FIRST SUNDAY LENT A – FEB 10 2008– 10:30 Mt 4:1-11
STORY: When Leonardo da Vinci was painting his famous The Last Supper, he look for a model of Jesus. He found a young man who was handsome and healthy in appearance and hired him to pose. His name was Pietro Bandenelli. When he had all but finished the painting, he still had to find someone to pose for Judas. He found a man whose face was so distorted with villainy that da Vinci shuddered at the sight. He hired him. When he finished the painting, he said to the ugly looking man: “I don’t even know your name.” The destitute man answered: “Master, I am Pietro Bandenelli. I sat as the model for your Christ.”
You enter the Jesus story. Jesus is being tempted in the same way as Bandinelli was. Unlike Bandinelli who gave into temptation and twisted his Christ-like face into the grotesque mask of Judas, Jesus is as resistant to temptation as God’s eternal word resists the distortions of our culture.
Jesus is truly a human being. As a human being, Jesus’s temptations were as real as the stones that could have been turned into bread. Jessus’ temptations were as real as the bloody sweat in the Garden of Olives when he was being lured into passing the cup of suffering back to his Father. Jesus’ temptations were as real as the bodily flesh the Son of God assumed to himself in the Incarnation.
Jesus did not use his divine power to overcome his temptations like flicking off a bug in the summertime. Jesus had to struggle through his temptations as we do. Jesus is like us in all things except sin, but not except temptation. Archbishop Fulton Sheen said that we are tempted not because we are evil but because we are human. And Jesus was totally, fully human.
Jesus whose hunger gnaws at his stomach like a vulture tearing into the carcass of a dead lamb, gears up for a battle that is far more formidable than that of David confronting Goliath. Then it was sword against slingshot. Now it is subtle innuendo trying to seduce the One who says, “I am Truth”. Now it is slithering manipulation versus the One who says, “I have come to do the will of him who sent me.”
Donald Gelpi in his book, Experiencing God, tells us that the temptations of Jesus symbolize the fact that we his followers will enter into a lifetime of being tested.
You’re familiar with tests such as, for example, others’ hostile arguments which you’re called upon to forgive. Or, for example, obnoxious putdowns which you are called upon to turn the other cheek to. Or,for example, gross ingratitude which you are called upon to respond with even greater generosity.
Then there are the tests that come from our gospel-denying culture. For example, human insensitivity and inhumanity, racism, sexism, greed, pollution. Or for example, injustice and violence, muder, unnecessary or unjust wars, white collar dishonesty and thivery, flagrant inequities that make the rich get richer because the poor get poorer?
All these and more are the tests you must face and cope with during your lifetime.
These tests begin in early childhood.
STORY: A teacher on a snowy day is trying to get all the kindergarten children’s coats, gloves and boots on. One little girt starts crying. I can’t find my boots, she wails. Honey, the teacher says, your boots are over there in the corner. They’re not my boots, she sobs. My boots had snow on them.
The temptation in facing these and other tests is to shrug your shoulders and crawl deeper into the cocoon of your own selfish security just as Jesus could have feasted on bread from stones or won the worship of all the powerful nations in the world had he given in to his temptations.
Lent is not a season as somber as a wake. Rather picture Jesus, after he has defeated his tempter, standing there in the desert with his face wreathed in a triumphant smile.
Enter into Lent with this picture of Jesus’ triumphant smile in your mind and you will find that lent is a time of joy as you triumph over temptations and make them occasions of deepening your spiritual life
HUMOR:
"WE WOULD RATHER DO BUSINESS WITH 1000 AL QAEDA TERRORISTS THAN WITH A SINGLE AMERICAN"
This sign was prominently displayed in the window of a business in Philadelphia. You are probably outraged at the thought of such an inflammatory statement.One would think that anti-hate groups from all across the country would be marching on this business... And that the National Guard might have to be called to keep the angry crowds back.But, perhaps in these stressful times one might be tempted to let the proprietors simply make their statement . . . We are a society who holds Freedom of Speech as perhaps our greatest liberty . . . And after all, it is just a sign.You may ask what kind of business would dare post such a sign?Answer: A Funeral Home (Who said morticians had no sense of humor?)
THOUGHT: Use Lent to overcome temptation and deepen your spiritual life.
