February 17, 2013 – Luke 4:1-13
Luke 4:1-13
Learning to say “No!”
First Sunday in Lent – February 17, 2013
First Lutheran Church – Winnipeg, MB
The Baptist pastor and writer Kyle Childress recently posted a story on his blog about
his ordination 30 years ago.
He invited an old preacher – over 80 years of age! – to preach at the ordination.
He preached a good sermon on three things that are essential to anyone entering
the pastor’s role:
he preached a sermon on loving God, loving scripture, and loving the people.
Afterward they had a big meal and then finally Pastor Kyle escorted the old preacher to his car.
Just as they got to the car, the old pastor turned and said to Kyle:
There are two more things you need to know about being a pastor.
You’ll need to say “No!” and “Hell no!”
And with that he got in his car and drove away.
(at http://www.ekklesiaproject.org/blog/2013/02/saying-yes-and-saying-no/)
Jesus goes into the wilderness right after he is baptized,
and just before he begins his public ministry.
Apparently before he begins that public ministry, he needs to learn to say “No” and “Hell no!”
Apparently he needs to struggle with what God is not calling him to do before he can
freely engage in what God is in fact calling him to do.
We’ve already heard a few weeks ago what his ministry will consist of:
announcing good news to the poor, release to the captives, freedom for the oppressed,
inaugurating the jubilee year, feeding the hungry, and forgiving the guilty.
But today, Luke shows us what Jesus will not do, what in fact he will resist.
Apparently our God-given vocations consist not only of what we do,
but what we choose not to do.
Oscar Wilde famously said, “I can resist anything but temptation.”
Today, Jesus resists temptation, three times.
He’s in the desert, he’s trying to figure what his baptism will mean for his life,
and along comes the devil to tempt or lure him away from that path.
And far from being a caricature with horns, a goatee, a trident, and red onesies,
this devil sounds pretty reasonable.
Several writers suggest this wasn’t necessarily a being outside Jesus,
but was maybe that voice you hear in your head that that is oh-so-good at
leading you away from what God is calling you to do.
Jesus is hungry, he’s been fasting for a month and half, and so the devil reasonably says,
“Hey! You’re God’s Son! You’re special!
Just use your power to turn that stone over there into a loaf of bread.”
The temptation here is for Jesus to use his authority to meet his own personal needs and desires.
Thwarted, the devil tries again.
“Say, you’re the Messiah, aren’t you? The king like David who’ll make everything right.
Just say the word and I’ll give you all the political and military might you want.”
The temptation here for Jesus is to assert worldly power rather than serving the Kingdom of God
which has as its agenda saving and reconciling peoples.
Encountering resistance, the devil tries one more time.
“You know,” he says, “I can see a guy like you has a lot of integrity. Great: I love that in a guy. But people with integrity have a hard time in this world. I’ll tell you what: I’ll make it easier for you. Throw yourself down from the temple and have the angels catch you. I’m telling you, after such a huge spectacle you’ll have all the fame and riches you could want, and people will do whatever you say.”
The temptation for Jesus here is take a path that leads to fame and riches rather than
a path that leads to service and the cross.
But Jesus sends the devil packing.
The devil offers Jesus an alternative to what God calls him to do.
The devil offers Jesus an alternative mission and destiny to the cross.
That is the real temptation.
And the alternatives sound reasonable to us, right?
An easy free meal rather than hunger?
Ruling rather than being tried by the state as a criminal and hung on a cross?
Relatively easy fame and riches rather than sacrificial service?
Sounded like a no-brainer then, and I’m sure it sounds like a no-brainer now.
But Jesus resists.
Jesus says “No!” and “Hell No!”
There are countless things and numberless voices everyday that lead us away from God and
away from God’s loving mission to love bless and heal this world and every person in it.
There are countless things and numberless voices everyday that lead us away from
being part of this community and its particular involvement in that mission.
Jesus had serious choices to make – he knew all about that – and so do we.
Lent developed, after all, after Jesus’ followers had become a little too comfortable.
Lent developed at a time when Jesus’ followers had lowered their expectations of what
God was up to in the world and of what that God expected of them.
In Luke’s scheme, we the church are now the resurrected physical body of Jesus on earth.
We are the ones whose job it is to announce good news to the poor,
and release to the captives, and freedom for the oppressed.
We are the ones whose job it is to inaugurate the jubilee year and
feed the hungry and forgive the guilty.
But, just like Jesus, we are tempted to abandon that and choose instead
ways of self-fulfillment, power and spectacle.
We are tempted to want worship that is self-fulfilling rather than worship that
builds community and incorporates us into God’s loving mission.
We are tempted to want power and size rather than
seek opportunities for service and self-sacrifice.
We are tempted to want spectacle and entertainment rather than death and resurrection.
But the good news is that
the Holy Spirit of the living loving God was in the wilderness with Jesus,
and that Holy Spirit enabled Jesus to say “No!” and “Hell No!” to the devil and
all his empty promises.
And that same Spirit has been given to us.
All Christians are tempted to dilute the wine in the cup that Jesus offers them.
That is a temptation for every single one of us.
