Temptations Are Mainly about Mistiming

1 Lent        A      March 5, 2017
Gen 2:4b-9,15-17,25-3:7  Ps.51:1-13
Rom. 5:12-21         Matt. 4:1-11

Lectionary Link

The Bible traces the great human epic and we as human beings have in every age had to be honest about things we don't understand.  Human being have always felt that there were forces which impinge upon our existence and since we are persons, we personalize the forces which seem to intervene within our lives.  In the human biblical epic beginning with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, we find human beings not feeling fully responsible for their actions; they felt tricked into actions by higher powers.  And so comes the cry of Adam and Eve.  "The Devil made me do it."  Or more correct to the story, "The serpent tricked us into doing it."  The original serpent has morphed into many metaphorical figures such as Lucifer the fallen angel of light who committed pride in heaven and became the liar.  The serpent is also a dragon, Beelzebub, the Lord of the flies, the devil and Satan, the accuser.   This serpent, dragon, devil and Satan have earthly agents, particularly in apocalyptic literature and the agents are usually seen in evil political figures and Empires which are called the Beast or beasts like the winged lion, the bear, the leopard and the beast with 10 horns.  Also there is the Anti-Christ and the false prophet who are the agents of the devil in the biblical apocalyptic tradition.

Rather than to take all of these images literally, we can appreciate their psychological truth as shadow forces within the human subconscious which can come to concrete expression within our lives whenever we lie or misuse power in our lives.  During the season of Lent we are asked to apprise our human agency.  Whose agent are we?  Are we God's agents?  Or are we agents of the inner forces which are expressed in lies and the abuse of power?  And if we want to be God's agents how can we accomplish this?  And how can we understand why we come to do what we do?

In the biblical epic, if Adam and Eve failed in their moral test because they were tricked by the higher powers of the serpent to disobey, is this story descriptive of the fact that all human beings fail and fall to similar trickery?  How is that we come to let wrong desire become the power to make us agents to do and say wrong things?  And where can we go to find heroic help for our moral agency dilemma?  How can we come to celebrate the fact that God inspires us to do good things rather than bemoan that fact that the interior shadow Satan tricks our desires toward acting out in bad things?

The first Sunday in Lent begins with the temptations of Jesus in the wilderness by Satan.  The wilderness is symbolic of paradise lost; there is no longer a perfect garden.  The weeds and the wild have taken over and they are not in natural harmony with humanity and human culture.  Jesus was driven by the higher power of the Spirit to fast and to be alone.  The Spirit wanted him to go into the ruined garden of the human unconscious and face the shadow forces which cause human beings to become agents of evil and bad will.  The shadow force is known to Jesus and to all as a lying accuser, Satan.   And we might look at the account of the temptation to gain some insights to help us in our hopes of being agents of God for good in our world.

I would submit to you that the dynamics of temptation is mainly about being tricked into mistimed deeds in our lives.  If creation is good and everything is potentially good, what can make things bad?  Our mistimed interactions with the good things in life.

Food is good.  Recognition is good.  Death is natural and death can be inevitably good.  What is that can make food bad?  Recognition bad?  And death wrong?  Mistiming of how, when and how many times we do things is what makes something good or bad.

The insights from the account of the temptation of Jesus show us the tricks that Satan, the inward and Shadow accuser of Jesus, used to try get Jesus off God's time schedule and into another time schedule in the performance of the deeds of his lives.

Food is good for us just as all things necessary for the reasonable maintenance of our physical lives are.  But the mistiming of our use of good things can result in destructive stewardship for our lives and for other people in our world.  Jesus was under the obedience of God his Father to undertake a fast.  He was taking a rest from food perhaps for the very purpose of becoming aware of his inner life as a battleground where he needed to go and win a battle that patriarch Adam and matriarch Eve lost.  Bread is human processed food.  John the Baptist ate locust and honey in the wilderness as his abject reliance upon nature's provision and not on human provision.  Perhaps Jesus was fasting for forty days from human processed food including bread.  "Jesus, you are God's special one.  If you are greater than Moses who interceded to get Israel some heavenly manna, why don't you just outperform Moses and command these stones to become bread to feed you."  How did Jesus respond?  He essentially said, "My food and provision are on God's schedule and not yours because everyone should live by the word of God and not by mistiming to do things at the wrong time with the wrong frequency." 

