Lent I, Cycle C

February 29, 2004

The Rev. Dr. David M. Wendel

Saint Luke’s Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, Colorado

Lessons:  Deuteronomy 26:1-11;  Romans 10:8b-13;  St. Luke 4:1-13

     Most of us have people we look up to, admire, and try to model our lives after.  For kids today, I suppose models would be people like, oh, popular singers, or football or hockey greats, you know, people that kids might look up to and think, "I'd like to be like that person."  Kids used to look up to presidents, and aspire to greatness by following in the footsteps of George Washington, or Abraham Lincoln, or Ronald Reagan, or Bill Clin--well, you know what I mean.  I always looked up to my grandfather, Lawrence Sigmund Wendel, who died when I was 6, but whom I learned was a great church-man, an honest, respected businessman, and a warm, loving husband and father.  I've always felt, "If I can be like my grandpa "Bud", I will feel satisfied in life."  It's helpful to have people you look up to and admire--as models for your life.

     As strange as it might seem, it's not so helpful for us to look at the example of Jesus, today, in our gospel lesson, and think--"I want to be like Jesus!"  Certainly, there are lots of times in Jesus' life when that might be helpful--in fact, Jesus says in John, "A new commandment I give you, that you love one another as I have loved you."  There, Jesus is telling us straight out, that He wants us to love, following his own example of love.  The Assisting Minister will pray the post-communion prayer,  on our behalf each week in Lent, saying, "Almighty God, you sent your Son both as a sacrifice for sin, and a model of the godly life.  Enable us to receive Him always with thanksgiving--and to conform our lives to his…"  Jesus is, normally, a model for us;  a model to which we want to conform our lives.  Normally.  But there are those times, in his life, when what he did was so--powerful, so super-natural, that to think we can be like Him--to aspire to do what he did, well, it's not only frustrating, it might also be idolatrous;  if we were to think that we could do what Jesus did.

     This First Sunday in Lent, every year, we hear how Jesus, immediately after his baptism, was led into the wilderness by the Spirit, for forty days of spiritual struggle against the devil and all his empty promises.  We hear it every year at the beginning of Lent, because we need to hear how Jesus wrestled with temptation--and yet remained obedient.  And we need to hear that, not because we can hope to do what Jesus did--not so that preachers can point to Jesus in the wilderness and say to parishioners, "See, Jesus resisted temptation and remained sinless--so you should, too!"  We need to hear about Jesus' forty days in the wilderness--to remind us that there are some things Jesus did, that we can never do.  We need to hear about Jesus' forty days of temptation in the desert, to proclaim to us that there is one sinless one--and so, one Savior--and it's not us!  Indeed, if we were able to fight against temptation and remain sinless--we would have no need for a Savior--we could save ourselves!  But, as we know all too well, as St. Paul writes,  "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God."  All have sinned, except Jesus--who fought against Satan's wiles, and won.  All have sinned--except Jesus--who was tempted in every way, as we are tempted, yet, he did not succumb to temptation--remaining, alone, without sin--so that He could be the unblemished Lamb;  so that He could make the ultimate sacrifice on the cross;  so that he could be the atonement for our sin.  The bad news in all of this--is that we human beings continue to sin;  we continue to give in to the temptation to drink too much, to eat too much, to focus on ourselves too much, to seek only our own desire and satisfaction, to seek only our own pleasure and gratification.  The good news in all this is--that Jesus Christ remained without sin--though He experienced the fullness of human temptation and testing and trial--He remained without sin.  And as frustrated and angry as that surely made that old devil trying to turn Jesus, the Son,  against God the Father--to us, it is nothing but Gospel--great news, that we sinners have hope and forgiveness, because Jesus remained sinless--because Jesus was the unblemished Lamb of God, who would give Himself, for us, on the altar of the cross--where he took our sin upon himself, and declared us, then, forgiven, and so, clean and pure and righteous.  It's an odd thing, this "happy exchange" as the Church Fathers called it;  the happy exchange that is celebrated in the Easter Proclamation of the Great Vigil of Easter, where it is proclaimed that all who believe in Christ are rescued from evil and the gloom of sin, are renewed in grace and restored to holiness--because Christ, breaking the chains of death, arises from hell in triumph--because Christ, by His death, wiped away the sin of Adam!  It is a--happy--exchange--that Christ, who remained sinless--accepted our sin upon himself, to have it crucified, with Him, on the cross, that we too, might share with Him, in His resurrection.  It is that exchange, of our sin and fault, with His life and grace, that is the good news of the Gospel--and we would be wrong, to think, to suggest, to imply that we could aspire to such a thing--as remaining pure and sinless, ourselves, by fighting against sin and Satan.  On this day, every year, we must celebrate, not ourselves, not our own accomplishments in resisting temptation--but only, Christ Jesus, the sinless one--only Christ Jesus, who was put to every test the devil could throw at him, and yet, still, He remained without sin--to be, our Savior!  Still, he remained obedient--even to His death on a cross. 

     This Lenten season, let us, together, fight against sin, and resist temptation.  This Lenten season, let us seek to be obedient, faithful followers of Jesus Christ, embracing fully our Lenten discipline.  But let us never think--that we can do what Jesus did.  Let us never think, that we can remain without sin, as Jesus did.  And for that, let us give thanks and praise continually…

     In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.