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Gospel: Matthew 4: 1-11
At that time Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert
to be tempted by the devil.
He fasted for forty days and forty nights,
and afterwards he was hungry.
The tempter approached and said to him,
“If you are the Son of God,
command that these stones become loaves of bread.”
He said in reply,
“It is written:
One does not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes forth
from the mouth of God.”
Then the devil took him to the holy city,
and made him stand on the parapet of the temple,
and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down.
For it is written:
He will command his angels concerning you
and with their hands they will support you,
lest you dash your foot against a stone.”
Jesus answered him,
“Again it is written,
You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.”
Then the devil took him up to a very high mountain,
and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in their magnificence,
and he said to him, “”All these I shall give to you,
if you will prostrate yourself and worship me.”
At this, Jesus said to him,
“Get away, Satan!
It is written:
The Lord, your God, shall you worship
and him alone shall you serve.”
Then the devil left him and, behold,
angels came and ministered to him.
The Gospel of the Lord.
***
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Do you remember learning how to ride a bicycle?
I’ve seen pictures of myself as a toddler, peddling my plastic tricycle around our family driveway. Then I became a “big boy,” graduating to a real bicycle, but with training wheels. Eventually, I outgrew those, too, and began learning how to pedal on my own.
That was the scary part.
I’m sure many parents have had that heart dropping feeling of watching your child wobble without training wheels. At first, you hold onto the back of their seat as they struggle to find their balance.
But soon enough, children develop a sense of confidence, insisting that you let go as they push and pedal on their own. For some, that command leads to a crash landing.
For others, newfound freedom.
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Isn’t that what Lent is all about?
Learning how to W-O-B-B-L-E.
How to pedal. Push. Balance. Striving for the freedom to live like Jesus, by choosing what is good and rejecting what is evil.
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In today’s Gospel, Jesus is driven into the desert in response to his baptism.
He had just been plunged into the Jordan River by John. The heavens were ripped open as God the Father proclaimed, “This is my beloved Son with whom I am well pleased. Listen to him.”
In the desert, Satan puts that claim to the test, urging the Lord to prove his divinity, to misuse his power, and to break his fidelity to his Father. These temptations come in two different ways.
Physically, the Lord is plunged into the depths of human suffering as he experiences the sharp pain of hunger, the constant dryness of thirst, and the awful sense of loneliness that comes with being denied human contact for forty days and forty nights.
Jesus was left with no one to talk to except his Father, while swatting away the seductive whisper of the devil.
Spiritually, Jesus is plunged into the fires of temptation, testing his flesh, as Satan offers him power, glory, and basic necessities such as bread. But by his resistance, Jesus proves that the only one who can ultimately satisfy him – and us – is God.
As he says today, “Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes forth from the mouth of God.”
While bread gives us life, it does not give us meaning. We all need to discover the deeper, intangible realities of life – things like truth, love, and purpose – things which Satan cannot give us.
When the temptations are over, Jesus returns to Galilee, where he calls his disciples to himself. They will not only serve as the foundation of the Church; relationally, they will also feed him – a reminder to all of us that no man is an island. We need one another.
***
Satan left Jesus for a time, but will return at the cross, when he uses the same phrase from the desert to tempt the Lord one final time – “If you are the Son of God…”
While Jesus is tempted privately in the desert, all of the temptations for power, glory, and comfort converge on the cross as he is publicly challenged to abuse his power and disobey his Father.
“If you are the Son of God,” an anonymous voice cries out, “come down from the cross!”
Though racked with pain, the Lord refuses. He’d rather die beaten and bloodied, scoffed at as a common criminal, than disobey his Father. While coming down from the cross would have provided temporary relief, it would have never led to lasting peace.
That only comes with fidelity.
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The Lord’s obedience should challenge and inspire us this Lent.
Over the next forty days, we are invited – not only to give up something simple like coffee or chocolate – but also to genuinely go deeper.
To examine our conscience, our commitment to the poor, the depths of our prayer life, and our fidelity to our baptismal call to holiness.
What are some of the temptations we face? How do we plan on resisting them? Most importantly, what would genuine spiritual growth look like by the end of Lent?
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May God grant us the grace to remove our “training wheels,” as it were, to wobble our way through Lent. To push. Pedal. Strive. Balance.
To seek the truest form of freedom – the ability to choose what is good and reject what is evil.
Even a crash landing would be better than never trying at all.
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Image credits: (1) Freepik (2) PushmeHome (3) Diocese of Covington