Another way that Satan tried to get Jesus to mistime deeds of his life was get him to interpret the Bible in a way that contradicted the laws of nature.  What happens if anyone jumps from a tall place?  The laws of gravity become evident.  The Psalm is a book of poetry and in it is written that God's care is so real for us that God's angels will catch us if we fall.  We can get tricked into doing wrong things when we take things so literally.  One of the worst tricks in life concerns our deaths and the death of other people.  We know that Jesus really died; he died at the hands of the Roman soldiers.  But the net that caught Jesus was God's resurrection life.  Satan tried to get Jesus to end his life before it was time.  "Go ahead Jesus, jump and you will defy gravity when the angels catch you."  Jesus believed in gravity and so should we.

The last temptation is about mistiming about fame, power and recognition is our lives.  In the Gospels it is recorded that the opponents of Jesus thought that he had made a pact with the devil.  The only way in which he could do his mighty works was because he had sold out to Satan.  This is a theme in literature such as in Goethe's Faust.  Faust made a bargain with the evil one to attain glory but to do so he had to sell his soul to the evil one.  In Star Wars, there is the metaphor of people who have gone over to the dark side and the Evil Empire was an expression of that dark side.  In human history, we have the example of the mystery of evil expressed on grand scale: Hitler, Stalin, and Pol Pot whose crusades of mass murder expressed an evil of the worst kind.  What happens in Empires when power becomes absolute and when lying on behalf of power becomes normal?  Satan promised Jesus the highest position in the world if he would go over to the dark side and use his power and skills for the mystery of evil.  But Jesus knew the first commandment; worship the One God who created everything, even the possibility of evil.  The fame of Jesus would not be mistimed because of Satan.  The fame of Jesus came after his resurrection when his Risen Life spread by the Holy Spirit in the lives of people who are members of the good and kind kingdom of God.

Today there is the temptation to go to the dark side of the powers of the kingdoms of this world.  Fame, wealth and power are intoxicating drugs in our world today.  People will cheat and lie and even kill to attain fame, wealth and power.  Many people get tempted to go over to the dark side today.  When people are able to do this on a grand scale, lots of people get harmed.

Today, we pray again the Lord's Prayer.  We ask for God's kingdom to intersect with our lives.  We need to submit to the timing of God's kingdom in this world.  We ask not be to led into temptation.  We ask not to be tempted to mistime the deeds and words of our lives.

Today, by the words of Jesus the altar bread will become for us again the presence of Christ.  And we will endeavor to live our lives by the presence of the Risen Christ in us as the Eternal word of God.  How will we know the presence of the Risen Christ in our lives?   We will know it as we come to sense God's time for the events and circumstances of our lives.  We will come into the esteem, fame, recognition and glory of our lives in God's times and ways without having to compromise with the dark side of the shadow of evil.  And we pray to arrive at the time of our death not a minute too late or too early, in God's good time.

The witness of Jesus is that he encountered the evil one; he encountered the dark side and he won because he was committed to be on God's time schedule for the providence of his life.

Lent is a season for us to assess the temptations regarding the mistiming of lives.  How can we know God's timing in our lives?  Are we finding peace, joy, the reality of being loved, forgiven?  Are we bringing people together or creating division?  The results of God's timing being known in our lives are known by the evidence of the fruits of God's Spirit.

The mystery of evil is out there and in us too.  It is tricky.  Power, fame and wealth can be made to appear to be godly and attractive.  And we must resist and find God's kingdom of love, peace, joy, self-control, gentleness, goodness, faith and justice.

May God reveal to us the tricks of the shadow of evil in our world and in our lives and may we have the strength of the Risen Christ to resist evil and to spread Christ's peaceful kingdom in our world.  Amen.

Sunday School, March 5, 2017 1 Lent A

Sunday School, March 5, 2017   1 Lent A

Themes for Sunday School about the Temptation of Jesus

We believe that even though Jesus is God, he was human that he was bi-lingual.  He could speak the language of God and he could also speak our human language because he lived and faced the good and bad things in life.  And Jesus faced the hard tests in lives.  We call some of these tests, temptations.

What was the temptation of Jesus about?  Jesus faced an inner enemy, Satan, who came to Jesus as a lying and an accusing voice.  He tried to trick Jesus by lying about some things.

Is food good for you?

Is fame and recognition okay?

Is dying something that will happen to everyone?

Yes, yes, yes.

