The Meaning of Lent
Luke 4.1-15 A sermon preached at Ellenbrook Church 10 March 2019
Today is the first Sunday in Lent. Traditionally Christians have fasted for the forty days of Lent – but not really; at least, not in my experience. Ash Wednesday has been celebrated, but the Lenten fast has not been taken seriously. People used to talk about giving up chocolate for Lent. I don’t recall I ever did. I took part in a radio program once with a woman who had joined an Orthodox church. She described with great enthusiasm how seriously they took the fast and how exciting it was when they came to Good Friday, and then the feast of Eastertide. I felt inferior.
After the program we were chatting. I must have said something about hunger, and she exclaimed, “We can eat some things, we can eat crayfish and prawns; they are not on the list of things you don’t eat in Lent.” She didn’t see the inconsistency, and I felt better.
So, what’s it all about? This morning’s reading is from Luke 4.1-15 and Luke is definitely not telling us about how we should fast, or even that we should fast. The focus is entirely on Jesus and something he did at the outset of his ministry. Even here Luke makes little of him fasting; he doesn’t use that word. He just says that for forty days and nights he went without food, and at the end he was hungry. The story is mainly about how he dealt with the temptations he faced during that time and after. But before I go there let me say something about fasting. One of my lecturers in Cape Town had a special ministry to Muslims and used to attend mosque on Fridays. He came to me and said the Muslims were challenging us to a debate about whether Jesus died and rose again; Muslims say he didn’t. Would I accept? I wasn’t going to let the opportunity of telling the gospel to an audience of Muslims go by, so I agreed. It was an exciting night at the University of Cape Town. They squashed 500 people into a lecture room that held 200, 500 sat outside and listened, and 500 were turned away. In the lecture room we were in each other’s faces. After the debate a bearded Muslim gentleman came up to me and said, “We Muslims believe in Jesus. Jesus fasted. We Muslims fast. You Christians don’t fast.” So should we fast; that is the question.
The first thing to note is that there is no appointed fast time in the New Testament, not even the Day of Atonement, which is the one Israelite fast day in the Old Testament. There is no Ramadan in Christianity, like the Muslims have. You are not commanded to fast. You may choose to, or not. It is a matter of choice.
The second thing to note is that Jesus only fasted this once. We have no record of him doing so again. There was no Lenten fast in his case. In fact, in Luke 5 he responds to criticism: John’s disciples fast, and the Pharisees’ disciples fast, but yours don’t. So normally Jesus wasn’t known to fast, and he didn’t teach his disciples to. His shared meals were well known; they were times of great enjoyment. So, what is going on?
Jesus responded to the criticism by saying that it was inappropriate for wedding guests to fast when a wedding was on, and the bridegroom was with them. The kingdom of God had dawned, and the promised king had arrived. The great marriage of God and his people was underway. It was a time for celebration. For those who had ears to hear he was saying dining with him meant being forgiven and reconciled with God. Perhaps he is even hinting that he himself is God.
My next observation is that this new state of affairs, which Jesus called the kingdom of God, this time of joy and celebration, began directly after his forty day fast, when he emerged from his wilderness temptations. Jesus fasting at the beginning of his ministry seems to be connected to his not fasting again. To find our why we will need to do some thinking.
Why fast in the first place? Fasting is associated with prayer. Mostly in the Old Testament it goes along with prayers for forgiveness. You remember the story of Jonah. Jonah warned the people of Ninevah that God was offended by their behaviour and was about to destroy their city. They repented and called a fast, and God forgave them. When sin catches up with people, and they are horrified at what they have done and the judgement it deserves, they humble themselves, they dress in rags, they stop eating, and they cry out to God for mercy. As I mentioned, Israel’s ancient calendar had only one fast day: the Day of Atonement. For one day a year they wore hessian, sprinkled ashes over themselves, and prayed for mercy. Atonement was made in the temple, and ritually the land was cleansed for another year.
So, what is Jesus doing going without food for six weeks? He is praying, of course, but earnestly and passionately! But what is he praying about? I am guessing here, because the Gospels don’t tell us, but I think they don’t tell us because to them it was obvious. John the Baptist has been preaching that the promised king has arrived, and he is going to judge -separate the wheat from the chaff – and burn the chaff with fire. Jesus has just come to John and asked to be baptized like the rest of the people. As he comes up from the water he sees into heaven, the Holy Spirit descends on him like a dove, and the voice of God commissions him as the promised king. This means that his first task, according to John, will be to bring about the great separation of the righteous and the wicked.
But now he withdraws into the wilderness and is praying. For what? That God will have mercy, I think. That God will be patient for a while longer, that God will forgive his people! And since there can be no forgiveness without repentance, this must mean giving him, Jesus, the time to lead the nation to repentance. Why do I think that? Because when Jesus emerges from the wilderness he does not proceed to judge as John expected and predicted, but to forgiveness and salvation. “For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.” (John 3.17) God must have said yes to his prayer.
