From Evernote: |
2012-01-22 Restart, Part 3: Possess |
How do you make a clean start? Can we really be better in the new year? What does the Bible say about breaking old habits and beginning a new way? Jesus started his ministry by following the path of "restart" taught by John the baptizer. Together, John and Jesus give us the tools for crafting a new beginning in God's Spirit. In this series, we'll explore their steps in the first chapter of the Gospel According to Mark. We'll see what it takes to restart in 2012. – James
Week 3: Possess
Mark 1:12-13 (New Revised Standard)
12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
So, this week, we're in Part 3 of a four-part series of messages called, "Restart." It's the new year. 2012. Woohoo. The last year in the Mayan calendar. Thankfully, we're not Mayans. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Mayans don't even follow the Mayan calendar anymore. They're into iPhones and the new season of The Bachelor just as much as we are. So, we're greeting 2012 with a heartfelt, "Hey," and taking careful steps into a new year that we're cautiously optimistic won't be the world's last.
We began week one of a Restart with Confess. It's the idea that all of us think we're normal. And we are all normal. For us. John the Baptist called everybody from the city and the countryside to come to the river and confess that "normal" just wouldn't cut it anymore, that they had some true confession to do, and that they needed to get ready for Jesus. So we did the Confess.
Last week, we moved from Confess to Bless. (If you're new here, you'll find that many of my subpoints rhyme. That's not because I'm poetic. I just have a bad memory. Hey, it works for Dr. Seuss and Jay-Z.) At Bless, the waters of confession turned into the waters of blessing. Jesus rose up from the waters of Baptism and the blessing of God came upon him. We talked about listening carefully for God's blessing as it rushes in to fill the empty space after confessing all the junk that makes us normal. We talked about how that blessing comes to you. We did the bless.
This week, we're talking about what comes after the confess, after the bless.
Here's what I want to talk about today, the main point.
If you've realized that there's something wrong, something missing, something overly normal in your life...
and if you've reached the point when you say, "OK, Lord," or "OK, wife," or, "OK, husband," or, "OK, Mom & Dad," or "OK, kids," or, OK anyone else...
if you've reached the point when you say, "OK, here it is... I'm tired of just being OK with things the way they are, because you know what? Things aren't what they should be. I'm not what I should be. I'M not WHO I should be..."
if you've reached that point and spilled your guts in the River Jordan, or the therapist's chair, or the pastor's study, or the dinner table...
if you've reached that point and you have emptied yourself so that finally, finally, finally you can receive God's blessing...
and if you do receive that moment of blessing, that precious note of forgiveness, that brilliant moment when you know somewhere God is smiling and saying, "Well done. THIS is my beloved son, my beloved daughter, my beloved child. THIS is who I knew was in there..."
if you've done that confession, and if you've received that blessing...
what next?
How do you hold onto that wonderful, mystical, miraculous feeling of peace? And still go on living in the real world? How do you hold on to that? How do you possess the blessing and carry it with you? How do you possess?
---
Maybe your brain works the same way mine does. Hopefully not, because you're "normal." But when I think about a scripture where Jesus goes into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan, and I hear the word, "Possess," I start thinking about all the movies about being "possessed" by the devil. Not that I've seen that many of them. I'd rather see movies by Pixar. So far, they've not gone that route. But when I hear the word, Possess, and think of Jesus being tempted, I think of the devil. I think about movies, pictures, and paintings. I think of possession. Is that normal? I think about heads spinning and green pea soup. I think about the guy in the red suit with the horns and the pitchfork. Do you do that? When I hear, "He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan," I don't think of the wilderness, I think of Satan. Maybe you don't because you're much more evolved than I am. I am not surprised.
OK. Here's what I have to say about all that red, cloven-hoofed Devil-guy. If focusing yourself on scary images like that helps you be a better follower of Jesus, go for it. If living in mortal fear of Satan's legions helps you be a better Christian, helps you be more kind, helps you be more loving, helps you be more compassionate, helps you be more patient, helps you be more peaceful... If living in battle with that guy helps you do these things, fine. I may not understand your method, but I know where it comes from. If you are more kind, more loving, more compassionate, more patient, and more peaceful because you're afraid of the flames of hell, good for you. Whatever works.
