Down to the desert to pray

Text: Luke 4:1-13

We are now 10% into the season of Lent. Lent is usually thought of mainly as the preface to Easter, much as Advent is thought of as the preface to Christmas. But like Advent, it is not just a prelude to something better. If the pleasure of the journey is its unfolding, then the worth of Lent is in the journey to which it invites us.

People have described Lent as a time of penitence and as a time of preparation. Historically and currently those are both accurate. But the word Lent in English has the same root as the word “lengthen,” as in the lengthening days. In Lent the days get longer, at least in the northern hemisphere. Lent is therefore not only lengthening but also lighten-ing, becoming lighter. The days are lighter as in they contain more light. And also, in the other sense, as Lent goes on, the spiritual load gets lighter, as in they get less ponderous. In the end—and we all know how the story turns out at Easter—we celebrate joyfully.

But we do not not start there. We do not start the journey there. We start the story with Jesus in the desert, led (as Luke says) or driven (as Mark says) there by the Holy Spirit. We start with Jesus famished in the desert.

Jesus is there a long time, which is what “forty days” means in the Bible. Forty means “long enough.” Long enough for whatever needs to happen to happen. It is clear that Jesus had to be in the desert. It is the first thing he does, after his baptism, in his adult ministry. He is guided by the Spirit. This is not, evidently, an optional step.

While there, Jesus is tempted or tested or tried—the word means all these things. But he is not tempted to wickedness and evil. He is presented with three temptations. None of them are diabolical. They are, all three, temptations to satisfy central human needs. The need for food or sustenance, the need for power or control, and the need for safety and security.

The devil offers Jesus bread. What do we need to sustain us? Food, plus shelter, clothing. Not everyone in the world has them. But don’t we want more? Medical care? Housing? Transportation? How about entertainment? Do we need a reserve to prepare for hard times? Do we need more than our daily bread? How much more? Perhaps a little more. Perhaps more than a little. And a place to store it. And perhaps a few luxuries. For fun. The devil offers freedom from want.

The devil offers Jesus authority. How much control over our own lives do we need? None of us want to be led, as the apostle Paul once wrote, tied to a rope held by someone else, or blown by the whims of an uncertain wind. To be slaves or servants of another. Should we not be masters of our own fates? And then perhaps master of a few others who threaten our fates. Shouldn’t we insure ourselves against circumstances? Shouldn’t we be self-reliant, self-sufficient? Not dependent on others. Neither a borrower or a lender be, says the proverb. Should we hedge our bets, protect our borders, maintain our fences? Shouldn’t we establish rules and codes and limits and order? The devil offers freedom from uncertainty.

The devil offers Jesus protection from harm. How safe do we need to be? Can we save ourselves from accident, stupidity, or evil? Can we identify all enemies? Can we ferret out all dangerous secrets? Can we preserve ourselves against all disease that threatens our bodies? How about against craziness, against mis-directed anger? How about against righteous anger? Can we protect ourselves from from love turned cold, from change of heart, from loss? The devil offers freedom from human pain.

The devil offers freedom from want, uncertainty, and pain. The things we fear the most. Any yet Jesus says three times: No! No. No. Three hard to refuse offers. Three instant rejections.

It is not that Jesus hates a full stomach, or stability, or safety. We need those things. Those are the things that God provides for us (as we heard in the all the other readings for today). The question is, first, whether the fear of not having those things seduces us more fervently than God does, and second, whether we trust God to provide them. We have many suitors for our loyalty, obedience, and attention. Who guides our life? We cannot say yes to God unless at some point we say no, as Jesus does in the desert, to God’s rivals for us. We need that desert time.

The desert is a place where there is nothing else. Just we and our thoughts. It is a metaphor for retreat, silence, meditation, and cleansing. We need time there. And Lent is a good and traditional time.

What is it about the desert?

The desert is far away. It is isolated from all the voices that call on us every minute to attend to them. Including our desires and our responsibilities.

The desert is empty. It has none of the shiny things that we usually have all around us. Things that are interesting, or falling apart, or need organizing or otherwise attending to.

In the desert we are unobserved. We are not required to please anyone (nor will we get their admiration). We are not required to be anyone, or to act in any special impressive, or polite, or outrageous way.

In the desert we are vulnerable. The quiet of the desert lets our thoughts come unimpeded. The harshness and limits of the desert test our comfort.

And finally, in the desert we are alone. We have only ourselves and God as companions. It is a good time for intimate, disturbing, renewing, and lengthy conversations.

This kind of removed, empty, unobserved, vulnerable, alone time is an important Christian practice. It is a prayer discipline and one of the traditional practices of Lent. Not literally time in the desert, though lots of people have done that, but more practically time that we reserve in our lives, weekly or daily, yearly, removed from the normal calendar.

The temptations of Jesus in the desert are temptations to deny our limits and our finite-ness. But the truth is that hunger, uncertainty, and pain are essential parts of the story of our lives. And the lives of all people. Our attempts to deny that induces in us a kind of sleepiness or depressive fuzziness in life. Desert prayer helps us remember what is true. It wakes us up. It makes our vision sharper.

The season of Lent is a season of repentance. The word means not so much remorse as a change of direction, a turning. But abstract repentance is meaningless. So Lenten disciplines—which are just everyday Christian disciplines, but we talk about them more pointedly—Lenten disciplines are tactics, rules of thumb, things that have worked for others who wish to change their lives. There are a handful. We’ll come across others during these weeks in Lent. But they all start, as it did for Jesus, in a desert place. It is evidently not optional. They all start with time enough in the desert.