Is too much food and food at the wrong time go for you?  No.  So we have to learn how and when to eat food in the right amounts at the right time.  Food is like drink and many things that we need in life; we need to choose to use them in the right time and right amounts.  If we take too much food and don’t share food with others who need it then we use food wrongly.   If we eat too much food we can make ourselves sick and unhealthy.  When God the Father wanted Jesus to fast, Satan tried to get Jesus to disobey his father and forget his fast.

Has Jesus become famous?  How?  By dying on the cross and by rising again and by bringing good news to billions of people through the Holy Spirit.  Satan tried to trick Jesus in making seek fame by disobeying God the Father and God’s plan for making Jesus famous in our lives.

Does everyone die?  Yes.  Should we make ourselves die or cause someone else to die?  No.  We want to live in the right way.  We want to die in the right way.  Satan wanted Jesus to jump from a high place so that when he fell some angels would catch him.  But this was not the way Jesus was to die or be rescued.  How did Jesus die?  On the cross.  How was he rescued from death?  By his resurrection.

Can we be tempted to use food and many good things in our lives to use them in the wrong way, at the wrong time and by over using good things.  Yes.  So we need to learn how to use all of the good things in God’s creation properly for our own good and for the good of others in the world.

Is fame and recognition okay?  Yes, because we from childhood need to have self-esteem.  We need to be told that God’s loves us, cares for us and we need caring people in our lives to tell us that we are important for them.  We do seek to be famous, we seek to be as good as we can and we work hard to make a difference in the world.  Sometimes we might be recognized by others for what we do and sometimes we might not.  Remember the best reward and the best fame is when we do good.  Nobody else can make us really good and important.  Satan tried to tell Jesus that he could make him famous and Jesus knew that he was lying.  Jesus did not want the kind of fame that Satan offered.  Remember bad people in life have a different kind of fame than good people.  We want good people fame because we want to inspire others to be good.

Will we all die?  We should not be tempted from anger or self-anger to ever hurt others or ourselves.  When we die and how we die is not our choice and so we look to Jesus to obey God by having faith to place our life and death in God’s hand.  What we can know from Jesus is that when we die, God will resurrect and preserve us in the only special way that God can.

Sermon

  Is chocolate cake good?  Is it okay to like chocolate cake?  Is candy good?  Is it okay to like candy?  Is playing outside fun?  Is it okay to play outside?

  Is it okay to eat ten pieces of chocolate cake?  No, why not?  It might make you sick.  And your body needs other kinds of food besides chocolate cake.

  Is it okay to ten pieces of candy?  No.  Because your body needs other foods and getting too much sugar is not good for you.

  Is it okay to play outside, when you still have lots of homework to do?  Or when your Mom has told you that it is time to come in and take your bath or clean your room?

  So, eating cake, eating candy and playing outside.  All of these things are good things.  But they can be bad things, if they are done at the wrong time.

  And I am going to teach you a new word.  Temptation.  Temptation is when we get tricked into doing something at the wrong time.

  Speeding in the car might be good for a racer on the race track.  But is it good on the streets of the city?  No.  But sometimes drivers drive too fast in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  So how can we learn to deal with temptation?    We learn to do all good things at the right time.  God gives us parents to help us do the right things at the right time.  And sometimes it is hard for us to hear our parents say no to us.  Our parents might say, “Wait and eat your cake after you eat a good healthy meal.”  They might say, “Eat only one piece of candy and then brush your teeth.”

  They might say, “Put on your helmet when you ride your bike and do not ride in the street.”

  God gives you parents and teachers to help us do the right things at the right time.  And parents too, they need to learn to do the right things at the right time in their behavior too.

  Jesus was tempted by the devil.  The devil tried to get Jesus to do things in the wrong time.  And he did not follow the devil.  He followed God his Father.

  Jesus showed us that we can learn to do the right things at the right time.  How many of you want to learn to do the right things at the right time?  If you learn to do this, you will learn to say no to temptation.  Amen.

St. John the Divine Episcopal Church

17740 Peak Avenue, Morgan Hill, CA 95037

Family Service with Holy Eucharist

March 5, 2017: The First Sunday in Lent

Gathering Songs: It’s Me O Lord,  As a Deer, Yield Not To Temptation,  Simple Gifts

Liturgist: Bless the Lord who forgives all of our sins.

People: God’s mercy endures forever.  Amen.