I don't want to mess up your game, but - you might already know this, you might not - this is not just my opinion, this is documentably true - those images of the devil - the pea soup and the horns and the red suit - they don't come from the Bible. They come more from Hollywood and Dante and those scary booklets that magically appear in bathrooms. This might be shocking; maybe not. But here's the kicker. This is the really scary part. Those images don't even come close to the real thing. In the Bible, the devil is much, much more devilish. Those images are caricatures of the devil of the Bible. In the Bible, the words used to describe the devil or Satan are literally translated, "adversary," or, "tempter." And that's much, much more demonic. That ought to be much scarier than the guy with the pitchfork. Why? Because if you're in the mall, and you see a guy in a red suit with horns, carrying a pitchfork, walking toward you, you're going to get out of the way. Probably. You might laugh at him. You might say, "Hey, Halloween's in October, dude." If the devil were that obvious, you'd see him coming and your Devil-dar would tell you to get out of the way.
The devil or satan in the Bible is much scarier. If the right words are "adversary," and "tempter," it's much, much scarier. Why? Because anyone can be your adversary. Anyone can be your tempter. Anyone or anything can be adverse to your life. Anyone or anything can turn into a temptation, and any temptation can turn into a compulsion, and any compulsion can turn into a train wreck. You thought trouble wore an easily identifiable red suit? You wish. Trouble comes dressed all sorts of ways, and if you've been to the mall lately, you might have seen some of these ways. If you've turned on the TV or been to the movies you've seen the adverse, you've seen the tempting. Even The Muppet movie shows how good things can turn bad without attention, and care, and devotion.
But let's go back. Let's assume for a minute that you are taking the opportunity of a new year to really, truly make a change in your life. Maybe it's not just a resolution, maybe you've been to the river of confession and you're ready. You're ready to step out in faith. You're ready to step out of the comforting, cleansing, refreshing waters of repentance and step forth into a new year, ripe with blessing.
You know health clubs absolutely LOVE January. Because after all the overeating and all the parties of December, we're all ready to say, "I'm gonna lose those pounds. This year. I've been working on them for ten years, but I'm going to lose them all this year. Maybe this month." And you go online and you sign up real fast because the first month is always free. Health clubs love this, because... yep. You know it. Most people go once. Maybe they go one month. And then, they go right back to the ways, the habits, the health of last year. Temptation wins. The adversary wins.
And it's the same, whether you're trying to regain your health, or regain your wealth, or regain your good habits that you used to have before you had children and could blame everything on them. Before you got your Xbox 360 and used to actually read. Before your doctor put you on medication that messes you up. The moment you step away from the glory of revelation, the second you put your foot on the dry land of reality - whatever that is for you - that instant you emerge from the safety of the waters of grace and peace, the nanosecond you get back to normal, you are a walking target for temptation. You are a Welcome Sign for an adversary. You don't need a guy in a red suit; you've got friends. You've got TV. You've got chocolate. The world does not like change, and it will align its forces against you the very instant you emerge from your blissful moment of faithful decision.
Now. If you tend toward paranoia, please take that last statement with a grain of salt. The universe is not really aligning against you, personally. But on the other hand, there are always temptations and there are always adversities that will do everything in their power to drag you back to how you were, and where you were, before you made your fateful choice in faith, in hope, and in devotion. And it is always, always, always, always MUCH easier to lose your faith, hope and devotion than it is to keep them.
And this is exactly the same place we find Jesus today.
---
Mark, chapter 1, verses 12 and 13 pick up right after Jesus emerges from the waters of baptism and hears the blessing of God upon him. The instant, Mark says, the instant after that happened, Mark says,
...the Spirit immediately drove him (Jesus) out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
If you're familiar with the Bible, you're probably more used to hearing about the Temptation of Christ from the Gospel According to Matthew or According to Luke. That's when the Tempter - that's actually what Matthew and Luke call him - the Tempter comes to Jesus with a series of three great temptations. I don't even want to get into them, because that's a different set of sermons. We're working with the Gospel According to Mark. In Mark, the whole temptation is just two verses, which, I'm discovering, is about as much as I can handle at one time. A lot of people think Mark was the first gospel written, and they think that mainly because it's the shortest. You know how preachers are. By the time Matthew and Luke get hold of the two verses in Mark, they've grown. Well, the disciples were fishermen, after all, the classic expanders of stories. Which is not to say that Mark's more accurate. He's just a short preacher. Yea for short preachers.
