Into the desert

Below is the text of my sermon at St Aldhelm’s on the first Sunday of Lent, 10th March, 2019. The text, arising from the Gospel reading (Luke 4, 1-13) was ‘Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert…’

I guess we might define the Christian faith as walking with Jesus, and the church as the community of those venturing to do so. But if we indeed dare to step out – it may be ever so falteringly – along the way of Jesus we must expect, indeed hope, to accompany him to the same places where he is intent on going.

 

So, if we walk in his path, we will spend time in the most wonderful fellowship, as was evident in his earthly life – and as indeed happens here at St Aldhelm’s when opportunity presents. For instance, a dozen or so (and had there been more there would always be room and food enough) gathered around the Vicarage kitchen table after the Ash Wednesday Mass: rarely was a day’s fast broken with so much laughter as well as  with delicious home-made soup and bread.

So also, if we walk in the path of Jesus, we will spend time with those in need, as we saw in his earthly itinerary – and as in fact happens here at St Aldhelm’s. Some among you help week by week at the Poole food bank. And a few weeks ago, although I passed on only hesitantly a request that we host a Sunday lunch for the homeless in Poole, knowing there was little time to organise something quite new for us, in no time at all a team was formed and they provided good food and hospitality and a warm welcome where usually there is suspicion and fear and cold discomfort.

Again, if we walk in the way of Jesus we will cross boundaries between people and find our common humanity enriched through differences of every kind, as was so apparent in his earthly ministry – and as indeed may be witnessed here at St Aldhelm’s among our wide range of people, backgrounds, generations – and at least one misfit (if I may include myself…)

 

Today’s Gospel assures us of anther destination however that we are unlikely to evade if we walk in his way. Jesus was led by the spirit into…the desert.

 

The desert is dry. It can be both debilitating in its heat, and numbing in its cold. The desert is lonely. And the desert is terrifying. The desert saps confidence and creates an exhausting confusion and uncertainty: which way to go? Each way is without a path and without a sign. The desert whispers and then amplifies every negative thought, doubt, regret, resentment, and fear. In the desert, demons seem to take shape – and the devil itself breathes its deceits and delusions into our inner ear.

 

Part of the testimony of scripture – both in the Old and New Testaments – is that if we respond to God’s calling we will at some stage be led into the wilderness. For many Christians it is a test too far and they – we – slip into the all-too-human denial or anger or evasion. God has deserted me and so I will desert him. I will return to where I can be sure of comfort and affirmation, in my family, my work, my leisure, my prevailing certainties. Many Christians when facing a time of trial and testing conclude that God has let them down or the Church has not helped them or both – and so they reject God or the Church or both.

 

I do not condemn any such. I am often enough inclined to join them. One reason why I think I am able to preach in a way that is helpful to some who are struggling is because I am someone who also struggles. I do not condemn, I merely hold out the alternative thought that such an experience of the desert might also be an experience of deepening formation in Christ. What feels like loss and diminution may, if we bear it, become a time of gain and growth. In the desert our roots go deeper to seek the water, and so we stand more strongly. In the desert we face the demons that are within and recognise their power is all pretence and bluster. In the desert we discover that our true strength and security lie not in possessions and purchases but in one who possesses us and has purchased us through his own blood.

 

Thus, to echo the three kinds of temptation recounted in today’s Gospel reading, in the desert we will, like Jesus, have to face the facts: that our value does not consist in bread alone, nor does our dignity depend on what we can buy and consume and nor do our possessions measure our lives.

 

In the desert we will, like Jesus, have to face the awful temptation to control and coerce. This I must overcome (despite the evident fact that I know so much better than others…)

 

In the desert we will, like Jesus have to relinquish the drama that we seek to make of our life. ‘What am I like..?!’ Well, actually, this is what I am like, and it isn’t especially pleasant or appealing or Facebook friendly. But once we stop pretending, then there is the chance for God to at last begin to make real change within us…

 

In whatever ways we are able to use the opportunities this Lent offers, may we each – and collectively as the St Aldhelm’s community – allow ourselves to be led into the – our – desert and there face the sober reality of ourselves, and there too be confronted by the utter, overwhelming, fearful, wonderful reality of God.