1st. Sunday of Lent (A),
(Genesis
2:7-9; 3:1-7; Romans 5:12:17-19; Matthew 4:1-11)
‘In the beginning’ the Serpent, speaking to the woman in the
Garden of Eden but targeting the man – Adam -- who had been warned by God
against eating fruit from the forbidden tree, directly contradicted God’s words:
You will not die. For God knows that in the day you eat of it
your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.
In today’s Gospel passage however, when speaking to the
second Adam -- Jesus sent by His heavenly Father to be our Lord and Saviour --
the ‘Adversary’ of mankind, Satan, considered it wiser not to openly contradict
the words spoken by the Father at Jesus’ baptism in the Jordan:
This is My beloved Son, in Whom I am well
pleased, (Matthew 3:17-4:1)
because he was not sure with Whom he was dealing. And therefore, being somewhat hesitant, instead
of directly contradicting what the Father had said, he tried to insinuate some seed
of doubt into the mind of this challenger from Nazareth:
If You
are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.
Jesus’ period of testing in the desert had gone on for a
full forty days and nights, and the devil apparently thought that a few
carefully chosen words of his at the end of it, when Jesus was physically close
to exhaustion, might cause Him to wonder whether His visionary experience at
His baptism by John in the Jordan had been as real as He had first thought. Satan hoped that Jesus -- having been very
much alone for forty days and nights and now feeling very weak from starvation
-- might seize an opportunity to both satisfy His hunger and bolster up His
morale, so to speak, under the pretext of showing him, Satan, to be mistaken
and wrong
However, Jesus had no burgeoning doubt to assuage, no clamouring
hunger demanding satisfaction as soon as possible; He had nothing to
prove to Himself, and He had no intention whatsoever of giving Satan the
satisfaction of an answer to his question. Jesus, therefore, made it supremely clear
where He found His true nourishment:
He answered and said,
"It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that
proceeds from the mouth of God.' "
Jesus, the Son of God, sent, as Messiah, to save God's
People from their servitude to sin, was being tempted as the early Israelites
had been, when they were being led through the desert towards the Promised Land
under the guidance of Yahweh their God and the leadership of Moses their
prophet. On that journey, Israel of old -- sinful
children of their sinful mother Eve -- had behaved as she did: they would not
to trust God and, on beginning to feel the pangs of hunger, they complained
bitterly against Moses saying that God was planning to kill them in the
desert. They openly expressed their
longing for a return to the slavery of Egypt where food was plentiful. Later on Moses reminded them of their
behaviour saying:
Remember that the LORD your
God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness, to humble you and
test you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His
commandments or not. So He humbled you,
allowed you to hunger. Do not
forget how you provoked the LORD your God to wrath in the wilderness. (Deuteronomy 8:2-3; 9:7)
Jesus, on the other hand, had shown Himself to be in no way
subject to that over-riding solicitude for self which is characteristic
of fallen humanity: suffering and trial could not lead Him either to suspect
His Father or abuse His gifts. Satan therefore
turned his attention from Jesus’ human make-up, to His divine mission: he homed
in on Jesus’ desire to be recognized and accepted as the Redeemer and Saviour
of Israel.
Satan had noted Jesus’ reference to the Scriptures and so, continuing
his attempt to find out just Who Jesus might be, he took Him to the Holy City,
Jerusalem, set Him on a pinnacle of the Temple, and said: ‘Here, on this
pinnacle of the world-famous Jewish temple is just the spot to prove yourself
and win your people. Here, you can do something that would resound
throughout Israel and it would be fully in accordance with the Scriptures You
quote so lovingly; it would be something whereby the whole Jewish nation could easily
recognize that the Lord has chosen and appointed you, therefore:
If You are the Son of
God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: 'He shall give His angels charge
over you,' and, 'In their hands they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot
against a stone.'
Jesus, unmoved, replied:
It is
written again, 'You shall not tempt the LORD your God.'
Now we, who have -- as St. Paul says -- ‘the mind of
Christ’, know that Jesus had not come among men for His own human aggrandisement
or satisfaction, nor had He entered upon His divine mission for the well-being
of Israel alone: He had come, He had been sent by His Father, for the
salvation of the whole of mankind.
Satan, however, knew neither Jesus nor His Mission fully, and
his temptations were only diabolically
cunning shots-in-the-dark. He seems to
have disdainfully thought that any human-being could be tempted successfully provided
that the stakes were high enough; therefore he made one further attempt to
derail Jesus’ Mission:
Again, the devil took Him up
on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world
and their glory. And he said to Him,
"All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.
