogs to catch.  Eventually we crossed the creek and headed up to Ronnie's house. As we approached the house, I saw my parents in the front yard.  First, I wondered what they were doing there.  Then, in amazement I thought, "Surely it is not time for the party to be over."  Then I realized, "Howard, the party is over for you!"  Was it ever!  That day, the longest way around would have been the shortest way home for me.
           
The shortcut of security was a real snare before Jesus.  He could have stepped into that trap but he carefully weighed the consequences of that choice.  Consider the strength that Jesus developed from this experience, and notice the lasting word in his statement, "Man shall not live by bread alone"(Luke 4:4).  This word cuts across the superficial solution that materialism supplies our every need and points to the cross living that involves the conscious giving of life for the benefit and edification of others.
           
There were other occasions when the shortcut of security reared its head to offer itself to Jesus: when the Pharisees asked for a sign of his sonship; when the high priest chided him to save himself; when the thief said, "Save yourself and us."  Apparently Jesus' experience in the wilderness gave him strength when he was tempted to take the shortcut of security.  His living gives us encouragement to avoid the snare of the shortcut of security and illustrates that the longest way around is the shortest way home.
           
As Luke tells about Jesus’ wilderness temptations he wrote that in a moment of time all the kingdoms of the world flashed through Jesus' mind.  Another question for Jesus was what kind of messenger for God would he be?  The adversary's view of the world was that it all belonged to him.  The adversary made an offer he was sure Jesus could not refuse.  All these kingdoms could belong to Jesus for the price of worship, of ultimate devotion to the obstructer.  What is the one thing a person must give up if he is serious about serving the evil one?  He must give over his power, control of his life, to the evil one.  To seek status through power is the bottom line in serving the obstructer, while the bottom line in serving God is love, using the power one has for the benefit of others.

The word power is of Latin derivation meaning to be able.  Power is the ability to effect change and it is not of itself good or evil.  The use one makes of power determines its moral quality.  Hebrew scripture has a consistent image of power that portrays God's creative and fulfilling energy.  This energy is activated in the worshiper of God and through the worshiper to his societal situation.
           
As Jesus wrestled with the question, "How will I use my power?" he was struggling with the kind of person and messenger for God he would be.  The Zealots were enraged with the oppression of Rome.  The Pharisees were involved in religious activity and adhering strictly to the religious rules.  The Sadducees were attempting to appease the Roman government and be actively involved in the Temple.  Underlying these and other groups was this secret wish, "If only the right leader would come to make us a confederacy, then we could unite and be the people of God." 
           
Danger was appealing to Jesus.  There was something adventuresome about the possibility of drawing this many people together.  In addition to this appeal, Jesus had been commissioned as the right leader at his baptism.  As Jesus envisioned the kingdoms of the world, he hungered for them.  How he wished he might draw all of them together to follow him.  There was plausibility in the feeling of Jesus that there was almost nothing he could not accomplish and that he had the power to do whatever he chose.
           
On the threshold of his ministry, Jesus was confronted with the end of his ministry and what means he would use to achieve the end.  Many people have concluded that as long as the end toward which they are moving is basically good, they ought not concern themselves with how they get there.  Invariably, this attitude deadens people's sensitivity to their ethical responsibility and they conclude that the best way to get along is to go along.  
           
This second temptation in Luke's account is a description of the power struggle that was alive in Jesus.  It is the same type of power struggle that confronts us.  Two Adolphs of the Nazi party in Germany in World War II illustrate the misuse of power (John R. Claypool, "The Power Problem," sermon, Broadway Baptist Church, Fort Worth, Tx., July 14, 1973, Vol. 12, No. 24). Apparently, Adolph Hitler had an incredible arrogance.  He saw himself as a superhuman destined to rule the world like a god.  He believed himself to be above all rules which ap­plied to other people.  He could break treaties, annihilate a whole race of people, and attempt by sheer power to impose his ruling hand over others.  Adolph Hitler epitomized the arrogant side of the power struggle.
           
Adolph Eichmann was on the apathetic side.  He was the offi­cial who was in charge of the final solution of the Jewish problem.  Years later, when he was tracked down and put on trial for crimes against humanity, his only defense for his part in the atrocity was simply that he was doing what he was told to do!  He defined himself as a cog in the machine‑‑just one more bureaucrat who received from above and passed on below.  He accepted no responsi­bility whatsoever for his part in the process.  In these two Adolphs is a modern embodiment of the alternatives that Jesus faced in the loneliness of the desert.