The sermon to be developed will be preached at my two Teaching Parishes, one a medium sized congregation with about one hundred fifty each Sunday, the other a very small rural charge with only about twenty-five per Sunday. The text is Matthew 4:1-11 and represents the lectionary for the first Sunday of Lent, March 13, 2011.
The text reminds us that there are wildernesses out there. And there certainly was a significant wilderness for Jesus too. Maybe we can learn from him.
The focus of this sermon is going to center on Christ's struggle in the testing scenario. In this passage I believe God seeks for us to realize that the temptation was real for Jesus. How else could he ever understand ours? I'll consider just how he coped, what strategies he used, from where he derived his strength. And then I will develop a platform from which to deal with the function of my sermon. I would like to give my parishioners hope that in their own wilderness situations, they can ponder letting Jesus lead, letting him become the kind of Jesus he really seeks to be in the lives of today's Christians.
Some resources for this sermon include Brian Stoffregen's Exegetical Notes at CrossMarks and Workingpreacher.org . I also like to use Interpreter's Bible references. I'll come back to talk about those resources later. For now though, I really need to ponder this temptation story on my own. A temptation story this surely is. How strange when we stop to think of Jesus' being tempted. And yet, if we fully acknowledge his being both divine and human perhaps we should not be surprised at all.
It's the timing of it all that seems almost ironic. Having just been baptized by John the Baptist, Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. What obedience we see in following the Spirit here! I'm thinking simple graphics right now. Really simple. Maybe I'll use footprints, the number 40, bread with an "X" across it (for there was none during the fasting), stones, more bread and again an "X", a high temple point, a high mountain. All these images come to my mind. And selective silent moments with the projected graphics may be effective. Maybe. Or maybe not. These are all initial thoughts, and I need to keep digging deeper into the text. But that's it for now. I'll be back.
I'm always fascinated by the chronology of events in the opening chapters of Matthew. Jesus is baptized in chapter 3, the Spirit comes upon Jesus, the voice from heaven declares him as "my son, my beloved, in whom I am well pleased," and immediately afterward, the Spirit he just received leads him into the wilderness. Like the Israelites in the wilderness, there is a purpose of the testing-- in the wilderness, there is nothing Jesus can rely on for survival other than God. In the wilderness, there can be no doubt that it is God who is sustaining Jesus. God's faithfulness will be proven.
ReplyDeleteDuring these difficult economic times in our country and in the church, I believe that God is calling all of us to trust and faith-- and that we are being reminded of our complete dependence on God's grace for meeting our most basic needs. Though the journey through the wilderness can be painfully long and straining, we know that Jesus is with us-- and we know where Jesus is leading us.