Today’s reading is the story of Jesus being tempted by the devil after fasting for 40 days.
Temptation, good grief, how do you even begin to broach this subject without way too much self disclosure! Oh maybe I could go on about the spiritual discipline of fasting…um… On second thought, no. I have never found that discipline particularly appealing nor doable…
Lest I get into even more self disclosure, maybe that is part of the point of the whole thing. I preached this last Sunday that part of repentance, part of turning and returning to God over and over again is confessing, I can’t, I can’t confront and overcome sin, and all that is broken in this world. The other side of repentance is remembering that God can, and that is where Jesus goes when tempted, he doesn’t just lean on his own human resources or even his nature as God, but trusts fully in God and God’s word to save him from caving into temptation. Even after being “alone” in the wilderness, Jesus remembers, that he is not in this alone.
Well I have to leave it at that for today but I do have two other things for you to ponder in this light… Let me know what you think…
