Luke 4:1-13
train ignored a red warning light and a dispatcher’s verbal warning before
crashing into a parked freight train at 40 miles per hour. 25 people died and
135 were injured. Investigators later discovered that the engineer, who died in
the crash, was texting several teenagers just before the crash.
On October 22, 2009, a Northwest Airlines flight missed the
Minneapolis airport by 150 miles. Despite repeated radio transmissions from air
traffic control, the two pilots did not respond or change course, prompting no
small amount of concern on the ground and for officials. Later it was learned
that the two pilots were locked in a heated discussion about airline policy and
lost track of their position. Fortunately, no one was hurt as the plane landed
safely. The pilots, however, were dismissed from their jobs.
$6,000 shower curtain for his Manhattan apartment with company money. Merrill
Lynch’s John Thain spent more than a million dollar redecorating his private
office during a period in which the company’s stockholders lost billions. In
his new office he had a $1400 parchment trash can.
companies crash because their leaders are distracted by their own hubris and
feeling of entitlement, marriages crash because one spouse or the other (or
both) are so deeply self-focused that they can’t see the perspective of the
other.
and goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden—the sidetracking, distracting
lure of temptation. Be it a temptation to distraction (as in the engineer), a
temptation to be self-righteous and win an argument (as in the pilots), a
temptation to toward wealth and power, or the temptation to put one’s own needs
over that of another, we are a tempted people – tempted, sometimes, to the
point of disaster.
entitled Derailed, which looks at the failure of several high profile CEOs of
companies like Home Depot and Hewlett-Packard—real industry heavyweights—and
the crash-and-burn results of their tenures. While Irwin doesn’t use the word “temptation,”
he nails the problem that many of us have, whether we’re CEOs, clerks, couples,
or kids—failure to pay attention to what’s really important.
relationships is usually the result of not paying attention to issues of
character (and, I would add, to issues of calling). Says Irwin, “The big lesson
is that no matter how brilliant, charming, strategic, or commanding in presence
the leader is, the consequences of a failed character are extraordinarily
disabling and will bring down even the strongest among us. Similarly, if our
character is inadequate, eventually we will miss the warning signals and slam
into a parked freight train.”
critical qualities:
1. Authenticity – to be transparent, to be who you say you
are
2. Self-management – the ability to manage one’s time,
energy, and commitments
3. Humility – not thinking of oneself in an overly inflated
way
4. Courage – the ability to face fears and act
If, on the other hand, we pay attention to these qualities,
we might begin to see success in our life and work. Notice the contiuum – from
intended direction to expected potential – like a set of railroad tracks the
intent is to move forward on a defined pathway. Derailment changes the whole
continuum.
I like Irwin’s book, but like most books on leadership or
self-management, it is really expressing principles that we’ve had all along in
the Scriptures. On this first Sunday in Lent, Luke’s Gospel presents us with a
critical moment in the life of Jesus—a moment at the beginning of his public
ministry that would determine whether his messiahship would begin on track or
be derailed as so many other would-be messiahs had been and have been since.
The story begins with the Holy Spirit leading Jesus out into
the wilderness. This is a very important setting because remember that
throughout the Old Testament the wilderness was a place of testing and
preparation and 40 the number associated with transition. Moses spends 40 years
in the wilderness before leading the people of Israel out of Egypt. The
Israelites spend 40 years in the desert before entering the promised land. With
a daunting mission in front of him, Jesus is led into the desert for 40 days of
prayer, preparation, and testing.
Luke tells us that after 40 days of fasting and prayer,
Jesus was “famished” (v. 2). I don’t know how long you’ve ever gone without
food, but I’m guessing that it wasn’t 40 days (in fact, I’m not sure the human
body can survive that long without food, but Luke and the other Gospel writers
are more concerned about making the connection of 40 days to the Old Testament
than medical accuracy). The point really is that Jesus was at his weakest and
most vulnerable – the time when the temptation to derail is most attractive.
Irwin says that “stress is one of those pressures that
squeeze out what’s really inside of us. Given sufficient time and stress, those
character derailment factors will surface.” Jesus was certainly under some deep
stress after a long time wandering alone without food, and it’s at this moment
that the devil shows up as a kind of spiritual saboteur.
Interestingly, Luke uses the Greek word “diabolous” for
“devil” while in other places the word “Satan” is used. Most commentators see
these terms as synonymous, which is probably true. But we shouldn’t get hung up
on the devil here—no speculation about pitchforks and horns. Like the snake in
the Garden, the tempter here simply reminds Jesus that he has choices he can
make – the choice between serving himself or serving God, the choice between
fame and faithfulness—the same choices with which we’re often presented.
Notice how each temptation begins with the devil saying, “If
you are the Son of God…” Son of God is a loaded term in the first century.
Caesar called himself “Son of God” as he ruled the Roman empire. The people of
Israel expected the messiah to be a “Son of God” who would liberate them from
the Romans and restore their national pride and sovereignty. But then there was
this definition of the term: At his baptism, God had commissioned him with a
dove and a voice from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved;” God says, “with
you I am well pleased” (3:22).
Each of the three temptations are designed to derail Jesus
from his divine commission and each of the three are really, deep down, tests
of character. Let’s look at them briefly in order:
1. “Turn these stones to bread.” That must have sounded
attractive to the hungry Jesus, but it was even more than that. Would Jesus use
the power given him to satisfy his own needs, or will he trust God to supply
them?
