Facing Up to Temptation, Becoming Children of God

Introduction: Knowing Temptation
Years ago, in my former life in the construction industry, I was delivering a proposal for a major hospital expansion. The Director of Facilities was out of his office, but his assistant told me he’d be right back, to have a seat. There on his desk were the proposals from the other three companies. I walked over to the desk and out my hand on the first one to open it and see how our proposal matched up to theirs and adjust ours as needed. I was tempted to open it and look, but sat back down.

Driving down I-95 in Maryland a few months ago, I was going the speed limit, and then passed a series of state troopers, six of them, each giving out tickets or warnings to other drivers. The guy in the car next to me smiled and sped up as they drifted out of our sight,

I thought what he thought, that’s got to be all the troopers for miles. And like him I sped up, thinking I could get to my appointment early. When I looked at the odometer as it was pushing 75. I saw that the car next to me continued to accelerate, and was tempted to press on well past the safe speed, but I slowed down.

I was speaking recently with some parents, who had been planning a long weekend to get away from their busy lives, to take a healthy break from parenting some place warm and sunny, but they told me they decided not to go because they’d have to leave their teenage children home alone. They trusted their children in most things, but with the party scene and the stories they’d heard about what can take place when parents are out of town, they felt like they couldn’t place them under that kind of temptation, and stayed home.

Several years ago when the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition arrived at our house and went directly into the paper recycling bag, much to the dismay of some of the male members of our household interested solely in seeing what swimsuit styles might be in this summer. One of our sons asked me later, in private, if I was going to retrieve it from the recycling, “I don’t know, I’m tempted,” I said.

Most of us think that if there’s one thing we know about in this life, it’s temptation. If there’s one church word that doesn’t need to be rescued for our modern ears, that connects firmly and clearly to our everyday experience, temptation may be that one church word. We may not know about grace and mercy or a peace that passes understanding; we may need some explanation about trespassing and atonement; but temptation we know. We face temptations all the time, and in this season of Lent, when we’ve gone out of our way to give something up or to take something on to try to lead a more committed, Christian life, it almost feels like we’re tempting temptation itself.

St. Paul writes that he didn’t know about sin until he read the law. To put in our terms,
he didn’t know all the sinful things he could do until the scriptures told him they were
not allowed. Temptations can grow. We’re tempted to break our Lenten disciplines if we haven’t already — to break our diets, to cheat on our taxes, to gossip about a friend, to lie our way out of difficulties. We’re constantly being tempted to do what we shouldn’t do. Most of us don’t need any instruction about temptation, temptation we know. But do
we really?

Twenty years ago, Robert Fulghum, had a best seller book entitled, All I Reall Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten, and in this very popular book, he argues that the deepest wisdom he knows came from the kindergarten classroom and the sandbox. Wisdom like sharing, playing fair, cleaning up your own mess, don’t hit people, hold hands and stick together. So, if Fulghum’s theory about wisdom is hold true, then maybe we should go back to Sunday School to learn what temptation is.

Truthfully, I don’t remember too many specifics about what I learned in Sunday School, beyond Jesus loves me. But I do remember most of the people who taught us, and one of these teachers said something that has always stuck in my mind. And that is that the best measure of a person is what they would do if no one else were around, is what they would do if there was no one there to reward or to punish them. It strikes me now that this is more conventional wisdom than Christian wisdom, but it’s pretty close, because we Christians believe that what we do in life as Christians comes not from a sense of reward or fear of punishment but out of who we understand ourselves to be and the kinds of persons we are becoming.

In that light, we probably have too shallow a view of temptation. In our minds we think temptation is the urge to do something. What we would really like to do, but shouldn’t do – one more piece of cake, one more juicy rumor, one more Sunday morning in bed. But the deepest level of temptation is not this urge to misbehave, but the temptation to be less than who we are called to be as God’s children. The temptation to not become who we are, but someone else.

Gospel: Jesus’ Temptations, Our Temptations
And that’s the issue at stake in this Gospel reading from Luke. The devil is not tempting Jesus to misbehave, he’s not tempting Jesus to break his fast or steal a piece of candy, or cheat on his taxes or pick a fight with his neighbor. It’s much deeper than that. The devil is tempting Jesus to deny who He is, tempting Jesus to forget His baptism, to set aside the truth that He is the child of His Father in heaven, who has been sent to restore humankind through the cross.

You see, it’s significant that Jesus is tempted, immediately after his baptism, Right after the skies opened and the dove descends and the voice proclaims, “You are my beloved Son, the one with whom I am well pleased.” You are the one I am sending down to reveal my heart of love, of grace, of forgiveness. You’re the One who will restore people to faith and to life with me. You’re the One who will walk the long, painful road to Jerusalem. You are the one who must endure the cross to save the world. It is here, then, right after His baptism, when Jesus’ vocation and identity are most clear that He comes to this time of tempting in the wilderness. And it’s Jesus’ identity that the devil seeks to destroy. That’s what temptation is really about.

The three temptations—to turn stones into bread, use all the powers this world to shortcut God’s plan; to throw himself down from the temple as some kind of circus trick — are not temptations to do bad things necessarily; Any of these actions provide an opportunity for people to know about Jesus; And perhaps even speed the process of gaining followers.

They are, at their very core, the temptation to be somebody else. The temptation to live some life other than the life of the beloved Son of God, to deny who He has been called to be and to be someone else. But Jesus remembers and knows who He is. And He chooses to be the person He is called to be and follow God’s plan, the plan that will require Him to accept the cross. With every temptation of the devil, Jesus chooses God’s way and remains who He is, the beloved Son of God. Because Jesus resists the temptation to be someone else, you and I have been freed from our sins and know for all time that God loves us.


Tempted to Be Less than Children of God
Now, because we belong to Jesus by nature of our baptisms, because we have been called to be the children of God in the world in our own day, we, too, have been given a life to live, a role to play, an important part in God’s plan of salvation. We who have been marked as Christ’s own forever, marked as the children of God Have been called to bring peace where there is strife, called to offer love in the presence of hatred, called to stir hope where there is despair, and to embrace faith where there is fear.
And because we have been called to this way of life, we are also tempted; Tempted to live out another story, a different plan; tempted to be someone other than who we have been called to be.

There’s a moment in Tolkien’s Lord of the Ring series when one of the Elf Queens is offered the ring of power. The temptation is that she would wield the ring well and for good. She is tempted, but after considering all the possibilities, she lets the temptation pass and decides to be who she is instead. You see, to give in to temptation is far more serious than misbehaving. To give in to temptation is to say, I am not a child of God, I will not take my part in God’s plan of salvation, I will not seek to know Christ and to make Christ known; I will be someone other than who I am.

And so in this season of Lent, when many of us are paying closer attention to our spiritual lives and giving up those habits that push God away, taking on habits that open the way for God to enter in, I invite you to remember who you are and to remember whose you are, to remember that you are the beloved children of God, that you belong to God.

Success or failure in a spiritual or physical habit is not the end goal we worship a God who forgives, even when we break our promise to live a certain way. No, these attempts on our part to change our habits are for a change of heart, a change of heart so that we can remember who we are and get about becoming the persons God created us to be. That’s what the season of Lent is all about.

And when the tempter whispers in your ear to be someone else, invite the power and presence of Christ to work in you all the more. Say no thanks and become who you really are, God’s child.

Amen.