Temptation: Giving Up or Giving In?
February 21, 2010
Luke 4: 1-13


First Sunday of Lent

The world and all its things tempt each of us in varying ways. Many of you may have wanted to get up, come down front, and grab one of those ice cream treats that the children shared earlier. Obviously you all have some self control, as none of you jumped up and came down to try to take one.

But we are all tempted in some way at various times in our lives; and often we cannot control ourselves, giving up and giving in to those temptations. You each know what your weaknesses are: food, alcohol, collecting stuff; and other non-tangibles such as pride, power, lust, greed, control. And on occasion we all give in to those things. We feel sorry afterward, but for some reason we cannot seem to prevent ourselves from falling into those traps.

The story of Jesus in the desert is an example to all of us. It is a goal for which we must strive. We must try to be more like him, more like God intended us to be and less like a creature of this world. Fred Rogers says, “What we have is less important, than what we make out of what we have.”

God has richly blessed each of us with love for others, skill and knowledge to accomplish good works for those in need, and grace deep in our souls to hear God’s voice leading us and guiding us on the right and righteous path.
But God has also granted us free will, and all too often that willingness to first fulfill our own needs takes precedents over the good we might do, and we loose the opportunity to do that work for God. We are tempted, and we give in to that temptation.

Lent is a time for introspection, a time to open ourselves to God, and a time to let God help us become different: different in how we approach and treat others; different in how we use the things with which God has blessed us; different as we realize that God through Christ has forgiven us for all the times we didn’t act and speak toward the created world and toward those around us as God wanted us to do.

I have planned some time into this morning’s message for each of you to start this process of introspection. For the next five (5) minutes I want each of us to pray and be silent before God. At some point in those minutes I will interrupt you and ask you to write down on the back of the bulletin whatever has come to your mind.

(FIVE MINUTES HERE TO BE SILENT)

What you have written is just the start of this process. Over the next 36 days that remain in this Lenten period, take time to be silent, reflect on your life and on the grace that has been given to you through the blood of Christ; and then make a plan that will help you resist the temptations that pull you away from God and toward your own selfishness; a plan that will help you to use what you have been given to those in need around you; a plan that you will remind you daily of God’s love and grace give to you while you were yet sinners.