Matthew 4:1-11<\/p>\n\n\n\n
February 13, 2005<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lent, for most of my life, means the first hint of spring. The winter solstice is past, the days grow gradually longer, the sunlight is brighter, and budding flowers suggest the return of new life. In the east coast, you begin to see crocuses pushing their heads up from the snow-covered ground.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For some of us who traditionally observe Chinese New Year this past week, we have purchased cut flower buds that are not yet in bloom. These buds symbolize the possibilities of a good, healthy, and prosperous New Year when the flowers open up. With all of these signs of new life and hope, we want to say, \u201cAlleluia!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But against this backdrop of newness and joy happening in nature and in our cultural traditions, this is not what we are doing in the season of Lent. The contrast in Lent is that we are to be restrained and somber.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some years ago, an Episcopal church in a coastal South Carolina town placed three crosses on the lawn adjacent to the church. They draped them in purple for Lent. After a week or so, the church received a call from the local Chamber of Commerce. They complained about the three crosses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThis is a big season for tourists,\u201d they said. \u201cWe think those crosses could send the wrong signal to visitors at the beach. People don\u2019t want to come down here for a vacation and be confronted with unpleasantness.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The church stood its ground. The crosses stayed. \u201cIt\u2019s Lent,\u201d said the church. \u201cPeople are supposed to be uncomfortable.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some pastors believe that every Sunday is the day of resurrection to say \u201cAlleluia!\u201d And that even if we are in the season of Lent, Sundays should not be somber and restrained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Countercultural<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Our society is always thinking about alleluias too. It\u2019s dedicated to success, fulfillment, human potential, and self-esteem. I was reading in the paper last week about the five \u201csocial intelligence\u201d abilities you need to be successful in your workplace. They are: situational radar (read situations), presence (confidence and self-respect), authenticity (honest and not phony), clarity (express oneself clearly), and empathy (connectedness with others). In this world that we live, we believe that we can make ourselves successful. When we come to church, we want people to affirm us for who we are not necessarily about who we ought to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But in Lent, what the church calls us to do during these 40 days of repentance, self-examination, and reflection is a counter-cultural move, a reverse in our society\u2019s predominate way of thinking. Lent is counter-cultural.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We are swimming against the stream in our seasonal confrontation with sin, finitude, death and mortality. These are the subjects that our culture has elaborate means of avoiding. But not at church. In church, in these brightening first days of spring, we insist that we turn our thoughts toward the shadow, toward the truth about our condition in our sin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While our society wants us to think how great we are, the church reminds us that we are in sin. While our culture wants us to feel good all the time, the church reminds us that as human beings we have done some bad things. While our society thinks that power-seeking is a good thing, the church teaches us that power-sharing is a Godly-thing. While our culture bombards us with messages that we should eat all the time, the church during Lent calls us to fast for 40 days. Lent is a season of unpleasant uncomfort-ability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus\u2019 Temptations<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In today\u2019s gospel, Jesus is confronted by Satan in the wilderness. The great tempter offers Jesus three possibilities\u2014turns stones into bread, perform spectacular spiritual feats, and take political power. When we look at these temptations, we actually can\u2019t see what\u2019s really wrong about them. Aren\u2019t these all good, worthy ends sought by most of us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Isn\u2019t it a good thing to feed hungry people? Wouldn\u2019t it be wonderful to witness a miracle so great that struggling believers would be able to believe? Isn\u2019t it a worthy vocation to attempt to do good for others through political action? We would think so.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yet, Jesus rejects all of these, otherwise good offers. He says, \u201cNo!