“More Than Chocolate”

Luke 4:1-13

February 26^th and 29^th, 2004

Saint Paul United Methodist Church

Rev. John Fleming

I wonder what would have happened if I had flexed my pastoral muscles this morning and exercised my pastoral authority. Now do not laugh at that. I have some pastoral authority, don’t I? When a preacher is ordained, a bishop places her hands on the pastor’s head and says, “Take thine authority as an elder in the Church to preach the Word of God, and to administer the Holy Sacraments.” So I have some pastoral authority, don’t I? Well, back to my wondering. I wonder what would have happened this morning, during the Sunday School hour if I had asked all of our classes and all of us who are not in a class or a small group, to get together and to have a lesson and a time of discussion. So there you are in your Sunday School class or in your small group class. There are several of you sitting around a table or in rows of chairs and the leader stands up or speaks up and says, “Okay, today the subject of our lesson this morning is temptation.” Maybe, at first, there would be a little nudging. Perhaps a smile would appear on several of your faces. Possibly someone sitting near you would quote the famous lines about what has been said about temptation. Someone might quote Flip Wilson’s famous line, “The devil made me do it.” Perhaps someone else would quote what Mae West once said, “I generally avoid temptation unless I can’t resist it.” Someone might offer Rita Mae Brown’s famous line, based on a scripture verse, “Lead me not into temptation; I can find the way myself.” After a minute or two of that, maybe someone will be bold enough to tell something that they did that was mischievous, but not all that bad. Because it is safe, maybe they will tell you about the time, back in high school, when they were not as prepared as they should have been for a test. They knew that they had to do something. They had to take the test. And in your small group, they confessed about the notes that they had written on the inside of their left hand. As they tell the story, they are reliving it. Sweat is beading up on their brows. It does not seem all that important now. It seems small now. But back then it was the day that they gave into the temptation to cheat.

That gets the discussion started. So someone else tells about the nice meal that they had out, just a few nights before. It was a great meal in a wonderful restaurant. Just as the food was beginning to settle, the waiter arrived, with a silver platter of sin held high on one of his hands. He lowers it. It is closer to you now. On the platter are the goodies. There is a plate with a piece of cheese cake smothered in blue berries. On another plate, there is a piece of German chocolate cake. Another option is hot apple pie, with ice cream oozing off of it. Maybe seeing those dishes prompted the words, “Get thee behind me, Satan!” The pressure is on. The waiter is awaiting a decision. The three other people with you are willing. Then out come the words, “Oh I don’t know. I shouldn’t. Maybe this time. What do you think? Would you split it with me? It’s so tempting!” If you don’t mind the preacher coming out in me for a moment or two, then listen to this. A lesson has been set up to talk about temptation, and the discussion going on around the table is about chocolate cake?! Temptation, friends, is more than chocolate cake!

Maybe there is someone in the room, sitting around that table, with the Sunday School lesson being talked about who would rather the subject be anything but the one of temptation, because it causes them to go to a deeper level and to another place. It makes them remember something that they have tried desperately to forget. It provokes them to think about the young lady in their office, or the tax return, the one mailed a couple of years ago that if they had to do it over again, they would have put one or two different numbers down. Perhaps they have gotten away with something, but when the memory of it surfaces, it haunts them. Temptation is a little more than chocolate cake these days!

Now if you are willing to wade out into the deep water, then I will ask you to and if you will join me, we will listen to our text this morning, the story of the temptations of Jesus, found in three out of the four gospels. Matthew, Mark, and Luke all include what happened out there in the wilderness in their gospels. Mark’s version is typical of his style. In his gospel, the temptations last only two lines. When they are over, the angels tend to Jesus’ needs. Matthew and Luke’s versions are longer. They include the actual temptations and the banter between Jesus and the devil.

It is easy to paint this scene. Jesus, just up from the baptismal waters, is led by the Spirit to the wilderness. Now that is an important fact that is easily missed. Jesus is out there in the wilderness, in the barren and rocky hill country of Judea between Jerusalem and the Jordan River valley. He is not out there alone, though. The Spirit is with Him. The wilderness is a desolate place. Even today it is that way. There is a tradition that says that the place where Jesus was is the place where many holy men went to get away from the world for a while, and to be closer to God. So Jesus is out there for forty days and nights. Forty. You have heard that number before, haven’t you? Reading it is supposed to remind you of the Israelites wandering in the wilderness, their exodus. It is supposed to say to you that this is something new and different. But, still, it is an exodus, a retreat, a withdrawal, a time of flight, a wandering.

Now if I asked you to, could you draw this scene with your mind’s eye? If you did, what would the scene look like? Even me, as weak as I am, if the devil came looking like the devil, with a red cape, a horn on top of his head, a tail wagging behind him, I would be able to say, “Hey, there’s the devil! Give me your best shot! I know who you are!” The problem is that the devil does not always look like the devil and temptation does not always resemble temptation, at least not at first. Hollywood and it’s films, I think, draw a more accurate picture of the devil.

Instead of portraying the devil in a red suit, Hollywood often pictures him in a business suit as the senior partner in a law firm. Or in a bathing suit when hands off ought to be the order of the day. I think that if I were drawing this scene, all that I would sketch would be Jesus. He would not be alone, but all that you could see would be Jesus. Now before we get to the temptations themselves, I want to say something about temptation to you. Temptations in and of themselves are not bad things. Temptations are not signs of weakness. Being tempted is a measure of strength. The stronger you are and the more capable you are, the more opportunity you have, the greater will be your temptation. A small person has small temptations, but Jesus’ temptations, well, they are huge and significant.