"...the Spirit immediately drove him (Jesus) out into the wilderness."
Hold on. I thought he was in the wilderness. I thought he was away from the city, away from the countryside, down by the River Jordan. So either there's a different wilderness into which Jesus is driven, or "wilderness" means something else. Hold that thought.
"He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him."
A lot of people have interpreted that one verse a lot of different ways. "Wilderness" can mean a lot of different things. You can think of it literally, with literal beasts and literal angels, and a literal guy called Satan. Or you can get all practical, like Jesus was on a religious fast, kind of an Outward Bound experience. Some kind of initiation journey, like when Dennis takes the Boy Scouts to Canada and they start hallucinating about giant, beastly mosquitoes. Oh, wait, I'm being told those mosquitoes are real. Or you can take it as a metaphor for what happens to everyone after they emerge from a massive religious experience. It metaphorically "takes you to another place." That's the beauty of Mark's short gospel version. He gives us just enough that we can apply it to our own religious journeys through the wilderness, whatever that means.
Here's what I take home from this verse. And this is just me. You may have a different take on this verse, and if so, good.
First, Jesus did go immediately from the confess to the bless to the wilderness. This much we know. The challenge was to POSSESS the blessing of God, to hang onto the blessing of God, no matter what temptations and no matter what adverse situations came his way. To hold onto that blessing, that spirit of God. In that regard, Jesus shows us the classic path of any spiritual journey. Jesus shows us the way. Jesus shows us the steps. And if we think we can skip a step - if we think we can detour around the temptation of our wilderness, we are wrong. Jesus is showing us the way things are. And that is, if you have a spiritual awakening, if you have a change of heart, a change of spirit, a change of plan, you will IMMEDIATELY find yourself challenged to hold onto it, to possess it.
Second, Jesus did go into the wilderness, possessing the blessing that comes through confessing. He was
DRIVEN into the wilderness, the Bible says. But... (and this is the second thing) he wasn't driven into the wilderness alone. He was there with wild beasts, and he was there with angels. He was not in the wilderness by himself.
Maybe this is a man-thing. Maybe this is residual gunk from the manly-man image a lot of us grew up with, or are still growing up with. Maybe it's part of being American, where we're fiercely independent, where we feel like anything less than pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps is sissy. But here it is. A lot of people - and maybe this is more true for men - think and act as though we're supposed to face all our trials, all our temptations, all our adversaries on our own. I know I tend that direction.
("Honey, why are you being so quiet?" "Shhh. I'm battling the forces of Satan." "Well could you pick up some milk on your way back from the war?")
This is so much easier to say than it is to do, but it is the truth, and it's what this verse teaches us. Jesus confronted the forces of Satan. But he didn't do it alone. Jesus confronted the forces of Satan, but he didn't do it alone. That's undeniable, straight from scripture.
So why, when we're confronting temptations,
why, when we're confronting tempters,
why, when we're confronting adverse situations,
why, when we're confronting adversaries...
are we so ARROGANT that we think we have to do it alone?
Jesus didn't. Are we saying we're smarter than Jesus?
Jesus may have been driven into the wilderness, whatever you take wilderness to mean, but he wasn't alone. The verse says, "and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him." That's verbatim. That's truth. That's in the Bible. So why, do we think when we get in dangerous situations, that we have to handle it all by ourselves? Now, a lot of manly men go this way, but a lot of women do, too. I don't want to be sexist. Women can, and do refuse help of people who would be angels to them, just as much as men do. Not even Jesus refused help. Not even Jesus refused company. Heck, he might have even had a dog with him. Or a cat. We don't know. What we do know is that even though he was driven into the wilderness, he wasn't there alone. He had help. Somebody, or something, cared for him, and sat with him in that wilderness time.
So, this is the second thing I get from this verse. The first thing is, if you have an awakening, blessing experience, you will IMMEDIATELY be challenged to possess it. The second thing is this.
