First Sunday in Lent, 2010

Text: St. Matthew 4:1-11

The Rev. Jerry Kistler

St. Stephen’s Reformed Episcopal Church

Montrose, Colorado

“Passing the Test”

Up in Montana, in a little town in the middle of the Rockies, a man lived in a small cabin with his young son. The man was a skilled outdoorsman. He knew all there was to know about survival in the wilderness. And every year he would take his son and head off into the wilds for as much as a month at a time with nothing more than what they could carry in their backpacks.

Each outing the man would teach his son a few more of the essential skills he’d need to know to live off land—how to set traps, how to catch fish with your bear hands, how to build a shelter to survive an unexpected storm. And by the time he was sixteen the boy had learned everything his father knew to teach him. So it was time for him to be put to the test. I was time him to go solo.

So early one morning in the first part of June, the man helped his son into his pack and sent him off to blaze his own trial, calling out after him that he didn’t want to see him again till the beginning of July.

The remaining days of June seemed barely to creep by. The man couldn’t help worrying about his son just a little. He knew the dangers his son would have to face. And now one of those dangers was looming up over the mountains: a storm. It was late in the season, but he knew this storm would bring snow to the higher valleys and passes where his son probably was by now. He was tempted to go out and rescue his son, but he resisted because he was sure his son was just as capable as he was of getting out safely.

After a few days the storm lifted, and the days continued. It got to be the first of July, the second, the third, the fourth. Finally on the fifth of July, while his father was making preparations to go out and find his son, the Youngman came walking around the bend in the trail and up towards the cabin. He looked a bit haggard—he’d lost some weight and his arm was bandaged. But the grin on his face told the whole story. He had the haughty look of a warrior who’d vanquished his enemy. And when his father saw it he began to laugh. His son had been put to the greatest test of his life, and he’d proved his mettle.

Sometimes fathers have to put their sons to the test, to prove them, and to bring them to maturity.

And Israel was God’s son. And God put Israel to the test in the wilderness. As we read in Deuteronomy chapter eight, God told the Israelites that he had led them those forty years in the wilderness to humble them and test them, that he might know what was in their hearts—whether they would keep his commandments or not. He wanted to test the mettle of their faithfulness. And so God allowed them to go hungry for a time, and finally gave them the manna, that they might understand that man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds our of the mouth of the Lord. And then he said this: “You should know in your heart that as a man chastens his son, so the Lord your God chastens you.”

Israel was God’s son, and for forty years God chastened his son in the wilderness. And for forty years Israel failed miserably. They failed to prove themselves faithful to the Lord who had reared them as a father rears his own child.

Well, how did they fail? They failed in three very important ways. First, they failed by not trusting the Almighty God to sustain them through their trial. Second, they failed by putting God’s faithfulness to the test. And third, they failed by turning away from the Lord and worshipping other gods. And because they failed, that entire first generation that came out of Egypt—barring Joshua and Caleb—died in the wilderness. Israel, God’s son, failed the wilderness test.

But out of Egypt God called his Son, and caused him to pass through the waters, and then immediately led him out into the wilderness to be tested by the devil. Jesus Christ was, and is, God’s Son. And God sent his Son into the wilderness to prove him—to put him to the test—that at every point Israel so miserably failed, Christ might prevail. And that, as the True Israel of God, he might pass the test and fulfill all righteousness for us, how also so miserably fail most every step of the way in our sojourn through the wilderness of this world. As we prayed in our Collect today: Jesus went into the wilderness and “for our sake didst fast forty days and forty nights.”

God chastened and tested His Son in the wilderness. But at every point that Israel failed—and at every point we so often fail—Jesus Christ prevailed.

The first test Jesus faces was the temptation to satisfy his hunger by miraculously turning stone into bread. Now, why would this have been wrong for him to do? I means, didn’t he turn some water into wine? Didn’t he miraculously multiply a few pieces of bread and a couple of small fish? So why no could he not have changed some rocks into a couple of loaves of bread? Well, it would have been perfectly fine, except for the fact that Jesus wasn’t into the wilderness for himself. Jesus went into the wilderness to identify himself with all the rest of humanity who must rely ultimately on God to provide them their daily bread. “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.” In other words, it is God, by the very command of his mouth, who creates and sustains life. In the beginning God called the universe into being by His word; he spoke, and it was so. And he is still calling the universe, and this world, and everyone in it, into being. So no matter how much bread you might have, if God ceased to call you into being—if God ceased to speak you into existence—you’d simply vanish. In other words, bread just have the power of life infused into it. Life comes from God and is sustained by God, and he wants his people to turn to him and rely on him ultimately to provide them everything they need for life.