STORY: When Leonardo da Vinci was painting his famous The Last Supper, he look for a model of Jesus. He found a young man who was handsome and healthy in appearance and hired him to pose. His name was Pietro Bandenelli. When he had all but finished the painting, he still had to find someone to pose for Judas. He found a man whose face was so distorted with villainy that da Vinci shuddered at the sight. He hired him. When he finished the painting, he said to the ugly looking man: “I don’t even know your name.” The destitute man answered: “Master, I am Pietro Bandenelli. I sat as the model for your Christ.”
You enter the Jesus story. Jesus is being tempted in the same way as Bandinelli was. Unlike Bandinelli who gave into temptation and twisted his Christ-like face into the grotesque mask of Judas, Jesus is as resistant to temptation as God’s eternal word resists the distortions of our culture.
Jesus is truly a human being. As a human being, Jesus’s temptations were as real as the stones that could have been turned into bread. Jessus’ temptations were as real as the bloody sweat in the Garden of Olives when he was being lured into passing the cup of suffering back to his Father. Jesus’ temptations were as real as the bodily flesh the Son of God assumed to himself in the Incarnation.
Jesus did not use his divine power to overcome his temptations like flicking off a bug in the summertime. Jesus had to struggle through his temptations as we do. Jesus is like us in all things except sin, but not except temptation. Archbishop Fulton Sheen said that we are tempted not because we are evil but because we are human. And Jesus was totally, fully human.
Jesus whose hunger gnaws at his stomach like a vulture tearing into the carcass of a dead lamb, gears up for a battle that is far more formidable than that of David confronting Goliath. Then it was sword against slingshot. Now it is subtle innuendo trying to seduce the One who says, “I am Truth”. Now it is slithering manipulation versus the One who says, “I have come to do the will of him who sent me.”
Donald Gelpi in his book, Experiencing God, tells us that the temptations of Jesus symbolize the fact that we his followers will enter into a lifetime of being tested.
You’re familiar with tests such as, for example, others’ hostile arguments which you’re called upon to forgive. Or, for example, obnoxious putdowns which you are called upon to turn the other cheek to. Or,for example, gross ingratitude which you are called upon to respond with even greater generosity.
Then there are the tests that come from our gospel-denying culture. For example, human insensitivity and inhumanity, racism, sexism, greed, pollution. Or for example, injustice and violence, muder, unnecessary or unjust wars, white collar dishonesty and thivery, flagrant inequities that make the rich get richer because the poor get poorer?
All these and more are the tests you must face and cope with during your lifetime.
These tests begin in early childhood.
STORY: A teacher on a snowy day is trying to get all the kindergarten children’s coats, gloves and boots on. One little girt starts crying. I can’t find my boots, she wails. Honey, the teacher says, your boots are over there in the corner. They’re not my boots, she sobs. My boots had snow on them.
The temptation in facing these and other tests is to shrug your shoulders and crawl deeper into the cocoon of your own selfish security just as Jesus could have feasted on bread from stones or won the worship of all the powerful nations in the world had he given in to his temptations.
Lent is not a season as somber as a wake. Rather picture Jesus, after he has defeated his tempter, standing there in the desert with his face wreathed in a triumphant smile.
Enter into Lent with this picture of Jesus’ triumphant smile in your mind and you will find that lent is a time of joy as you triumph over temptations and make them occasions of deepening your spiritual life
HUMOR:
"WE WOULD RATHER DO BUSINESS WITH 1000 AL QAEDA TERRORISTS THAN WITH A SINGLE AMERICAN"
This sign was prominently displayed in the window of a business in Philadelphia. You are probably outraged at the thought of such an inflammatory statement.One would think that anti-hate groups from all across the country would be marching on this business... And that the National Guard might have to be called to keep the angry crowds back.But, perhaps in these stressful times one might be tempted to let the proprietors simply make their statement . . . We are a society who holds Freedom of Speech as perhaps our greatest liberty . . . And after all, it is just a sign.You may ask what kind of business would dare post such a sign?Answer: A Funeral Home (Who said morticians had no sense of humor?)
THOUGHT: Use Lent to overcome temptation and deepen your spiritual life.
posted by The Ronald | 1:04 PM
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