Forty Days of Temptation

Over at Radical Congruency, they've got a nice little post about Jesus in the desert. 

Yesterday, I was prepping a talk on Lent for one of our women's groups.  The gathering was cancelled due to snow (it's an older group).  One of the things that had really struck me as I was getting ready was the rapid succession of Jesus' baptism, at which the Father declares his love for the Son, and then the Spirit driving him (literally "casting him;" ekballo is the Gk. verb, the same word used for when Jesus casts out demons) into the desert (Mk 1:11-12).

Certainly we do not want to inappropriately celebrate suffering and trial.  But in our world so fixed on comfort, fulfillment, and satisfaction, how easily do we slide over that connection: Jesus is baptized, anointed with the power of the Spirit for his ministry, and declared to be the beloved Son of the Father.  And God shows that love by sending him into the wilderness for fasting, temptation, and trial. 

We'd prefer to believe that if God really loved us, all of our desires would be satisfied.  We'd be fulfilled.  We'd be comfortable.  Such lovely prisons we choose for ourselves, such pretty chains covered in soft velvet.  But our Lord wishes to cast us out, to where we can be formed and shaped and changed.