Liturgist:  Oh God, Our hearts are open to you.

And you know us and we can hide nothing from you.

Prepare our hearts and our minds to love you and worship you.

Through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen.

Song: It’s Me O Lord (LEVAS, # 797 or CCS, # 210)

Refrain: It’s me, it’s me, it’s me, O Lord.  Standing in the need of prayer.  It’s me, it’s me, it’s me, O Lord, standing in the need of prayer.

Not my brother, not my sister, but it’s me O Lord.  Standing in the need of prayer.  Not my brother, not my sister, but it’s me, O Lord.  Standing in the need of prayer. Refrain

Not the stranger, not the neighbor but it’s me O Lord.  Standing in the need of prayer.  Not the stranger, not the neighbor but it’s me O Lord.  Standing in the need of prayer.  Refrain

Liturgist:         The Lord be with you.

People:            And also with you.

Liturgist:  Let us pray

Almighty God, whose blessed Son was led by the Spirit to be tempted by Satan: Come quickly to help us who are assaulted by many temptations; and, as you know the weaknesses of each of us, let each one find you mighty to save; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Litany of Praise: Praise be to God! (chanted)

O God, you are Great!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have made us! Praise be to God!

O God, you have made yourself known to us!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have provided us with us a Savior!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have given us a Christian family!  Praise be to God!

O God, you have forgiven our sins!  Praise be to God!

O God, you brought your Son Jesus back from the dead!  Praise be to God!

Liturgist: A reading from the Book Genesis

The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, "You may freely eat of every tree of the garden; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall die." Now the serpent was more crafty than any other wild animal that the LORD God had made. He said to the woman, "Did God say, `You shall not eat from any tree in the garden'?" The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat of the fruit of the trees in the garden; but God said, `You shall not eat of the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden, nor shall you touch it, or you shall die.'" But the serpent said to the woman, "You will not die; for God knows that when you eat of it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." So when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise, she took of its fruit and ate; and she also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate. Then the eyes of both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together and made loincloths for themselves.

Liturgist: The Word of the Lord

People: Thanks be to God

Liturgist: Let us read together from Psalm 32

I said," I will confess my transgressions to the LORD." * Then you forgave me the guilt of my sin.

Therefore all the faithful will make their prayers to you in time of trouble; * when the great waters overflow, they shall not reach them.

You are my hiding-place; you preserve me from trouble; * you surround me with shouts of deliverance.

"I will instruct you and teach you in the way that you should go; * I will guide you with my eye.

Litany Phrase: Thanks be to God! (chanted)

Litanist:

For the good earth, for our food and clothing. Thanks be to God!

For our families and friends. Thanks be to God!

For the talents and gifts that you have given to us. Thanks be to God!

For this day of worship. Thanks be to God!

For health and for a good night’s sleep. Thanks be to God!

For work and for play. Thanks be to God!

For teaching and for learning. Thanks be to God!

For the happy events of our lives. Thanks be to God!

For the celebration of the birthdays and anniversaries of our friends and parish family.

   Thanks be to God!

Liturgist:         The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ according to Matthew

People:            Glory to you, Lord Christ.

After Jesus was baptized, he was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. He fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterwards he was famished. The tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread." But he answered, "It is written, 'One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.'"  Then the devil took him to the holy city and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple, saying to him, "If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down; for it is written, 'He will command his angels concerning you,' and 'On their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.'" Jesus said to him, "Again it is written, 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'" Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor; and he said to him, "All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me." Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan! for it is written, 'Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.'"

Liturgist:         The Gospel of the Lord.

People:            Praise to you, Lord Christ.

Sermon – Father Phil

Children’s Creed

We did not make ourselves, so we believe that God the Father is the maker of the world.

Since God is so great and we are so small,

We believe God came into our world and was born as Jesus, son of the Virgin Mary.

We need God’s help and we believe that God saved us by the life, death and

     resurrection of Jesus Christ.

We believe that God is present with us now as the Holy Spirit.

We believe that we are baptized into God’s family the Church where everyone is

     welcome.

We believe that Christ is kind and fair.

We believe that we have a future in knowing Jesus Christ.

And since we all must die, we believe that God will preserve us forever.  Amen.

Litany Phrase: Christ, have mercy.

For fighting and war to cease in our world. Christ, have mercy.

For peace on earth and good will towards all. Christ, have mercy.

