First Sunday of Lent
Matthew 4:1-11

The Gospel for the first Sunday of Lent, in all three years of the lectionary cycle, is devoted to the temptation of Jesus in the desert. The Gospels of Mark, Luke and Mathew all tell this story.

Temptation, that word! Sometimes we joke about temptation. When offered a second piece of delicious Aussie pie, we might say, “I can resist anything but temptation”. We associate temptation with the tendency to eat too much, or with the urge to engage in sex outside of marriage, or with the opportunity to get ahead financially by dishonest means, or with any situation that allows us to gain unfair advantage over others especially the less fortunate than us.

Those things may be real tests of our commitment to serve and obey the Lord, but the story of Jesus’ testing shows that temptation goes much deeper than outward actions or sinful impulses.
Jesus’ testing had to do with how he understood himself as the beloved Son of God. It had to do with his identity as God’s Son with whom his Father is well –pleased. One cannot fully understand Jesus’s temptation without the context of his baptism. (Mathew 3;13-17). The temptation took place immediately after His baptism at the river Jordan.

If we ask Jesus to reveal to us his experience at his baptism, I am sure he would respond by saying that, ‘to be loved by my Father is all that counts. Now, I am ready to take on the world and face my own Jerusalem and nothing is going to stop me’. Indeed, to be loved by God is all that matters to us. Everything else is secondary.

Then Satan, the greatest adversary, approaches the beloved Son of God in the desert, not to tempt Him to sin, but rather to tempt him away from His true identity, his true calling, from who he was called to be by His Father to build the Kingdom of God on earth. The ultimate temptation here is for Jesus to doubt his true identity, “If you are truly the Son of God, do this, do that”.
What does this say to us about our identity as beloved children of God? And the ways of the world that tempt us away from being a loved child of God?

You are I are invited to be extra-vigilant with the illusions of security, reputation and power in our society today. According to one of Pope Emeritus Benedict’s reflections,
“At the heart of all temptations ... is the act of pushing God aside because we perceive him as secondary, if not actually superfluous and annoying, in comparison with all the apparently far more urgent matters that fill our lives" Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth (28).

Friends, the world can offer other alternatives to leave God out of the picture and make us the centre of our own meaning and value, and give up the call of a loving God.

May this Lenten season, a time to contemplate the gentle reassuring voice of God, “YOU ARE MY BELOVED CHILD”. And may this experience of being loved by God the sole purpose of our existence and mission today.

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