At that moment Satan -- in the fullness of his maniacal
pride and ambition -- overreached himself, and Jesus, no longer tolerating his
presence, responded by a manifestation of His own authority, before adding the
words of Scripture:
Away with you, Satan! For it
is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall
serve.'
‘Away with you, Satan!’
Words cannot express the loathing, revulsion, and anger of Jesus’ reply
… but we can recall that years after, at the very end of His mission, He relived once again -- and once more rejected
with startling vehemence -- this desert experience when Peter tried to persuade
Him to follow an easier path than that of the Cross (Matthew 16:23):
He turned and said to Peter,
"Get behind Me, Satan! You are an offence to Me, for you are not mindful
of the things of God, but the things of men."
In the temptations of Jesus in the desert we recall, as I
have mentioned, Israel’s trials in the desert of Sinai on the way to the
Promised Land, in particular the occasion when Moses told the Israelites:
When the LORD your God brings
you into the land of which He swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac, and
Jacob, then beware, lest you forget the LORD who brought you out of the land of
Egypt, from the house of bondage. You
shall fear the LORD your God and serve Him. (Deuteronomy 6:10-14)
Now Jesus sums up, and fulfils, in Himself the history and
calling of Israel, the Chosen People; but He also prepares for the future
world-wide People of God, the Church that would be His Body and Bride, the
Church whose Head and Saviour He would be.
Therefore, these temptations of
Jesus in the desert are to be understood in all the fulness of their purpose
and meaning: they are for mankind’s salvation and for the instruction and confirmation of all who
would be His disciples.
We can recognize ourselves in the first temptation of Jesus,
for violent people say so often these days, “I, we, had no alternative”, “we
have to bring the world’s attention to this matter”, “we have to register a
protest”. These people always find
themselves obliged, driven, to do what is otherwise inexcusable. Let us learn from Jesus, People of God,
starving after 40 days and nights in the desert, He would in no way abuse His divine
gifts to get earthly satisfaction.
Nothing can oblige, or allow, a Christian to do what is against God’s
teaching.
Again, in all three temptations of Jesus, Satan endeavoured
to stir up suspicion of God’s love and providential care. How many Christians, today, succumb to this
temptation! They fall away from God
because they begin to doubt that He is with them, they are not sure He is
hearing them, they are unaware of His helping, guiding, hand in their
lives. “I don’t feel anything; He makes
no sign. If only I could be conscious of
His presence, if He would only answer, I would be satisfied.” In some such way they begin to demand a sign
from God, a sign to convince them that His Providence is with them; and some, on receiving no such sign, turn away from the
true Faith and seek refuge in religious sects which provide them with all sorts
of pseudo-divine signs.
Still others try to stir up signs for themselves by
rashly setting aside faith and reasonable behaviour and pushing themselves to
become neurotically excited and disturbed.
You will see some of these in popular churches doing all sorts of
strange antics or excessive practices, and how many pseudo-Muslims
worship their god because he allows them to cherish and seek, seek, seek, revenge.
Many Catholic, however, complaining that God is silent in
their lives, simply fall away from the Faith; and, as it were returning to
Egypt's slavery, turn aside to enjoy the pagan life-style of the surrounding society,
trying to forget their conscience in a maelstrom of worldly endeavours,
comforts, pleasures, distractions, and inevitable worries.
Finally, in the third temptation of Jesus we have the
situation of those who do indeed set out to do the work of God – proclaiming Catholic
teaching, and trying to explain its truth and show its beauty -- but allow themselves
to become discouraged at little result or apparent failure. They then resort to making just a few slight
compromises and minimal accommodations acceptable to popular tastes, done with
the apparently laudable aim of recording success where previously there had
only been what seemed failure. Thenceforth, however, all the high aims and
loving purposes still being avowedly pursued are increasingly subject to their
too human desire for results, good results, successful results, above all, acceptable
results. The ultimate end for such
victims of the devil's deceits is that, far from worshipping God as they
started out, they end up worshipping the devil in his very best clothes! They worship him who gives them humanly
appreciable and acceptable success in God's works! They both distrust and fear the humility,
the waiting and trusting, the hoping and praying, involved in worshipping God whole-heartedly,
and then leaving the results to Him alone.
Our evangelist, however, would have us never forget that,
when Jesus had successfully overcome His trials:
The
devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.
And we too, now turn to God’s abiding Gift, with us
in Mother Church, and in us, through true faith and the Body and Blood of Our
Lord Jesus, and trustfully beg Him to lead us, strengthen us, in the ways of Jesus,
that we may -- in life and death -- give glory to God our Father, forward the
salvation of all those of good will, and in the life to come, find our own ultimate
fulfilment as children of God able to sit at the festal table of God’s heavenly
rejoicing in His heavenly Kingdom.
