For Sale or Sold Out?

on Matthew 4:1-11

Human Relations Day Sunday in The UMC

This Sunday, January 19^th, is the Second Sunday after the Epiphany, as well as “Human Relations Day” Sunday, one of The UMC's special offering Sundays. Special offerings received will be used by The UMC to assist ministries helping to overcome injustice and empower the oppressed. Find out more at www.umcgiving.org. 

• A man offers woman $1,000,000 to sleep with him... she agrees. He then says, “Would you do it for $5?” The woman replied, “What kind of person do you think I am?” The man answered, “We've already established that, now we're just haggling over the price.”

• We have read in Matthew 4 an account of Jesus' temptations, but we see that Jesus could not be bought, not by $5, not by $1,000,000... nothing the devil offered was able to sway Jesus, buy him, veer him from his path...

The temptations are not particularly evil; we need to eat and we do rely on God's protection, and if we had great power we could do great good things...The devil wants to do whatever it takes to buy you, to get you off God's path of righteousness and justice. And one of the things we find in this passage is a model for dealing with temptation.

• Jesus knows his path:
1) He was led by the Spirit, and 2) he spent 40 days in the wilderness thinking about it. He was disciplined, sold out to God... He wasn't for sale.
He knew who he was, whose he was, and what he was called to do.

• Jesus was grounded in scripture. The word was a part of him.

• In addition to providing a model for dealing with temptation, we see in Jesus the redemption of the story of Moses and the children of Israel: Jesus went into the wilderness (so Moses) for 40 days (so Moses 40 yrs) after going through water (Jesus' baptism, Moses crossing the Red Sea). Both were hungry, but where the children of Israel complained, the Son of God said “I rely on God.” And where children of Israel turned and worshiped an idol of their own making, the Son of God refused to worship the devil. Where the children of Israel failed to keep covenant with God, the Son of God refused to break that covenant, and in his discipline, obedience, and submission, in his perfect Sonship we find redemption.

Jesus knew who he was and whose he was,
and what he was called to do.

• I learned recently about a social experiment some students did on a college campus. (you can find it online at http://youtu.be/EisZTB4ZQxY) They wanted to see how people would respond to witnessing bullying, so they would stage fights right in front of people. One person did nothing, just let the fight proceed. Some people saw the fight and hurried away. A few people intervened. Whenever possible, the guys that were fighting tried to ask the people why they responded the way they did, and there were pretty much two common responses: “I didn't want to get involved” or “I couldn't sit by and let that happen.”

The people that didn't want to get involved: they sold their integrity for fear and for personal comfort... the people that intervened: they said with their words and their actions, I won't let my fear of getting hurt stop me from doing the right thing, I won't let my fear of what other people might think stop me from using the power I have to stop an abuse.

• We see in this experiment and in the temptation of Jesus that we are called to use the power we have for good, for God, for community, and that our identity and our abilities are given by God for good, for God, and for community.

• We see in the temptation of Jesus that being completely sold out to God, committed to God means that our actions and reactions will show who we are and whose we are, and that when our identities are rooted in God and nurtured in his word, we will live lives that are beneficial to others and pleasing to God.

• We have something of a mission statement at First Church, and if it isn't part of the fabric of our lives (as the word was part of the fabric of Jesus' life), I hope that it would become part of us in 2014: 

to share the love of God with people in a hurting world.

We also fall under the umbrella of The UMC, whose mission is 

to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

• What have these mission statements to do with the temptation of Jesus? These two things: that when we know who we are and whose we are, when our principles and values are not for sale but we are sold out to God and grounded in his word, that we will stay on the path God has for us, (to share... to make disciples)

and that as disciples of Jesus Christ we will actively use our God-given powers and abilities to further the kingdom of God.

• To God be the glory. Amen.