2. “Worship me and all the kingdoms of the world will be
yours.” Would Jesus exchange his
identity as God’s Son for a relationship with the devil – a relationship
characterized by political power and authority. Where does Jesus allegiance
ultimately lie?
3. “Throw yourself down off the pinnacle of the Temple and
land unscathed – prove that your God’s Son by having God save you. Prove your
divinity to the crowds and you’ll be wildly popular.”
Fred Craddock, in his excellent commentary on Luke, points
out that each of these temptations are attractive because they “beckon us to do
that about which much good could be said. Stones to bread—the hungry hope so.
Take political control—the oppressed hope so; leap from the Temple—those
longing for proof of God’s power hope so. All this to say that a real
temptation is an offer not to fall but to rise. The tempter in Eden did not
ask, “Do you wish to be as the devil?” but “Do you wish to be as God?” There is
nothing here of debauchery; no self-respecting devil would approach a person
with offers of personal, domestic, or social ruin.” Then Craddock says
something really profound – “We are not tempted to do what we cannot do but
what is within our power. The greater the strength, the greater the
temptation.”
Craddock points out the subtle twist, the momentary
distractions, that can easily lead to jumping the rails. It’s good to do good,
especially when it benefits us. Power and popularity can give us a forum to
spread ideas and do some good in the world, while having the side benefit of
making us famous. The real temptation is not to fall, but to rise.
Jesus, however, is paying attention.
Irwin says that one of the main precursors to derailment is
a lack of self-awareness, and a lack of awareness and concern for others. When
we’re not paying attention to our inner lives and when we’re not being honest
with ourselves and our strengths and weaknesses, we’re primed for a crash.
Problem is that most people don’t take any time to work on being self-aware,
instead focusing their lives on lots of external things—job, money, sex,
computer, etc. One of the biggest problems in our fast-paced, information
overload culture is that we don’t carve out space to simply sit and listen to
what’s going on inside of us, let alone listen to God.
Jesus, however, is very intentional about being self-aware
and God-aware. Not only is he out there in the desert for weeks, alone with his
own thoughts and with God, but the Gospels tell us that he often withdrew from
the crowds and even his disciples so that he could go to a lonely place and
pray. It’s not a stretch to say that Jesus was probably the most awake and
aware person who ever lived, and I really believe that’s because he
intentionally paid attention to his inner life, which gave him a laser focus
from his intended direction to his expected potential—which in his case was
God’s redemptive mission for the whole world.
The Scriptures provided the content of that mission, and
Jesus knew them well. Notice that every time that the devil throws up an
attractive temptation (interestingly, couched in Scriptures taken out of context),
Jesus deflects it with Scripture that is contextually grounded in the mission
of God. The Scriptures, the story of Israel, the story of God’s covenant
promises, the reality of the Messiah as God’s suffering servant, the hope of
the Kingdom of God—these were the rails upon which Jesus moved during his
entire ministry.
It was from the Scriptures that Jesus knew that God would be
the one to supply daily bread, that God’s reign would be the ultimate political
reality, and that the Messiah’s mission was not about celebrity but about
suffering and sacrifice. That understanding had already crystallized in Jesus
by the time the devil showed up with an offer of fast food and good times.
But coupled with a deep understanding and belief in the
Scriptures was Jesus’ life of prayer—time spent simply communing with God,
listening to God, being God’s “beloved.” For Jesus, prayer was not merely a
list of ailments and requests but rather a deepening of his relationship with
the Father. I can’t know this for sure, but I don’t think Jesus’ prayer life
was simply a hands-folded-heads bowed kind of thing, but a constant
conversation, a cultivated awareness of God in every moment of the day.
When I was in Korea, the thing that impressed me the most
about the Korean churches was their emphasis on prayer. At Yoido Church, for
example, we went to the youth service in the afternoon, where we saw the ushers
praying before the service, then the thousands of young people praying out loud
all at once. All around the country these churches have built “prayer mountain”
retreat centers, where people simply come to pray. Each church holds all night
prayer vigils every week. The pastors rise at 4:00 in the morning to pray and
spend all day Saturday in prayer for Sunday. Someone asked me why Christianity
caught like wildfire in Korea, and I think that’s the answer – the people pray.
I came home convicted about my own prayer life. It’s no
coincidence that the times in my life where I’ve held to the disciplines of
daily prayer and scripture, I’ve felt a deeper sense of mission and purpose.
When I let those disciplines slip, on the other hand, I’m primed for a crash.
Lent gives us an opportunity to get back on the rails—to
take 40 days, like Jesus, to spend some intentional time working on our inner
lives—to focus on those character traits of authenticity, self-management,
humility, and courage and remembering the mission to which God has called us.
I’m taking that to heart this Lent and have begun spending
an hour every day to simply read Scripture and pray—not Scriptures for
preaching (that’s work) but Scriptures for my own growth. For prayer, I like to
journal, to write out my prayers to God. I’ve also added fasting as a
discipline this Lent, going without lunch three days a week and spending those meal
times as prayer times and feeding on God’s Word.
I’d like to invite you to join me in whatever way works for
you. I am posting some Scriptures, reflections, and prayers on my blog every
day during Lent if you need some inspiration. I will also post some
recommendations on other devotional resources you can order or look at to help
you on the Lenten journey.
Jesus avoided the crash of giving into temptation by paying
attention, every day, to staying on the rails. May we use his example as we
move into Lent.
