Dear Parishioners,
During the forty-day journey in the desert that we make each Lent, again and again, we find ourselves tempted, like Jesus in the wilderness, to do the wrong thing: to overindulge, to lie, to take any way out. Fortunately, the Holy Spirt accompanies us, like Jesus, to guide us along the right path and lead us back after we lose our way. We recall Jesus was able to resist temptation on his journey, even when the devil offered him the whole world. May we be strengthened regularly by his Body and Blood while on our holy pilgrimage.
The devil’s final temptation promises Jesus all the kingdoms in the world. Had Jesus taken the offer, he would have soon found out that he wasn't getting what was promised at all. Would Jesus emerge from the desert as king of every nation with every army and every person subject to him? Obviously not. The fact is, this was an empty promise, designed to gain Jesus’s fidelity. Note that with none of these temptations is the devil actually promising to do anything. He doesn't promise to turn stones to bread, or catch Jesus, from the parapet himself. When we renew our baptismal promises at Easter, we renounce Satan’s empty promises and his empty show. We recognize that the devil’s promises are hollow.
Even if Jesus had turned stones to bread, he would be hungry again. The bread of this world satisfies for only a few hours. At the Last Supper, Jesus turns bread into his Body, providing spiritual food that can satisfy forever. The second temptation is echoed on Good Friday, when passersby tempt Jesus to throw himself down from the cross. Instead of prostrating himself to the devil in the desert, Jesus kneels in Gethsemane and affirms that he will follow God’s will to the end. Jesus not only refuses the devil’s temptations now, he turns them all around in the end. May our journey in Lent give us the strength to pass all our tests in life.
Love, Peace, Joy,
Fr. Bob
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