First Sunday in Lent

First Sunday in Lent (B)

February 19, 2024

Text: Mark 1:9-15

            A passage through the water.  Driven into the wilderness.  Tested.  Tempted.  But in God’s care.  Receiving the ministrations of angels.  Then, finally, entering into the Promised Land for the realization of God’s Kingdom.

            This was God’s plan for Israel.  In exodus from slavery in Egypt, freed from tyranny, they passed through the Red Sea waters on dry ground, while their enemies were drowned in the depths of the Sea.  But now, driven into the wilderness, the place of nothingness and death and demons, with only God to rely on.  It was a test from Him.  Will they remain faithful?  And a temptation from the devil.  Can they be stolen away from God?  One and the same event can be divine test and demonic temptation, can’t it?  And what is God’s goal for His people in the whole thing?  To bring them, first, to the holy mountain, Mt. Sinai, to hear God’s own voice in the giving of the Law, and to ratify the Covenant.  That is what they need in this wilderness.  The Word of the living God.  His Law and His Promise.  And then to bring them into the Promised Land, to take possession of it, and to live under the blessed rule of God, their King. 

            How did they fare?  If you’ve read much of the Old Testament, or learned any of it from Sunday School… or, for that matter, if you’ve ever seen the Charlton Heston movie… you know how the Israelites failed at every point.  God’s chosen people, His holy nation, failed the test, fell to the temptation, again and again.  They did not trust God.  They did not heed His Commandments.  They wanted to go back, forever pining after the good ol’ days of slavery.  Rebelling against Moses.  Grumbling about the food (you know, the manna, the bread from heaven that miraculously appeared at their door every morning, and the quail that fluttered in every evening; never mind the water miraculously flowing from the rock).  Then there was the golden calf.  Right after hearing the voice of God.  Idolatry and its accompanying sins.  The deception of Baalam.  And on the cusp of entering the Promised Land, the faithless report of the spies.  The refusal to go in.  Rejection of God’s Promise that He would go before them, and fight for them, and give them their inheritance.  Believing, in spite of God’s Word, that the whole operation was up to them, and their military might and prowess, knowing that, of themselves, they were no match for the giants in the Land.  So, except for Caleb and Joshua, that whole generation died in the wilderness.  It was a colossal failure.  Even Moses had to die on the eastern side of the Jordan, a seemingly futile end of his life’s mission.  Under the leadership of Joshua, Israel would eventually make it across the river.  But it would take 40 years.  And they never fully realized God’s gracious plan for His beloved, but rebellious children.

            And so it is that Jesus (His Name in Hebrew is Yehoshua, Yeshua, Joshua) enters the River Jordan to be baptized by St. John.  A passage through the water.  Then, driven by the Spirit into the wilderness.  To be tested by God.  To be tempted by Satan.  To trust in His Father’s Promise and providence, in spite of the hunger and loneliness.  To know that man does not live by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God.  To be the faithful Son.  To receive the ministrations of angels.  And then to enter again into the Promised Land, to come into Galilee and proclaim: God’s plan is finally in motion.  It is as good as done.  “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel” (Mark 1:15; ESV). 

            He is recapitulating God’s plan for Israel.  He is Israel reduced to One.  Where Israel failed as God’s beloved children, Jesus succeeded as God’s beloved Son.  See, He comes to do what no one else on earth can.  Pass the test.  Endure the temptation, and reject it.  Go toe to toe with the evil one, and emerge victorious.  Trust in the Promise of His Father rather than the emptiness and ugliness His eyes behold… and rather than His rumbling and distended tummy.  To be the Faithful One. 

            He does it not only for Israel.  He does it for us. 

            In Lent, we meditate especially on the Passion of our Lord Jesus Christ, that is, His suffering and death for the forgiveness of our sins.  And this is right and good.  This is what we call our Lord’s passive obedience, the things He suffers for us, and in our place, to atone for our unrighteousness and unfaithfulness.  And, to be sure, Jesus’ hunger and destitution in the wilderness are part of His redemptive suffering. 