For the safety of all who travel. Christ, have mercy.

For jobs for all who need them. Christ, have mercy.

For care of those who are growing old. Christ, have mercy.

For the safety, health and nutrition of all the children in our world. Christ, have mercy.

For the well-being of our families and friends. Christ, have mercy.

For the good health of those we know to be ill. Christ, have mercy.

For the remembrance of those who have died. Christ, have mercy.

For the forgiveness of all of our sins. Christ, have mercy.

Youth Liturgist:          The Peace of the Lord be always with you.

People:                        And also with you.

Song during the preparation of the Altar and the receiving of an offering

Offertory:  As the Deer Pants for the Water, (Renew # 9)

1          As the deer pants for the water, so my soul longs after you; you alone are my heart’s desire and I long to worship you.  Refrain: You alone are my strength, my shield, to you alone may my spirit yield; you alone are my heart’s desire, and I long to worship you!

2          I want you more than gold or silver, only you can satisfy; you alone are the real joy-giver and the apple of my eye.  Refrain

Doxology

Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him, all creatures here below.

Praise Him above, ye heavenly host. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.

Prologue to the Eucharist

Jesus said, “Let the children come to me, for to them belong the kingdom of heaven.”

All become members of a family by birth or adoption.

Baptism is a celebration of birth into the family of God.

A family meal gathers and sustains each human family.

The Holy Eucharist is the special meal that Jesus gave to his friends to keep us together as the family of Christ.

The Lord be with you

And also with you.

Lift up your hearts

We lift them to the Lord.

Let us give thanks to God.

It is right to give God thanks and praise.

It is very good and right to give thanks, because God made us, Jesus redeemed us and the Holy Spirit dwells in our hearts.  Therefore with Angels and Archangels and all of the world that we see and don’t see, we forever sing this hymn of praise:

Holy, Holy, Holy (Intoned)

Holy, Holy, Holy Lord, God of Power and Might.  Heav’n and earth are full of your glory.

Hosanna in the highest.  Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. 

Hosanna in the highest. Hosanna in the Highest.

All may gather around the altar

Our grateful praise we offer to you God, our Creator;

You have made us in your image

And you gave us many men and women of faith to help us to live by faith:

Adam and Eve, Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachael.

And then you gave us your Son, Jesus, born of Mary, nurtured by Joseph

And he called us to be sons and daughters of God.

Your Son called us to live better lives and he gave us this Holy Meal so that when we eat

  the bread and drink the wine, we can  know that the Presence of Christ is as near to us as  

  this food and drink  that becomes a part of us.

And so, Father, we bring you these gifts of bread and wine. Bless and sanctify them by your Holy Spirit to be for your people the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ our Lord.  Bless and sanctify us by your Holy Spirit so that we may love God and our neighbor.

On the night when Jesus was betrayed he took bread, said the blessing, broke the bread, and gave it to his friends, and said, "Take, eat: This is my Body, which is given for you. Do this for the remembrance of me."

After supper, Jesus took the cup of wine, gave thanks, and said, "Drink this, all of you. This is my Blood of the new Covenant, which is shed for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink it, do this for the remembrance of me."

Father, we now celebrate the memorial of your Son. When we eat this holy Meal of Bread and Wine, we are telling the entire world about the life, death and resurrection of Christ and that his presence will be with us in our future.

Let this holy meal keep us together as friends who share a special relationship because of your Son Jesus Christ.  May we forever live with praise to God to whom we belong as sons and daughters.

By Christ, and with Christ, and in Christ, in the unity of the Holy Spirit all honor and glory is yours, Almighty Father, now and for ever. AMEN.

And now as our Savior Christ has taught us, we now sing,

Our Father: (Renew # 180, West Indian Lord’s Prayer)

Our Father who art in heaven:  Hallowed be thy name.

Thy Kingdom come, Thy Will be done: Hallowed be thy name.

Done on earth as it is in heaven: Hallowed be thy name.

Give us this day our daily bread: Hallowed be thy name.

And forgive us all our debts: Hallowed be thy name.

As we forgive our debtors: Hallowed be thy name.

Lead us not into temptation: Hallowed be thy name.

But deliver us from evil: Hallowed be thy name.

Thine is the kingdom, power, and glory: Hallowed be thy name.

Forever and ever: Hallowed be thy name.

Amen, amen, amen: Hallowed be thy name.