All Christians are tempted to make their faith comfortable,
and all Christians are tempted to make their faith something manageable.
There are times, like coach Noel said of our middling Jets this week, when
we’re tempted to give the adequate rather than the best in response to a call from God.
The thing is, the life of faith and baptismal living are not easy.
It is hard when things are good because it’s then you’re tempted away from the
difficulties of what Jesus calls us to do.
And it is hard when things are bad because it’s then that you question whether
Jesus is really with you.
But the thing is, Jesus knows what it is like to have things good:
by all accounts he liked people, he was popular and charismatic.
But Jesus also knows what it is like to face difficulty and pain:
he was rejected by many of his friends, perhaps even by his family, and died on a cross.
And finally, Jesus knows what it is like to have to make really really hard decisions.
It took him, after all,
forty days to decide whether or not to say “No!” and “Hell No!” to the devil.
The temptations are many.
When we pray “Lead us not into temptation” we are not praying for God to help us avoid
the little personal peccadilloes we imagine are so horrifying to God.
We are praying that God will not allow us to forget the majestic far-reaching world-changing
mission God has invited us into and to not get side-tracked into anything less.
That is where the diluting of Christianity has really been worst.
In response to that, the ELCIC has published materials in Spiritual Renewal that
seek to keep us grounded in all the richness of what the life of faith is and can be.
Each week I’ll highlight one, and this week I want to highlight the importance of
regular attendance at worship, since Jesus tells the devil this week,
“Worship the Lord your god, and serve only him.”
Right now, take a moment to commit yourself to more regular attendance at worship,
maybe to every Sunday in Lent and the services of Holy Week this year.
In the wilderness, Jesus was confronted with two doors, Door A and Door B.
As the Lutheran pastor and writer Daniel Erlander has it in his book Manna and Mercy,
Door A involved using military force and impressive displays and
consolidating authority and power while Door B involved
using vulnerable love and compassion,
living and teaching dignity, mercy, and food for all, and
getting in trouble and dying on a cross.
He chose Door B and said “Hell No!” to Door A.
And because we have graciously been given the same Spirit that was at work in him
on that day long ago in the wilderness,
we too can choose Door B and say “Hell No!” to Door A.
We have an annual meeting coming up next week, and that is always an opportunity to
discern whether or not we as a community are walking through Door A or
Door B.
Are we living up to our potential as a community of the called?
Are we using our collective pool of gifts as well as we can in service to God’s mission and
our neighbours in need?
Are we consistently saying “Hell Yes!” to the right things and “Hell No!” to the wrong things?
This is not always easy, because these things require both individual and collective sacrifice.
Last year there was a great story in the Christian Century magazine about a church in California
that faced some mighty temptation.
Just as they were kicking off a $100,000 fundraising campaign,
a Hollywood studio phoned and offered them $10,000 to rent their worship space for
a few days to shoot a wedding scene in an Adam Sandler movie.
The scene involved a priest getting into a fist-fight with someone
whose cell phone rings during the ceremony.
The pastor felt justified in turning them down.
The next day the studio phoned back and offered $60,000.
Now he was going to have to think about this again.
So he called a meeting of their 23 congregational deacons and discovered that
18 were in favour of accepting the money while 5 were opposed.
They talked and talked but couldn’t get the five to budge, especially since
the plot of the movie hinged on the sexual exploitation of an adolescent.
Finally, the majority decided to go ahead and accept the money and just try and
patch things up afterward when suddenly a long-time deacon said:
Look – it seems as if saying yes to this offer is going to hurt some members of the congregation. Not most people. Obviously not the majority. But some people. So I guess the question isn’t about a movie. It’s about us. Is $60,000 worth hurting some of our members?
Five minutes later they unanimously agreed to turn down the offer.
(at http://christiancentury.org/article/2011-10/take-money-an-run)
I think they discovered who they were in the process.
They said “No” to the money so they could say “Yes!” to community.
Motives are tested on the wilderness journey.
In Part One of the film adaptation of The Hobbit,
one of things I really like about the picture is that it plays up the difference between
Bilbo Baggins’ motives and the Dwarves motives in
undertaking the long journey to the Lonely Mountain.
The Dwarves lost their home in the mountain long ago when
the Dragon Smaug took it and their treasure from them.
Now they want to go there, kill the dragon, secure their revenge and get their money back.
Bilbo, on the other hand, who is very attached to his Hobbit-hole home, is motivated
neither by revenge or greed, but by the simple desire for the Dwarves to have a home.
Bilbo says to the chief dwarf at one point: I miss my books, and my armchair, and my garden. See, that’s where I belong. That’s home. That’s why I came . . . ‘cause you don’t have one, a home. It was taken from you. But I will help you take it back if I can.
Bilbo says no to greed and revenge, and that frees him to say yes to home.
Living within the one who chooses us, who has said “Yes” to us in the life death and
resurrection of Jesus, let us be free to say “Hell Yes!” to regular worship,
to the God of manna-sharing and justice-doing,
to following the one who chose sacrifice and service and death on a cross,
and let us be free to say “No!” to all that would hinder our saying this “Yes!” to God.
So together let us say, “Amen.”
Pastor Michael Kurtz
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