            But remember, just as important as His passive obedience, is what we call His active obedience, His doing what we have not done, and are unable to do, for us, and in our place.  That is, His perfect fulfillment of God’s Law.  His faithfulness in the face of temptation.  His hearing and heeding God’s Word.  His unfaltering faith.  All of it, He does for us.  And we get the credit.  His righteousness is… and now, this is a big theological word, but one maybe worth knowing… imputed to us, reckoned to our account by God, given to us freely, as a gift… received by faith.  Not earned by us.  Not in any sense.  Given because God loves us.  By grace alone.  On account of Christ alone. 

            You know why God didn’t give up on Israel, in spite of their stubborn rebelliousness, and constant and repeated failures?  Because His plan all along was to have Jesus come and do for Israel, what Israel could not.  Jesus’ obedience, Jesus’ success, applied to them retroactively by God (who is outside of time, anyway).  In other words, God’s Old Testament people, likewise, were saved by grace alone, on account of Christ alone.  And how did they receive the benefit of that?  By faith in the Promised Messiah, the Christ, who was to come. 

            But now, what about you?  Because you aren’t Old Testament Israel, and to my knowledge, none of you are Jewish.  And even if you are, how does this work as a New Testament member of Christ’s Church? 

            Baptized into Christ, you are joined to Christ, grafted into His Israel.  And so, you are baptized into the pattern He has fulfilled.  You are led on a passage through the water.  And then driven by the Spirit (whom you have received in Baptism) out into the wilderness.  And what now?  Tested by God, yes.  Will you remain faithful to Him?  Even when life gets hard?  When you suffer?  When you lack?  Tempted by Satan.  He will (and does) try to rob you away from God.  He will always present an enticing, but entirely false, vision of how grand life can be apart from God.  And he will always remind you how good you had it (though you didn’t really) back in the old days of slavery to the Egypt of your sin and unbelief.  But you will suffer all of this under God’s care and provision.  With the unseen ministrations of His angels.  Hearing, even in this wilderness, God’s own voice.  Not just from Sinai, but from Mt. Zion.  From the Scriptures.  From this pulpit.  It is just what you need, to sustain you this side of the Jordan.  And, finally, entering into the Promised Land for the full realization of God’s Kingdom.  You’re already in that Kingdom now, because you are in Christ, and Christ is the King.  But still to come, heaven, and the resurrection of the body, and an eternal inheritance in the New Creation (the Land).  

            And what of your own colossal failures?  Your stubbornness and rebellion?  Your grumbling and lack of faith?  Your idolatry and its accompanying sins?  Repent of all that.  But know this.  God does not give up on you, either.  Because of His Son, Jesus.  Jesus takes our failed and broken attempts at fulfilling the pattern, and puts His perfect fulfillment of it in their place.  Jesus’ obedience, Jesus’ success (His active obedience), counts for you.  And His Sacrifice of Atonement, His suffering and death for your sins (passive obedience), covers you.  When God looks at you, now, He sees, not your sin and failure, but Jesus’ perfect obedience and righteousness.  You are clothed with Christ.  That is your baptismal reality.  And so, raised with Him to new life, to live faithfully under Him in this wilderness, until He calls you over-Jordan into the Promised Land of heaven.

            Beloved, Lent is a gift from God that stops us in our tracks.  It stops us from going our own way, veering off course, turning back to Egyptian bondage.  It is an opportunity to intentionally stop, and look around ourselves.  To take stock.  Where am I rebelling?  Where am I refusing to hear and heed God’s Word?  Where am I failing to trust in Him in all circumstances?  What idols need to be destroyed?  What distractions need to be stripped away?  How am I, in all of this, depending on myself and my own fulfilling of God’s plan, instead of depending entirely and alone on Jesus?  Our Lord takes all that stuff away and puts it to death on His cross.  And then He takes us up into His faithful fulfillment of God’s plan.  Through the water (Baptism).  Through the wilderness (this fallen earthly life).  Through every sin and temptation.  Rescuing us from the devil, and defeating him once and for all.  Carrying us across the Jordan to dwell with Him in His inheritance.  To see Him face to face.  Jesus is God’s Faithful One.  And in Him, all has been accomplished.  And we have nothing to fear.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son X, and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.