(click image to enlarge)
He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan.
—Mark 1.13
From a lectionary reading for Lent 1: Mark 1.9-15
Reflection for Friday, February 24 (Day 3 of Lent)
Still dripping with the waters of the Jordan, Jesus is poised on the brink of his public ministry. Yet instead of turning toward the people whom, in the days to come, he will heal and teach and challenge and love, he first turns his face toward the wilderness. Toward solitude. Toward a place where, shed of everything that is familiar to him, he will wrestle and reckon with who he is and what he has come to do.
Satan comes to that forty-day place. Mark’s version of the story omits the details of the temptations that Jesus’ visitor offers. We could turn to Matthew and Luke to remind us of the specific ways that Satan seeks to entice Jesus. In their Gospels we could see how Jesus, shimmering with the clarity the wilderness can provide, turns away from each temptation Satan brings, the temptations he has designed to target what he thinks are Jesus’ soft spots. Or we could instead enter into the wilderness with Jesus, travel into that landscape to which Lent draws us, and let Mark’s omission of the details serve as an invitation to us.
In the wilderness of Lent, what temptations might a visitor offer to you? What enticements would come to you, tailoring themselves—as temptations always do—especially to fit you, molding themselves with precision to the places where you are most vulnerable? What comes to distract you from your path? How might you enter this wilderness season as a space to see more clearly: who you are, what you have come to do?
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February 22, 2012 at 2:14 PM |
We usually know what we can do,
but temptation shows us who we are.
-Thomas Kempis
February 22, 2012 at 6:11 PM |
Thank you for a most perceptive use of Mark’s “omission” – for prompting us to join the dots and fill the space that Mark leaves for us to colour in and flesh out our own wilderness experience. What an interesting lectio exercise to have brewing in the background of my day. Your beautiful words and art are truly a blessing.
February 23, 2012 at 4:48 PM |
What comes to distract me from my path?
Everything that would keep me from a reverential fear of God Almighty.
February 24, 2012 at 1:14 PM |
‘shimmering with the clarity of the wilderness’……’like’…..would like!
March 12, 2018 at 9:51 PM |
So apt for me today. I have heard it said we have a guardian angel assigned to protect us. Today, fear mugged me and I found myself pondering if perhaps I had a personal demon assigned to harass me. Today I chose to go to the altar at our church with my fear and talk to Jesus. There I found comfort . My temptation comes in the form of fear, doubt and self pity. But mostly fear. Shopping lures me too. Keeping busy too is a temptation. Veggie tales has a song that I love. “Busy, busy dreadfully busy , more than a bumble bee , more than a aunt. I’m busy, busy dreadfully busy, I’m much too busy for you.” i.e. relationships with others and God.
I was glad today for supernatural assurance. “we are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed: perplexed, but not in despair ; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down but not destroyed. 2 Cor 4:8-9