The Wilderness Way

Jesu Juva

Mark 1:9-15; Gen. 22                            

February 18, 2024

Lent 1B                                     

 Dear saints of our Savior~

        What was going through Abraham’s mind?  What was he thinking about that day as he walked up the mountain—with the knife, the wood, and the fire—and with his beloved son, Isaac?  Was his heart breaking and sinking with every step?  Did his eyes well up when the boy innocently asked, “Dad, where’s the lamb?”  Abraham knew what God had said—knew what he was prepared to do.  Yet Abraham, ever faithful, declares, “God will provide.  God will provide the lamb.” 

        Abraham’s faith was being tested.  Isaac was the son of the promise, conceived and born when Abraham and Sarah were well past their prime.  Isaac was a miracle baby—uniquely precious to his mother and father.  What did Abraham tell the boy’s mother about this march to Moriah?  Just a father-son camping trip?  Or did he tell her the truth?  We never hear another word from Sarah after this.  Her death is recorded in the very next chapter, which has led some to speculate that she knew what was going on—that she died of a broken heart.

        If I were Abraham—if I were walking in his sandals—I’m thinking the lines must have gotten crossed—that this wasn’t God talking to me, but the devil.  Could this be the same God who had promised him a son in the first place?  Who had told him that his descendants would be as numerous as the stars in the sky?  Who had told him that all the nations of the world would be blessed through his offspring?  Abraham could do nothing but confess his faith: God will provide the lamb.  He has to.  He has promised.  And so, up the mountain they go—father and son, with the knife, the fire, the wood, and nothing more but faith alone.  God will provide.

        In contrast to that harrowing narrative from Genesis, the Gospel of Mark seems much more streamlined and efficient.  Everything happens “immediately” in Mark:  Jesus is baptized.  The heavens are torn open.  The Spirit descends.  And the Father speaks, “You are my beloved Son, with you I am well pleased.”

        What happens after that—immediately?  What does the same Spirit who descended on Jesus in the form of a dove do next—immediately?  He drives Jesus into the wilderness—forces him violently into the wilderness for forty days of fasting—forty days of deprivation—forty days of temptation.  This is where Jesus’ baptism immediately takes him—into direct confrontation with the devil, where Jesus has nothing with which to defend Himself except the Word of the Lord.

        Today’s Scripture readings should lead you to wonder:  Why in the world do we expect the life of faith to be easy?  Why are we surprised when every move we make to draw closer to God seems to stir up trouble?  It’s become a standard part of my spiel when I’m visiting with new members who are about to join the church.  I tell them, watch out!  Troubles and trials are just around the corner. You shouldn’t be surprised when your faith is tested and challenged.  The devil positively hates it when people draw nearer to the Lord—when they undertake a renewal or a deepening of their faith.

        The marketing department always tries to edit out this word of warning.  But it’s true.  Start praying more, reading the Scriptures more, receiving God’s gifts more regularly, attending Bible study, putting into practice what you believe—and there will be trouble.  I think Abraham would back me up on that.  Jesus too. 

        The hard truth is that the road of faith doesn’t always lead onward and upward into success and happiness.  More often it leads into the wilderness—into the desolate places of testing and temptation.  Or it leads up that mountain where everything you have and love hangs in the balance and you have no good answer to give . . . except Abraham’s answer—the answer of faith:  “The Lord will provide.”

        Martin Luther said that when these things happen to you (as they did to him)—when you find yourself being tested by God and tempted by Satan—rejoice.  God is at work here, and He does some of His best work when you are “uncomfortable.”  Next Sunday we will hear from the apostle Paul in Romans chapter five.  Paul was no stranger to testing and temptations.  He wrote:  “We rejoice in our sufferings” because suffering produces all kinds of good things, including hope that does not fade away.  Christianity is not idle philosophy.  It’s not a contemplative escape from the harsh realities of life.  No, it plunges you right into those messy realities.

        St. Mark doesn’t go into all the details of Jesus’ temptation the way Matthew and Luke do.  Suffice it to say, He was tempted as you are tempted.  And yet He didn’t sin.  And through faith in Him, you get His sinless record of obedience.  Jesus’ skirmish with the devil which we hear about today was just the opening round of a war that would end with Jesus’ bloody corpse hanging from a cross, in the wilderness of Golgotha, where with one last word, “it is finished,” Jesus defeated the devil and all his works and all his ways.

        You see, at Golgotha, God provided.  God has indeed provided the Lamb for sacrifice; and wonder of wonders, it turns out to be His own beloved Son.  Where is the Lamb?  God Himself has provided the Lamb—conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried.  Abraham’s terrible test was but a preview of the awful sacrifice God would ultimately require of Himself.  Isaac was spared, not sacrificed; Jesus was sacrificed, not spared.  In Romans chapter eight Paul connects the dots definitively:  He who did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up for us all, how will He not also graciously give us all things? Surely, the Lord will provide.

        You too must walk the wilderness way—the way of testing and trial—where the devil seems so real and God seems so hidden you might think He’s absent.  This is the way of the baptized.  This is the way to the promised land of eternal life.  It’s called the way of faith—the wilderness way.  And you do not walk it alone.  Your Savior—the one who loves you and gave Himself for you—He has traveled the wilderness way ahead of you and He will lead you through it—sustaining your life with His life, His forgiveness, His salvation, His body and His blood.  For He has risen from the dead, never to die again.  Death could not hold Jesus and it cannot hold you either.

        The Lord will provide.  In Jesus, the Lamb of God, your sin has been atoned for, your guilt has been taken away.  The Lamb has done it all for you.  Where is the Lamb?  Here is the Lamb of God.  Here He comes, in the preaching of His promises, in the bread that is His body and the wine that is His blood.  At the Lamb’s high feast we sing.  Worthy is the Lamb whose death makes you His own.  The Lamb is reigning on His throne. 

        In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.