Amen, amen, amen: Hallowed be thy name.

Breaking of the Bread

Celebrant:       Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.

People:            Therefore let us keep the feast. 

Words of Administration

Communion Hymn: Yield Not To Temptation (LEVAS # 170)

Yield not to temptation for yielding is sin. Each victory will help you some other to win.  Fight still pressing onward, dark passions subdue.  Ask the Savior to help you, he will carry you through.  Refrain.  Ask the Savior to help you, comfort, strengthen and keep you.  He is willing to aid you, he will carry you through.

Shun evil companions, bad language disdain. God’s name hold in reverence, nor take it in vain.  Be thoughtful and earnest, kind-hearted and true.  Ask the Savior to help you, he will carry you through.  Refrain.

To him that overcometh, God giveth a crown.  Through faith we will conquer, though often cast down.  He who is our savior, our strength will renew.  Ask the savior to help you he will carry you through.  Refrain

Post-Communion Prayer. 

Everlasting God, we have gathered for the meal that Jesus asked us to keep;

We have remembered his words of blessing on the bread and the wine.

And His Presence has been known to us.

We have remembered that we are sons and daughters of God and brothers

    and sisters in Christ.

Send us forth now into our everyday lives remembering that the blessing in the

     bread and wine spreads into each time, place and person in our lives,

As we are ever blessed by you, O Father, Son and Holy Spirit.  Amen.

Closing Song: Simple Gifts  (Christian Children’s Songbook, # 206)

‘Tis a gift to be simple, ‘tis a gift to be free, ‘tis a gift to come down where you ought to be, and when we find ourselves in the place just right, ‘twill be in the valley of love and delight.  When true simplicity is gain, to bow and to bend we won’t be ashamed.  To turn, turn will be our delight till by turning and turning we come out right.

Dismissal:   

Liturgist: Let us go forth in the Name of Christ. 

People: Thanks be to God! 

 

Jesus Versus the Trickster

1 Lent        A      March 9, 2014

Gen 2:4b-9,15-17,25-3:7  Ps.51:1-13

Rom. 5:12-21         Matt. 4:1-11

Lectionary Link

   It is hard in our lives not to take things  personal.  As human persons, we cannot help but filter everything through our personhood.   And even when we try to do some non-personal imaginations of not being a person like trying to do dog whispering, we still do it as a human person.

  You would think that non-human and non-personal or extra-human or extra-personal things would escape being personalized for us but it is hard to avoid experiencing anything without projecting some personal presence engaging us in many ways.

  When seemingly random or coincidental things happen to us in nature or in happenstance events, even then we still personalize the events.  We lose someone or something, we take it very personal.  We get in an accident and we take it personal.  So we take negative events in a very personal way.  It like we impute a motive of some personal force against us in making our lives bad or inconvenient.  On the other hand, we also personalize the positive occurrences as well.  No parking places at all and suddenly we drive up and someone pulls out and we can park.  We take it as a personal blessing or personal providence.  We see a rainbow and think that it happened just for and because of me as a personal sign of the forces of climate and weather wearing the face of God’s blessing for me.

  Children personalize all sorts of forces; boogie men and monsters and angels are found in the shadow and light of their bedrooms.

  Adulthood and modern science provide us with practices of critical thinking to distinguish between the personal and non-personal.  We learn about non-personal and impartial forces of nature which happen and occur towards us at all time.  Science teaches us to discipline our simplistic childhood personalizing response to all that happens to us.  “Silly you, it is not God or the devil, it is the play of freedom in a string of impartial events.  Bah humbug.”

  As impersonal as science makes causality, all of the events of our lives still get filtered through our personality and so we cannot escape the mode of personalizing in how we assign meaning to the events of our lives.  The most poignant events of causality are when another person hurts us or blesses us.  It is poignant because we can see or feel the effect directly.

  It is hard for us to escape our personalizing tendencies for the larger cosmic issues of the world, like morality itself.

  How does the moral make up of humanity get framed in the creation story of Adam and Eve?  In part, the moral moment involves a form of “the devil made me do it.”  Why did you eat the forbidden fruit Eve?  Well, the serpent tricked me.

  A good portion of the experience of evil and badness in life comes from taking bad things very personally.  And if the devil didn’t make me do it or make it happen to me, there is the mystery of events that are experienced as personal failure or personal misfortune and they happen because there is some great foe or trickster who is tripping me up or who is evident in the arrangement of the events which happen in my life.

