18 February 2023 Lent 1

Genesis 9:8-17; Psalm 25:1-10; 1 Peter 3:18-22; Mark 1:9-15

 Our passage from Mark would have to be the most brief, truncated story imaginable.  In the space of 6 verses we are told that Jesus is baptised; as he emerges from the water the heavens are ripped open, the Spirit comes upon him  and he is told who he is.  “you are my Son, the beloved, with you I am well pleased”.  Then the Spirit drives him into the wilderness where he is tempted by Satan, surrounded by wild animals, and supported by angels.  When he returns from this wilderness, Jesus proclaims ‘the kingdom of God has come near’.

Now there are some interesting bits in this truncated passage.  Jesus does not choose to go into the wilderness, he clearly does not resist either, but it is not his choice – the Spirit drives him into the wilderness.  Now, it is probably true to say that you and I would not choose to go into the wilderness either.  The wilderness is a dangerous place, you only go there if you have to, and when you get there, most of us do whatever we can to get out of the there as soon as possible.  But, we are told, Jesus was in the wilderness for 40 days.  That is quite a long time, and while it is true that when Scripture speaks of 40, it is not necessarily a numerically accurate number, Mark is indicating to us that Jesus was there for an extended period of time of testing and trial.  40 is used to denote – trial, testing, generation and prophesy.  Moses and the Hebrew people wandered through the desert for 40 years, when Noah was in the ark it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, and now Jesus is in the wilderness for 40 days.  Like 3 and 7, 40 is a term in Scripture with meaning not really related to its numerical value.

But that does not diminish the significance of this time of testing and solitude for Jesus.  While in this wilderness, apart from being tempted by Satan, the details of which we are not given, we are told Jesus was surrounded by wild animals, yet there does not appear to be any implied threat from these animals.  At the start of creation, when the animals were created, and humankind was told to care for them, there was also no hint of threat to humankind from the animals.  Left to their own devices animals only killed to eat, they did not, and usually still do not, kill for ‘fun’ or ‘for the sake of it’.  So, it would appear that although Jesus was surrounded by wild animals, they were ‘just there’, there does not appear to be any risk to Jesus from their presence, and besides that we are told Jesus had the angels supporting him.

In our Genesis reading, we are told that God made a covenant to never again ‘destroy everything’ because of what is happening in the world.  And the covenant is with ‘all of creation’, with humankind as well as animal and plant life.   And I wonder if Jesus was letting the wild animals know that the time of their salvation is near, in the same way that he told the people when he returned from the wilderness.  Were the animals the first to hear of the coming of the kingdom of God, and how special would that have been, because animal life is part of creation and the coming of the kingdom of God is for all creation, not just one particular species who have an ego problem because they happen to walk upright on two legs.

Anyway, as I said, going into the wilderness is not something we usually choose, but that does not mean we do not end up there anyway.  Hopefully not for 40 days, but, no matter what our wilderness experience is, we can be assured that, like Jesus, we are not there alone.  We will always have God on our side, and most of the time we will also be supported by angels, although what form our angels take often depends on the type of wilderness we are in.  Jesus has just heard, you are my Son, the beloved; did that help him get through his time in the wilderness?  What about us, we also are God’s beloved children, does that knowledge help us to weather the storm of our wilderness?

Now, I must admit, sometimes I do choose to be on my own.  I am not sure if that qualifies as wilderness, but sometimes it is only when I am on my own, without distractions, that I am able to do what I need to do.  But, as I said, this is my choice, it is not somewhere that another has ‘driven’ me to go.  And there are times when, even though I am surrounded by people, and noise, and lots going on, I feel like I am ‘on my own’, I feel ‘disconnected’, or ‘alone’, or ‘isolated’, in the midst of a busy community.  And I wonder if it is at times like these that I might say I was ‘in the wilderness’. 

This week we have started our wilderness journey of Lent.  On Wednesday, we acknowledged, with the imposition of ashes, that we will surely die; our bodies will eventually fail us no matter how well we care for them with medicines, cosmetics, exercise and mindfulness.  And then we venture into the wilderness like Moses, Abraham, Elijah, and like Jesus.  With ashes on our foreheads and mortality on our minds, we begin a hazardous journey inward, a journey to learn our true names, our true identities.  May we walk with courage through the wilderness we cannot avoid and do not choose.  May our long wilderness stints teach us our true identities and when angels whisper ‘beloved’ into our ears, may we listen and believe them.