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n But after resisting these three temptations in the wilderness, we know that Jesus twice multiplied bread to provide enough loaves to feed multitudes of hungry listeners (Mt. 14:15-21; 15:32-38. He performed wonders like that one time walking across the waters of the Sea of Galilee (Mt. 14:25). And we all know that Jesus\u2019 ministry had and continues to have enormous political impact, for no ruling authority has been able to ignore him or his message entirely since that time right up to the present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He did all these things he was once tempted to do, but he did them for others and not for himself. He did them as part of his obedience to God\u2019s call, rather than as a way to seize control and command the world around him. His acts of power were for the purpose of submission, obedience to God and not for his own self-promotion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Jesus\u2019 temptations were linked to his divine status. Satan says, \u201cIf you are the Son of God.\u201d Jesus resisted the temptations to be a certain kind of messiah\u2014an earthly king of this world. Unlike Satan who was a fallen angel, Jesus remained obedient to God. Even after Satan quoted Scripture to Jesus, Jesus was not the kind of messiah who subdued evil through an overt display of supernatural power but only through humble obedience to God, even unto death.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Our Temptations<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n How about us? The temptations to which Jesus was subjected by Satan were not the kind of ordinary human temptations that we know. Since Jesus is the Son of God, his temptations threatened his identity as God. What are some of our temptations?<\/p>\n\n\n\n During this time of the year, many people face the temptation to cheat on their taxes. A growing number of Americans feel that they are paying more than their fair share in taxes, so they feel justified in fudging some of the numbers on their returns to lower their tax bill. A recent survey revealed that people who see paying taxes was a part of their civic duty was down from 81% to 68% in four years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Many people face the temptation to gamble. On Saturday mornings, busses lined up on Stockton Street transporting gamblers to Tahoe. Huge casinos may be opening right in the Bay Area. To resist the temptation of gambling, there\u2019s an Arizona state law that allows people to ask casinos to ban them from their facilities. By signing a \u201cself-exclusion,\u201d casinos can refuse to pay any winnings, evict them from the casinos, and, if necessary, arrest them for trespassing. So far nearly 400 Arizona residents have signed up for this ban.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How about the temptation of overeating? In many areas of the country, fried chicken fellowship dinners and potbellied pastors are a part of the landscape. Last year, CNN reported about a pastor in Texas who preached a series of sermons on the biblical principle of how our body is supposed to be the temple of the Holy Spirit. The problem was that after his sermon, the congregation immediately proceeded to the fellowship hall and devoured piles of fat-filled doughnuts. We may not eat doughnuts at FCBC, but those Chinese wedding banquets can easily do us in!<\/p>\n\n\n\n While most conservative Christians don\u2019t drink, smoke, curse, commit adultery, they do eat. Gluttony has become an acceptable vice. A study done by Purdue University in 1998 found that church members are more likely to be overweight than other people. And that Southern Baptists tended to be the heaviest causing the denomination\u2019s medical and retirement board to issue a warning against obesity. They found out that 75% of Baptist pastors eat fried foods at least four nights a week, and 40% snack two or more times each day with cookies, chips and candy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now don\u2019t think that just because these statistics are on the Southern Baptists that there\u2019s no correlation or inferences on us American Baptists. With convenient fast foods and cheap Chinese restaurants that we have, we all eat more today than people in the past. The average American consumed 1,497 pounds of food in 1970, that amount rose to 1,775 pounds per year in 2000. That\u2019s almost 300 more pounds of food. Over-consumption is something that most people don\u2019t want to face up to.<\/p>\n\n\n\n How about the eating we are doing closing out the old year and welcoming the New Year? Every time we sit down, there\u2019s more food than any of us can and should consume. Didn\u2019t I tell you that in Lent, it\u2019s a time of unpleasant uncomfort-ability! We are going against the stream of what our society, our culture, and even our Chinese heritage are trying to tell us to do.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We know that we have all been tempted and sinned against God. I need only to look within my own heart to find ample times when I was unkind, cruel, prideful, impatient, self-hating, envious, angry, and fudging on my income returns to pay fewer taxes. If we were driven into the wilderness and at the end of forty days, we most likely would change the stones into bread.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Temptations and Sins<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n In Hebrews 4:15, we read that Jesus was not someone \u201cunable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sinning.\u201d What does this mean for us?