  The serpent, the devil, Lucifer, Beelzebub and Satan are the various names for the personification of the superior Trickster who seems at many times in our lives to be in the ascendant.  You perhaps remember the words of the Rolling Stones’ song, “Sympathy for the Devil?”  “Pleased to meet you.  Hope you guessed my name, But what's puzzling you, Is the nature of my game.”  It is almost like in all religious cosmology there is a shadow person and shadow force to deal with.  Persons in this cosmic drama are caught in the great drama between the two great personal forces as they become evident in the whether we perceive events and actions as good and beneficial or as evil and malevolent.

  The great drama as recorded in the Bible characterizes our human and personal situations as having lost to the Serpent or that extra-human personality who has tricked us and the events of this world to result in bad performance in human behavior and as the clash of the systems of nature which cause human and personal conveniences.

  Harmony is but the ancient and forgotten time of the garden of Eden.  Harmony is the forgotten time of the nine months of gestation of the proto-child within the womb of mother.

  We’ve been tricked out of paradise by forces greater than us and as persons we cannot help at times as interpreting those forces as being seeming personal assaults upon our progress if not upon the convenience of our life.

  Who will confront the great shadow figure of the world?  Who will confront the great trickster and not get tricked?  And how will the hero who does this fare in the world of the great trickster?

  We arrive at the temptation of Jesus in the wilderness during the event of his solitude, isolation and fast.  Jesus confronts the great trickster.  The wiles of the trickster involve getting Jesus to do some good things in ways that make them bad because of mistiming.  All things in life are good; they are bad because of mistiming and the clashes which occur because of the mistiming.  Food, fame and literal interpretations are good in themselves but they can be mistimed and from the mistiming caused by wrong motives good things can be experienced as evil and bad.

  Food stands for our physical needs; how bad is the mistiming in the provision of the physical needs for all of the people in our world?  Hunger, lack of housing, lack of health care, lack of employment comes from the incredible disaster in the timing of provision and there are plenty of roadblocks in the natural world but some very big human willfulness issues which do not provide an adequate meeting of the needs of people in our world.  "Okay, Jesus, be a divine magician turn stones into bread and into housing and health care for all.  Make it happen."  We do not live by divine magic; we live by the words of God which orders our lives in acts of love and charity and done in freedom with everything else.  We cannot magically just wish for ideal conditions; we have to learn how to time good things to happen toward the well-being of as many people as possible.

  Fame and glory, that is what we need for esteem.  Megalomanical narcissism is the great temptation.  I will sell my soul to the devil for great fame and power.  Give me fame and lots of it and I will feel good about myself through that external affirmation coming towards me.  But Jesus said to the devil “You are not God and esteem and enjoyment come through the perpetual worship of God, the great One and in all of that worship energy going towards God there are wonderful collateral experiences of personal esteem and the enjoyment of the many good things that God has given to us.

  In the last temptation, Satan encourages Jesus to be very literal.  “Throw yourself off the temple because the Psalmist wrote in your Bible that the angels will catch you.”  The obeying of God means we know when to be literal and when not to be literal.  We are called to learn how to read and interpret the events of our lives and the words of influences which have been given to us in our various human traditions.  So we need to know the difference between language that would end up in personal injury and language that is figurative in encouraging us to trust God in the emergency of falling from the high places or crises of life.  If life is often a seeming “free fall” we need to know those metaphorical angels who will break our fall.

  We begin Lent with our hero Jesus going against the Trickster and winning.  And the winning of Jesus gives us great wisdom about the goodness of life but more importantly about how we time the words and deeds of our lives and how we read correctly the events of our lives so that we offer good motives and well-time responses to what befalls us.

  Yes, we do take the weal and woes of our lives as very personal, since the events are filtered through personhood, which we regard to be the highest designation of humanity.

  And if we regard our own humanity as personal, we cannot avoid allowing that which is greater than us at the very least does include a superior personhood.

  Today, let us be aware of the great Trickster personality whom we often confront in the bafflement of our life events; but let us look to one greater than the Trickster who can give us the wisdom of a more perfect timing in how we read and interact with the people and events of our lives.

  I wish all of us holy and propitious timing in our lives this Lenten Season.  And may Jesus give us wisdom to deal successfully with the Trickster more than just a few times.  Amen.