Even though you will find yourself in the wilderness,
even though you will find yourself seeing temptations and adversaries as temptations and adversaries,
even though you will feel as though you are fighting the forces of Satan...
you don't have to do it alone.
And more than that, you shouldn't try to fight these battles alone. Jesus didn't. Why should you?
If you're trying to hang onto, if you're trying to POSSESS a new way of life, a new way of thinking, a new way of believing... tell somebody. If you're trying to change, if you're trying to start new habits, if you're trying to begin a new year with a new life... ask for help. Again, this is so much easier to say than it is to do. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. How many times have you said that to someone, to your kids, to your friends, to your spouse? So why is it so hard to take unto yourself? If you've finally, finally, finally, got a handle on a better way, don't refuse the help of the angels around you. Don't refuse the company of the wild beasts. Even if they're not that wild anymore. Don't try to possess the spirit of God all by yourself. Not even Jesus pretended to be stronger than he was.
So, if you are following the path of Jesus Christ, and that's what we're all trying to do, you know two things for sure from this scripture. First, your determination to hold onto the the blessed assurance will be tested. And second, you don't have to stand the test alone.
---
I am certain you know somebody who is trying to start out this new year on a positive note. And you don't have to be a musician to know how hard it is to maintain a positive note. (We've been watching the preliminary rounds of American Idol. It's really hard for a lot of people to maintain a positive note.) We get "pitchy" real fast.
I am certain you know somebody who could stand some help getting and maintaining the love and grace of Jesus Christ. I am certain you know somebody who's fighting temptation, who's fighting a tempter, who's up against some sort of adversary, who could use your help. Whether it's encouragement, or prayer, or a phone call, or a casserole, or more drastic kinds of intervention... be an angel for them. Don't let them lose their sense of blessing. Help them hang on and possess what God has already given them.
And if you're in your own wilderness, and if you're struggling to hang onto the blessing of God in your life... tell somebody about it. Don't hide from the angels. You've got a church full of them.
---
It's always a struggle to take into your heart, and to hold in your mind, the blessing of Jesus Christ. It's always going to be a struggle. But the struggle is not the end. That's what we're going to talk about next Sunday. So don't leave today going, "Sigh. Off to another week of battle with the forces of evil." Give your superpowers a rest. Instead, take your steps into the wilderness knowing that there are angels out there, maybe even a beast, who can, and who will, care for you. Do you see them?
Week 3: Possess
Mark 1:12-13 (New Revised Standard)
12 And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
So, this week, we're in Part 3 of a four-part series of messages called, "Restart." It's the new year. 2012. Woohoo. The last year in the Mayan calendar. Thankfully, we're not Mayans. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Mayans don't even follow the Mayan calendar anymore. They're into iPhones and the new season of The Bachelor just as much as we are. So, we're greeting 2012 with a heartfelt, "Hey," and taking careful steps into a new year that we're cautiously optimistic won't be the world's last.
We began week one of a Restart with Confess. It's the idea that all of us think we're normal. And we are all normal. For us. John the Baptist called everybody from the city and the countryside to come to the river and confess that "normal" just wouldn't cut it anymore, that they had some true confession to do, and that they needed to get ready for Jesus. So we did the Confess.
Last week, we moved from Confess to Bless. (If you're new here, you'll find that many of my subpoints rhyme. That's not because I'm poetic. I just have a bad memory. Hey, it works for Dr. Seuss and Jay-Z.) At Bless, the waters of confession turned into the waters of blessing. Jesus rose up from the waters of Baptism and the blessing of God came upon him. We talked about listening carefully for God's blessing as it rushes in to fill the empty space after confessing all the junk that makes us normal. We talked about how that blessing comes to you. We did the bless.
This week, we're talking about what comes after the confess, after the bless.
Here's what I want to talk about today, the main point.
If you've realized that there's something wrong, something missing, something overly normal in your life...
and if you've reached the point when you say, "OK, Lord," or "OK, wife," or, "OK, husband," or, "OK, Mom & Dad," or "OK, kids," or, OK anyone else...
if you've reached the point when you say, "OK, here it is... I'm tired of just being OK with things the way they are, because you know what? Things aren't what they should be. I'm not what I should be. I'M not WHO I should be..."
if you've reached that point and spilled your guts in the River Jordan, or the therapist's chair, or the pastor's study, or the dinner table...
if you've reached that point and you have emptied yourself so that finally, finally, finally you can receive God's blessing...
and if you do receive that moment of blessing, that precious note of forgiveness, that brilliant moment when you know somewhere God is smiling and saying, "Well done. THIS is my beloved son, my beloved daughter, my beloved child. THIS is who I knew was in there..."
if you've done that confession, and if you've received that blessing...
what next?