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Temptation refers to the inner state of feeling when the mind contemplates doing something, whereas sin refers to the act or deed. Not all temptations are temptations to commit crimes or acts of immorality. But we know that in our Christian tradition, sin has been defined as being more than merely acts or deeds. It also refers to the intention or underlying desire behind sinful acts. For instance, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus identified anger to be akin to murder (Mt. 5:22) and a lustful thought is a form of adultery (Mt. 5:28).<\/p>\n\n\n\n But anger can also inspire us to rectify situations of injustice and sexual desire can lead to genuine love in a marriage. In other words, deeds and actions spring from feelings or affections and our moral character is as much about how we respond to our feelings as it is about the acts we commit. And that\u2019s the hope and prayer that we have. Unlike Jesus who was tempted but without sin, we too are tempted but before we commit sin, we are called to use these temptations to do good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When we may be tempted to cheat on our taxes, we may direct this desire to be honest and truthful and even go further by making a charitable contribution to a worthy cause. When you were tempted to bet on last Sunday\u2019s Super Bowl game, you might resolve to rededicate yourself to be faithful at work, home, and in your community. And when we are all tempted to eat more than it\u2019s really good for us, we might pray for the poor and hungry in the world and work toward peace and justice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Made Right with God<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n The first Sunday in Lent is an unpleasant experience because we are confronted with so many truths about ourselves\u2014truths that we spend much of our lives avoiding. Here, with God\u2019s help, we try to tell the truth about ourselves, and sometimes the truth hurts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The whole world is busy attempting to climb up the ladder to success; here we kneel down in confession of sin. The world keeps telling itself that we are basically good people who are doing the very best we can. Here, we admit that we are those who wander, go astray, rebel; tempted and commit sin. As a church and as Christians, we are countercultural when it comes to Lent. And that\u2019s not a bad place to be.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In Hebrews 4:15, Jesus is a Messiah who is able to sympathize with our weaknesses. We are able to be honest with our temptations and sins because in Jesus Christ, we have been loved. Jesus also was tempted and therefore knows what we are experiencing in life. While our sins may be many, Jesus understands for he has been tested many times too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n We could not get good enough for God, so God in Christ has made us good through his saving love for us. We could not do right by God, so God in Christ did right for us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The good God who should have punished us for our failure to be good, instead loved us back into relationship with God. The world out there, the culture that we have wouldn\u2019t do that for us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I read that on Sunday afternoon, there\u2019s a program called, \u201cThe Emerging Church.\u201d This church was fairly predictable\u2014the usual 2,000 member mega church in California where everyone under 30 was gathered, where a rock band played throbbing praise music and the pastor told sappy stories about some awesome people doing awesome things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One of the pastors of this large congregation with lots of people under 30 was asked by the interviewer, \u201cTo what do you attribute the remarkable attraction of your church to young adults?\u201d This young pastor said, \u201cYou have a whole generation of young people\u2014beautiful, bright, successful young people\u2014who have never had anyone love them enough to look them in the eye and say, in love, \u2018Man. You really suck.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I might have made the point differently but the message here on the first Sunday in Lent is that we are people who are tempted, sinned and need the love of Christ and the grace of God to be good people again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Lent is a time of unpleasant uncomfort-ability facing our temptations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Let us pray.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Almighty God, whose Son our Lord was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, there to be tempted by Satan, we pray for your grace to resist the temptation that come our way. We pray for honesty to truthfully confront our sin and falsehood and, having told the truth about ourselves, be embraced by your love. In our weakness, you come to us in your strength. In our waywardness, you move toward us with forgiveness. Be with us during these 40 days of Lent and teach us, having repented and confessed our sin, we might eagerly receive your forgiveness. Amen.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Matthew 4:1-11 February 13, 2005 Sermon preached by Rev. Donald Ng at the First Chinese Baptist Church in San Francisco. Lent, for most of my life, means the first hint