“Test Drive”
March 9, 2025
Rev. Rebecca Migliore
The first Sunday in Lent. We have completed our epiphany journey with Jesus—stood with him (and the disciples) on the top of the mountain and been filled with awe at the shining of God’s love. We may have begun the season of Lent by putting ashes on our foreheads—or maybe this Sunday is how we are beginning our walk with Jesus towards the cross. You can see the subtle differences in our sanctuary. The colors have turned from the white of Epiphany to the purple of Lent. Now is the time to see how strong our faith really is. Now is the time to go for a “test drive” with Jesus.
The first Sunday in Lent is always a reading about Jesus in the wilderness. Jesus tempted by the “devil.” Jesus spending 40 days and 40 nights fasting and praying. Chronologically, this happens in the gospels right after Jesus is baptized, and before he starts his ministry. But tradition (and the lectionary committee) has us reading it at the beginning of the Lenten season—a way of thinking about what our priorities are supposed to be—as we watch Jesus wrestle with these human questions.
And “wrestle” is a good word for what is going on here. Remember how the patriarch Jacob wrestled with an angel, eventually getting a new name out of the process? Jesus is wrestling with another type of angel—“the satan.” We now imagine the devil, or Satan, as this pointy eared, red-dressed, diabolical embodiment of evil. The Jewish people of Jesus’ time would not recognize this image. The satan was God’s prosecuting attorney—the tester of what was true and false (we see this most explicitly in the book of Job). God has called Jesus to a ministry in his baptism. And then, he is led out to a wilderness. Here Jesus comes face to face with the tests that all of us face in a life of faith.
Tests like: Who do you trust to sustain you?
Tests like: Who do you serve?
Tests like: Do you trust that God loves you?
All of this conversation that Jesus has with (I’m going to call him/it) the satan is based on passages in Deuteronomy—passages where Moses is talking to the people of Israel after he has talked with God. So Jesus isn’t just making up a theology in which to repel these “temptations.” In fact, we often see this passage lifted up as an example of how we are to withstand all evil, by mere force of our own will. But this is not what Jesus does. Jesus continually steps back from asserting himself, instead putting the focus on God and God’s word.
Turn these stones to bread or Who sustains you? The satan starts off with the most basic of impulses, the most basic of desires. The desire to assuage our hunger. And the desire to do it on our own, to stand on our own two feet we might say. Of course, this is a question of power. Did Jesus have the power to turn stones into bread? We don’t see him do that in the gospels. Certainly he multiplies that which is already food, but he doesn’t just transfigure non-food into food.
For Jesus, whether he thinks he has this power or not, he sees the test. Who is supposed to sustain us? Who has always sustained us? From the time before we were wandering Arameans; before, during, and after the time of exodus; before, during and after the time of exile; before us and during our lifetimes and after us—the answer is the same. God sustains us. God finds us. God rescues us. God teaches us in the wilderness. God leads us into freedom and new life. God makes an everlasting covenant with us. We are not supposed to try to do it all on our own. We do not sustain ourselves. We do not make bread just appear. God gave us manna in the wilderness—a symbolic way of saying that all that sustains us comes from God’s hand, from God’s grace and mercy. Jesus says, “It is written, and I’m quoting the Torah here, satan, “One does not live by bread alone.”
Okay, so Jesus won’t use his power for himself. But what about other people? Who of us hasn’t dreamed about being able to have enough money to end hunger, or poverty, or cure cancer, or rid the world of all of it’s ills? This is what the satan dangles in front of Jesus. “I have all power. And I’ll give it to you. Think what you could do! Think of all the good, all the justice, all the peace, all the righteousness you could bring. It’s a big job, but you could handle it.” Wouldn’t we be tempted for just a second?
“All you have to do it bow down to me.” And Jesus sees this for the test it is. This isn’t really about how much power we can have, or even how we use our power. It is about who we serve, who we worship, who is our ultimate allegiance to. It takes a nano second to know the answer to this one—it is found in the beginning of the 10 commandments, it is sounded forth in the Shema, Here O Israel, the Lord is one, and you shall worship the Lord your God and only serve him. Or as Luke’s gospel puts it: “It is written, and I’m quoting the Commandments and the Shema in the Torah as you well remember, satan, “Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.”
Then the tester changes tactics, and goes straight for the bedrock of our faith, our belief in God’s love for us. The satan says, “You say you are the Son of God (does “this is my son, the beloved” ring in our ears?)—but how do you know? I can quote Scripture too, Jesus. And it says in Scripture that God will set angels to protect you, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone. God will raise you up on eagle’s wings, bear you on the breath of dawn, make you to shine like the sun, and hold you in the palm of God’s hand. You believe in Scripture. Prove that God loves you so much. Jump off the top of the temple, right now!”
Jesus certainly sees through this twisting of the idea of trusting in God. (As one commentator put it, this is akin to a child throwing herself into traffic to test if her parents love her). God’s love, God’s covenant does not promise that there will never be suffering, or hardship, or grief or pain—we have heard Jesus talk about his own coming passion.
But it does promise that God will be with us, even in the valley of the shadows. God will be with us, no matter what. In fact, Jesus is the embodiment of that promise—Emmanuel, God with us. And so, Jesus says, “It is said, “Do not put your Lord to the test.” And when the satan was finished, he departed until an opportune time.
As I was musing on this, I had flashes of the prayer that Jesus would teach us all to prayer. “Give us this day our daily bread.” “Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” “Lead us not into temptation (or time of trial) but deliver us from evil.” Was Jesus trying to give us a short hand way of holding onto these necessary truths when facing the trials and temptations of human life? Maybe we can’t be as facile as he was with Moses’ words—but we do have the Lord’s Prayer.
I was really taken with the way that Matthew Boulton pictures what is happening in the desert (and how we might take it as an example in our own lives). As he says in his commentary, “Not heroic “self-reliance,” then, but rather genuinely strong, humble communion with God, is this story’s central theme. Indeed, the devil tempts Jesus toward “fortitude” and “self-sufficiency,” at least as the world often defines them (Sustain yourself! Rule the world! Trust no one! Put your own interests first!). Jesus declines to pursue this path, testifying instead to his deeply intimate, empowering communion with God, the fountain of blessings at the center of his life.”
And that is what we are encouraged to recommit ourselves to in Lent. To fostering our communion with God. To opening ourselves to feeling the deeply intimate love that emanates to us from God. To drink of the fountain of blessings. To turn towards making God the center of our lives.
Will we be tested? Will we be tempted? We will mess up and rely on ourselves personally? Or wish for some magic wand to fix the world? Or dream that with God all will be right, always? Undoubtably. Maybe that is what it means to be human.
But what we can be sure of, what we can stand upon as a house built on rock and not sand, is that God will be there. God will be there in the morning and the evening. God will be there through our joys and our sorrows. God has known us from before we were born and God will hold us in God’s palm when we leave this life, and beyond.
I know that purple is the color of Lent. A royal color, for Jesus the King. A somber color, for Jesus the Lamb, Jesus the Redeemer, Jesus moving towards the cross. I also know that the reason purple was so valued was it took an enormous amount of time to make the dye that would color the cloth. It is said to come from the glands of sea snails—and it can take tens of thousands of sea snails to make a single gram of the dye. Think of the labor, catching the snails, excreting their glands, mixing it with sea water and boiling! Not to mention the dying process itself.
As we surround ourselves with purple this season, may this beautiful color permeate our lives.
Let us remember that our covenant with God is precious.
Let us remember that our relationship with God takes time.
Let us never forget: Who we trust to sustain us—
Who we serve—
And Who loves us beyond all measure.
May it be so, Amen and Amen.