How do you hold onto that wonderful, mystical, miraculous feeling of peace? And still go on living in the real world? How do you hold on to that? How do you possess the blessing and carry it with you? How do you possess?
---
Maybe your brain works the same way mine does. Hopefully not, because you're "normal." But when I think about a scripture where Jesus goes into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan, and I hear the word, "Possess," I start thinking about all the movies about being "possessed" by the devil. Not that I've seen that many of them. I'd rather see movies by Pixar. So far, they've not gone that route. But when I hear the word, Possess, and think of Jesus being tempted, I think of the devil. I think about movies, pictures, and paintings. I think of possession. Is that normal? I think about heads spinning and green pea soup. I think about the guy in the red suit with the horns and the pitchfork. Do you do that? When I hear, "He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan," I don't think of the wilderness, I think of Satan. Maybe you don't because you're much more evolved than I am. I am not surprised.
OK. Here's what I have to say about all that red, cloven-hoofed Devil-guy. If focusing yourself on scary images like that helps you be a better follower of Jesus, go for it. If living in mortal fear of Satan's legions helps you be a better Christian, helps you be more kind, helps you be more loving, helps you be more compassionate, helps you be more patient, helps you be more peaceful... If living in battle with that guy helps you do these things, fine. I may not understand your method, but I know where it comes from. If you are more kind, more loving, more compassionate, more patient, and more peaceful because you're afraid of the flames of hell, good for you. Whatever works.
I don't want to mess up your game, but - you might already know this, you might not - this is not just my opinion, this is documentably true - those images of the devil - the pea soup and the horns and the red suit - they don't come from the Bible. They come more from Hollywood and Dante and those scary booklets that magically appear in bathrooms. This might be shocking; maybe not. But here's the kicker. This is the really scary part. Those images don't even come close to the real thing. In the Bible, the devil is much, much more devilish. Those images are caricatures of the devil of the Bible. In the Bible, the words used to describe the devil or Satan are literally translated, "adversary," or, "tempter." And that's much, much more demonic. That ought to be much scarier than the guy with the pitchfork. Why? Because if you're in the mall, and you see a guy in a red suit with horns, carrying a pitchfork, walking toward you, you're going to get out of the way. Probably. You might laugh at him. You might say, "Hey, Halloween's in October, dude." If the devil were that obvious, you'd see him coming and your Devil-dar would tell you to get out of the way.
The devil or satan in the Bible is much scarier. If the right words are "adversary," and "tempter," it's much, much scarier. Why? Because anyone can be your adversary. Anyone can be your tempter. Anyone or anything can be adverse to your life. Anyone or anything can turn into a temptation, and any temptation can turn into a compulsion, and any compulsion can turn into a train wreck. You thought trouble wore an easily identifiable red suit? You wish. Trouble comes dressed all sorts of ways, and if you've been to the mall lately, you might have seen some of these ways. If you've turned on the TV or been to the movies you've seen the adverse, you've seen the tempting. Even The Muppet movie shows how good things can turn bad without attention, and care, and devotion.
But let's go back. Let's assume for a minute that you are taking the opportunity of a new year to really, truly make a change in your life. Maybe it's not just a resolution, maybe you've been to the river of confession and you're ready. You're ready to step out in faith. You're ready to step out of the comforting, cleansing, refreshing waters of repentance and step forth into a new year, ripe with blessing.
You know health clubs absolutely LOVE January. Because after all the overeating and all the parties of December, we're all ready to say, "I'm gonna lose those pounds. This year. I've been working on them for ten years, but I'm going to lose them all this year. Maybe this month." And you go online and you sign up real fast because the first month is always free. Health clubs love this, because... yep. You know it. Most people go once. Maybe they go one month. And then, they go right back to the ways, the habits, the health of last year. Temptation wins. The adversary wins.