Something else happened in the wilderness as well as Jesus’ prayers, and that’s what we need to look at now. For it holds the answer to how it was that God changed his mind from what he had told John the Baptist to say, and why the story of Jesus proceeded to the cross in the way it did.
Jesus was tempted by the Devil. It seems like this confrontation with the Devil was something that had to be: a part of God’s plan of salvation, something which the Spirit of God within him caused his spirit not to back away from. And looking at the three temptations it is clear they were about establishing the kingdom of God.
It will take too long to consider them all. We will pay attention to the most puzzling of the three.
Luke 4.5 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 And Jesus answered him, “It is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.’”
The Son of God, who is God himself, became a man. As a man he was subjected to temptation just like us. Temptation is like a suggestion. Suggestions come into our minds often. Sometimes our normal desires suggest something. You are hungry. You are in the supermarket and passing the chocolates; the aisle is empty. The thought goes through your head that you could eat that chocolate before you reach the checkout. No one would know. That is a temptation, a suggestion arising from what we call the flesh. What will you do?
Suggestions also come from outside. You have a perfectly good car and it’s all you can afford, but that advertisement on the television last night made you think you will get that new one. People would really notice you then. That is a temptation, a suggestion from what we call the world. What will you do? Suggestions can also come to our minds directly from the Devil. We talk about the world, the flesh and the Devil.
The suggestion came to Jesus from the Devil that if he went about things in this way and that, he could win the world and establish his kingdom. In this case the Devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. You might wonder whether there is a mountain that high. But that is how our imaginations work. In his mind Adolf Hitler saw all the countries in the world in a moment of time and began to think how they might all be his. He would need to build the best army in the world. He would need to unite his people behind a common hatred of the Jews. He would need to lie and employ a master of propaganda. And so on.
To Jesus Satan said, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will.” Jesus knew this was true. He could use the Devil’s methods and achieve his aim. The world would become his kingdom. We baulk at this. Is it true that the rule of the world has been given to Satan? Is it true he can give it to whomever he will? God gave the rule of the world to Adam. But when Adam gave in to the Devil’s suggestion, and when we do the same, over and over, we establish Satan’s dominion. Leaders driven by desire for glory undermine their opponents. Business people driven by love of money design ways of fleecing the public. Men giving way to anger strike their wives. Children driven by envy are nasty to their school mates. The world is given up to Satan. If he can get people to do what he wants, well, yes, he can give it to whomever he will.
“If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” I said this is puzzling. Could Jesus have really been tempted to worship the Devil? This story could only have come from him, so it appears so. One thing is clear: Satan craves glory. His original attack on the human race was driven by jealousy of the privileged position God gave them as rulers of his creation. Satan wants that for himself. If Jesus would only recognize his true worth … I can only think that the Devil took a step too far here, that he revealed too much of his real intentions. In any case, Jesus rebuffed the suggestion. “You shall worship the Lord your God; him alone shall you serve.” Jesus was not prepared to give the Devil an inch. The kingdom he establishes will be God’s kingdom, and he will use God’s methods to achieve it.
Already he is! He identified himself with sinners when he asked to be baptized. He is now at prayer for their salvation. Even these horrible thoughts that come his way are allowed by God to fulfil his purposes. His final resolve out of this time of testing will make him a preacher, a teacher, a compassionate healer, a critic of all that is evil. And it will drive him to his great confrontation with evil at the cross.
Adam was made king of God’s world. Satan intervened and tempted him to turn away from God. The kingdom meant for man became the kingdom of the Devil. But God has now appointed another man as the king of his creation. Again Satan has come and sought to turn him away from God. But he has stood firm. The struggle is not over, but in this first contest the new man is victorious. His next step will be to move to Galilee to announce the arrival of the kingdom of God.
Let me finish with a few comments about fasting. None of the Gospels tell us about Jesus’ forty days in the wilderness to teach us to fast. We don’t know if Jesus fasted again after that. He taught that his time in the world was a time of rejoicing. However, he also said that he would be taken away from his disciples and they would fast in that day. I think he is saying here that after his death there would be much weeping and repenting; there wouldn’t have been much feasting between Golgotha and the first Easter Day. But on the third day God raised him from the dead, and then we see him eating again with his disciples. Since then Jesus has never ceased to be with us, even after his ascension. Jesus has risen, the kingdom of God has come; it is a time for rejoicing.
And yet, the kingdom has not come in its fulness. Sin is still a reality, and so is judgement in its various forms. There will be times when focused, concentrated, desperate prayer are appropriate, and we may well wish to abstain for from food.
I would only say, make sure your fasting is purposeful. There is nothing to be gained by fasting for its own sake. Fasting is not an exercise which will help you resist sin. Paul makes that clear. Prayer is all important. Pray without ceasing! Fast if it helps you with your prayers.
But when you think of Jesus in the wilderness, do not think of your own fasting. Think that Jesus was at prayer for you, for God to have mercy on you. Think about Jesus and salvation.
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