Let’s look at them. There are three, you will remember. Luke helps us along with the first one by telling us that Jesus had been in the wilderness for forty days and nights and that he was famished. The first test would have been, then, even more inviting. The devil suggested that since Jesus had the power to turn stones into bread, he should do so, and feed himself. Actually it was not all that bad of an idea. After all, Jesus had not tried out his miraculous powers yet. Performing one out there in the wilderness would give him the confidence to know that he could do it when the time came. But Jesus resisted the temptation because he knew that his messiahship

would not be about taking care of his own needs. He knew that it would be about taking care of other person’s needs and feeding them. John, the gospel writer who does not include this story in his writings, will have Jesus say, “I am the bread of life. Those who come to me will never be hungry again.” So Jesus resists the devil, and quotes the scriptural line, “Man does not live by bread alone.” Then he prepares himself for the second temptation. For it, the devil gives Jesus the chance to see all of the kingdoms of the world. The devil says, “I will give you all this, for the authority to do it has been given to me. All you have to do is to bow down and worship me.” It is tempting, isn’t it? I think that it would have been for Jesus, too. After all, he was about to launch a ministry that will try to do just that, to reach the people in the kingdoms. But he knows better and so he says, “We are to worship God and God alone.” Then there is temptation number three. The devil and Jesus travel in an instant to Jerusalem. They go to the pinnacle of the Temple. The devil has heard Jesus quote scripture and so he tries a little of it himself. He says, “It says in scripture that if you fall, God will rescue you, sending his angels to bear you up.” But Jesus rejects this temptation, too, saying to the devil that no one should put the Lord to the test. It is there that our scripture lesson ends, as do the temptations, but there is that phrase that shouts out at preachers. It is this one, “When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.” We will think about the more opportune time in a few weeks.

Well, those are the temptations. What should we do with them? I have preached this banter between Jesus and the devil before, of course. I preached it last year and in that sermon I said that I did not believe that the temptations of Jesus had much to do with me. I thought that they were unique to Jesus. After all, turning stones to bread, being in charge of a kingdom, and jumping down from a church’s highest point are not things that I am inclined to want to do. Susie tells me that I do not say this often enough, so I hope that you will listen. I was wrong. I was wrong about the temptations, too. Jesus’ temptations are ones that lead to greatness. That is not really my temptation. I do not mind telling you that I do not believe that it is your temptation, either. Listen to this, I do not believe that our temptation is to be greater than we are. I think that our temptation is to be less than we are.

Look again at the temptations with those eyes. The first temptation was for Jesus to turn stones into bread and to serve himself. We, too, have all this power, believe it or not. Oh, we cannot turn stones into bread, but we can take what we have and use it for ourselves, store it up, say that it is only mine, and enjoy the satisfaction of the taste of it. Now that is the way that the world lives, but we are to live another way. There is one word that kind of sums up the way that we are supposed to live and the word is stewardship. You did not see that coming, did you? You expected it, at the earliest, in September, but here it is. It is here and I mention it now, because stewardship is not just money. It is doing something with the things that God has given us. And the temptation is to use it all for ourselves and no one else. We are really called to help change the world and often we do nothing with what God has given us.

Then there is the second temptation, the one of worshiping the devil and thereby receiving all the kingdoms of the world. You cannot go through this Lenten season without noticing the cross and the Messiah’s kingship. On the cross, Jesus has a crown on his head, one of thorns. What would have happened if he had compromised? Well, he might have gotten a crown of gold instead, but the world would be different. Here is a word us preachers ought to use a little more often, integrity. As Christians, we are called to live as people of integrity. Do we do it? I heard the story of the employee who told his boss that he needed the afternoon off to attend his grandmother’s funeral. His employer, of course, granted that time off. The next day, the employee came back to work. He settled into his desk chair. His boss walked in and asked him about the funeral. The employee tried his best to make up details about a funeral that did not happen. After a minute of that, the boss asked, “Do you believe in the afterlife? The man said that of course he did. His boss said, “That’s good, because after you left yesterday afternoon, your grandmother stopped by here to see you.” We are called to live lives of integrity and the temptation is to sell it out for success. Maybe these temptations have everything to do with us.

Then there is the third temptation, putting God to the test. The third temptation is the only one that refers back to the exodus story. You remember that story, don’t you? The people of God were out there in the wilderness. They were hungry and thirsty. They wondered if they would survive. They had already formed a Back to Egypt Committee. They complained that God was not doing His part. The lesson assumes that we are equal partners with God. So, if I keep my end of the deal, God had better do His part. And His part is to look after us because we are special. But there are so many things that we do not know. There is a bigger picture that we cannot see and if we did see it, we could not handle. The temptation is to ask to see it and not trust that God knows what is best for our lives. Sometimes, friends, we just have to pray what Jesus prayed, “Not my will be done, gracious Lord, but your will be done in my life. Temptations these days, friends, oh, they are more than chocolate. Let us pray.

(Special thanks to Fred Craddock for the opening idea for this sermon, and for another pastor who helped me to see what the temptations of Jesus are really about).