And it's the same, whether you're trying to regain your health, or regain your wealth, or regain your good habits that you used to have before you had children and could blame everything on them. Before you got your Xbox 360 and used to actually read. Before your doctor put you on medication that messes you up. The moment you step away from the glory of revelation, the second you put your foot on the dry land of reality - whatever that is for you - that instant you emerge from the safety of the waters of grace and peace, the nanosecond you get back to normal, you are a walking target for temptation. You are a Welcome Sign for an adversary. You don't need a guy in a red suit; you've got friends. You've got TV. You've got chocolate. The world does not like change, and it will align its forces against you the very instant you emerge from your blissful moment of faithful decision.
Now. If you tend toward paranoia, please take that last statement with a grain of salt. The universe is not really aligning against you, personally. But on the other hand, there are always temptations and there are always adversities that will do everything in their power to drag you back to how you were, and where you were, before you made your fateful choice in faith, in hope, and in devotion. And it is always, always, always, always MUCH easier to lose your faith, hope and devotion than it is to keep them.
And this is exactly the same place we find Jesus today.
---
Mark, chapter 1, verses 12 and 13 pick up right after Jesus emerges from the waters of baptism and hears the blessing of God upon him. The instant, Mark says, the instant after that happened, Mark says,
...the Spirit immediately drove him (Jesus) out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
If you're familiar with the Bible, you're probably more used to hearing about the Temptation of Christ from the Gospel According to Matthew or According to Luke. That's when the Tempter - that's actually what Matthew and Luke call him - the Tempter comes to Jesus with a series of three great temptations. I don't even want to get into them, because that's a different set of sermons. We're working with the Gospel According to Mark. In Mark, the whole temptation is just two verses, which, I'm discovering, is about as much as I can handle at one time. A lot of people think Mark was the first gospel written, and they think that mainly because it's the shortest. You know how preachers are. By the time Matthew and Luke get hold of the two verses in Mark, they've grown. Well, the disciples were fishermen, after all, the classic expanders of stories. Which is not to say that Mark's more accurate. He's just a short preacher. Yea for short preachers.
"...the Spirit immediately drove him (Jesus) out into the wilderness."
Hold on. I thought he was in the wilderness. I thought he was away from the city, away from the countryside, down by the River Jordan. So either there's a different wilderness into which Jesus is driven, or "wilderness" means something else. Hold that thought.
"He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him."
A lot of people have interpreted that one verse a lot of different ways. "Wilderness" can mean a lot of different things. You can think of it literally, with literal beasts and literal angels, and a literal guy called Satan. Or you can get all practical, like Jesus was on a religious fast, kind of an Outward Bound experience. Some kind of initiation journey, like when Dennis takes the Boy Scouts to Canada and they start hallucinating about giant, beastly mosquitoes. Oh, wait, I'm being told those mosquitoes are real. Or you can take it as a metaphor for what happens to everyone after they emerge from a massive religious experience. It metaphorically "takes you to another place." That's the beauty of Mark's short gospel version. He gives us just enough that we can apply it to our own religious journeys through the wilderness, whatever that means.
Here's what I take home from this verse. And this is just me. You may have a different take on this verse, and if so, good.
First, Jesus did go immediately from the confess to the bless to the wilderness. This much we know. The challenge was to POSSESS the blessing of God, to hang onto the blessing of God, no matter what temptations and no matter what adverse situations came his way. To hold onto that blessing, that spirit of God. In that regard, Jesus shows us the classic path of any spiritual journey. Jesus shows us the way. Jesus shows us the steps. And if we think we can skip a step - if we think we can detour around the temptation of our wilderness, we are wrong. Jesus is showing us the way things are. And that is, if you have a spiritual awakening, if you have a change of heart, a change of spirit, a change of plan, you will IMMEDIATELY find yourself challenged to hold onto it, to possess it.
Second, Jesus did go into the wilderness, possessing the blessing that comes through confessing. He was
DRIVEN into the wilderness, the Bible says. But... (and this is the second thing) he wasn't driven into the wilderness alone. He was there with wild beasts, and he was there with angels. He was not in the wilderness by himself.