But what happened with Israel in the wilderness? When they began to hunger, even though God was sustaining their lives without food… Have you ever noticed that none of them were dying in the wilderness? None of them were dropping dead because of hunger. But when their tummies started to hurt a little bit, when they had a few little hunger pangs, they immediately wanted to turn back to Egypt. They wanted to go back to the leeks, and onions, and cucumbers of Egypt, even if that meant returning to slavery! That’s how little they trusted the Lord to sustain them.

But where Israel failed, Christ prevailed! Our text says that after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, be became hungry. Of course he did; he was a true man, like every one of us. So when the devil came to him and tempted him to use his power to turn stones to bread, he experienced a true temptation. For it is written, He “was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Heb. 4:15). But how did he respond to the temptation? How did he answer the devil? Did he get into and argument with the devil? Did he begin to reason with the devil? No. He simply responded by putting his trust in the Word of God. “It is written,” he said. “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’” So at the first point in which Israel failed—and were we so often fail by not trusting the Lord to sustain us—Jesus passed the test, and he passed it for us.

So the devil came at him from another angle. He took Jesus up to a very high point in the temple and said, “If you really are the Son of God—if you really are the Messiah—why don’t you prove it? Go ahead and jump. Go ahead and throw yourself down. For isn’t it written that God will send his angels to bear you up lest you dash your foot against a stone?” What was the devil tempting Jesus to do? He was tempting him to put God’s faithfulness to the test—to set up a situation, an experiment, by which he could prove God, like one proves a car on the proving grounds to make sure it’s going to work right for you.

Israel had also fallen to this temptation. They said, “Moses, give us water to drink so we can know whether God is with us or not.” They didn’t want to take God at his word. They wanted to prove his faithfulness. So in Exodus 17, the place was called “Massah and Meribah”—testing and contention—“because of the contention of the children of Israel, and because they test the Lord, saying, ‘Is the Lord among us or not.’”

Thank God we never do any thing like that! We never set up situations to make sure God is going to be faithful before we act in faithfulness. But again, where Israel failed, and where we so often fail, Christ prevailed. Again he said, “It is written.” “It is written, ‘Thou shalt not put the Lord thy God to the test.’” And he acted in faith to that word.

The devil was beaten, and he knew it, but he had one last temptation up his sleeve: the big one. The mother of all temptations. He brought Jesus up to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them in a moment, and then said, “All this I will give you, if you will only fall down and worship me.”

Now you have to understand the magnitude of this temptation. What Satan was offering to Jesus was the Kingdom without the Cross. Jesus could take possession of all the kingdoms of the world, which is exactly what God will for his son from all eternity, but he could by-pass the way of suffering. All he had to do is fall down, and for just a brief moment—for one small second—commit cosmic treason. All he’d have to do is proclaim Satan as God—to proclaim Satan as Elohim. And, you know, that is exactly what Israel did in the wilderness.

The people couldn’t wait for God any longer. Moses had gone up the mountain and hadn’t returned in more days than they could count. And so they went to Aaron and said, “Make us a god.” “Give us something tangible we can worship, Aaron. Give us something we can control by our worship. This Yahweh God is far too unpredictable.” And so Aaron, in a terrible moment of weakness and unbelief himself, complied with Israel’s desire, and made for them the golden calf. And worse, this is what he said: “This is now your God, O Israel—this is now your Elohim—who brought you out of Egypt.” And the people fell down and worshipped. The Scripture says that, in so doing, they worshipped demons rather than their God. This was the ultimate blasphemy, the ultimate treason again the Lord. And this was what Satan was tempting Jesus to do. But once again, where Israel failed, Christ prevailed. He rebuked the devil and said, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’”

You see, the story of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness is the story of how God chastened and tested his son. And if we are truly his children, he will chasten us as well. He will put us to the test to prove the mettle of our faith. The Scripture says, if it were not so, we would be illegitimate children and not true sons. But it is never an enjoyable thing to be put to the test. Some of us have had to endure some pretty grievous trials. And so often we fail through those trials. We’re like Israel in the desert. We grumble and complain. We seek to sustain ourselves by our own strength, or by our technology, or by our money. We put God’s faithfulness to the test. We say things like, “God, if you really do care, then do so and so, then I’ll know you’re the God you say you are.” And sometimes we even turn away from the Lord and create other gods and serve them in his place—the god of pleasure, or the god of work, or the god of family. But where we so often have failed, Christ in every way has prevailed. And he has prevailed for us. It’s possible to sum up Christ’s whole life in those two wonderful words: for us. They mean that in Him we too may be found righteous, we too may be found faithful, not because of what we’ve done, but because of what he had done in our place—for us. The great hope that we have is that, even though we have so often failed in our faithfulness to God, if we are Christ’s by faith, we will never be cast off in our wilderness wandering. For where Israel failed—even the New Israel—Christ has prevailed. +