Maybe this is a man-thing. Maybe this is residual gunk from the manly-man image a lot of us grew up with, or are still growing up with. Maybe it's part of being American, where we're fiercely independent, where we feel like anything less than pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps is sissy. But here it is. A lot of people - and maybe this is more true for men - think and act as though we're supposed to face all our trials, all our temptations, all our adversaries on our own. I know I tend that direction.
("Honey, why are you being so quiet?" "Shhh. I'm battling the forces of Satan." "Well could you pick up some milk on your way back from the war?")
This is so much easier to say than it is to do, but it is the truth, and it's what this verse teaches us. Jesus confronted the forces of Satan. But he didn't do it alone. Jesus confronted the forces of Satan, but he didn't do it alone. That's undeniable, straight from scripture.
So why, when we're confronting temptations,
why, when we're confronting tempters,
why, when we're confronting adverse situations,
why, when we're confronting adversaries...
are we so ARROGANT that we think we have to do it alone?
Jesus didn't. Are we saying we're smarter than Jesus?
Jesus may have been driven into the wilderness, whatever you take wilderness to mean, but he wasn't alone. The verse says, "and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him." That's verbatim. That's truth. That's in the Bible. So why, do we think when we get in dangerous situations, that we have to handle it all by ourselves? Now, a lot of manly men go this way, but a lot of women do, too. I don't want to be sexist. Women can, and do refuse help of people who would be angels to them, just as much as men do. Not even Jesus refused help. Not even Jesus refused company. Heck, he might have even had a dog with him. Or a cat. We don't know. What we do know is that even though he was driven into the wilderness, he wasn't there alone. He had help. Somebody, or something, cared for him, and sat with him in that wilderness time.
So, this is the second thing I get from this verse. The first thing is, if you have an awakening, blessing experience, you will IMMEDIATELY be challenged to possess it. The second thing is this.
Even though you will find yourself in the wilderness,
even though you will find yourself seeing temptations and adversaries as temptations and adversaries,
even though you will feel as though you are fighting the forces of Satan...
you don't have to do it alone.
And more than that, you shouldn't try to fight these battles alone. Jesus didn't. Why should you?
If you're trying to hang onto, if you're trying to POSSESS a new way of life, a new way of thinking, a new way of believing... tell somebody. If you're trying to change, if you're trying to start new habits, if you're trying to begin a new year with a new life... ask for help. Again, this is so much easier to say than it is to do. Asking for help is not a sign of weakness. How many times have you said that to someone, to your kids, to your friends, to your spouse? So why is it so hard to take unto yourself? If you've finally, finally, finally, got a handle on a better way, don't refuse the help of the angels around you. Don't refuse the company of the wild beasts. Even if they're not that wild anymore. Don't try to possess the spirit of God all by yourself. Not even Jesus pretended to be stronger than he was.
So, if you are following the path of Jesus Christ, and that's what we're all trying to do, you know two things for sure from this scripture. First, your determination to hold onto the the blessed assurance will be tested. And second, you don't have to stand the test alone.
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I am certain you know somebody who is trying to start out this new year on a positive note. And you don't have to be a musician to know how hard it is to maintain a positive note. (We've been watching the preliminary rounds of American Idol. It's really hard for a lot of people to maintain a positive note.) We get "pitchy" real fast.
I am certain you know somebody who could stand some help getting and maintaining the love and grace of Jesus Christ. I am certain you know somebody who's fighting temptation, who's fighting a tempter, who's up against some sort of adversary, who could use your help. Whether it's encouragement, or prayer, or a phone call, or a casserole, or more drastic kinds of intervention... be an angel for them. Don't let them lose their sense of blessing. Help them hang on and possess what God has already given them.
And if you're in your own wilderness, and if you're struggling to hang onto the blessing of God in your life... tell somebody about it. Don't hide from the angels. You've got a church full of them.
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It's always a struggle to take into your heart, and to hold in your mind, the blessing of Jesus Christ. It's always going to be a struggle. But the struggle is not the end. That's what we're going to talk about next Sunday. So don't leave today going, "Sigh. Off to another week of battle with the forces of evil." Give your superpowers a rest. Instead, take your steps into the wilderness knowing that there are angels out there, maybe even a beast, who can, and who will, care for you. Do you see them?
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