Immediately after his baptism – in fact, right after God the Father spoke the words, “This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” – “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry.” (John 4:1-2)  Jesus spent forty days in the desert, fasting and disciplining Himself.  At the end of the forty days the devil came to Him to tempt Him.

The Church celebrates Lent so that we may voluntarily unite ourselves to Jesus in the same discipline: forty days of fasting (Sundays are not included as they are feast days celebrating the Resurrection, not fast days) and warring against the temptations of the world, the flesh, and the devil. We do not commit to a complete fast (no food), as  we are not Jesus and Lent is not a contest to see who can give up the most.  The key is to be “led by the Spirit” as Jesus was; to fast those things that the Holy Spirit brings to our minds as the things we run to or depend upon instead of Him.

In the Old Testament ashes were used to express grief and sorrow for sins. Job, when confronted by God after declaring his innocence, responds: ” I have heard of You by the hearing of the ear, but now my eye sees You.  Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.” (Job 42:5–6)  The Church uses ashes made by burning completely the palm leaves blessed and waved on Palm Sunday the previous year.  This reminds us that the same people who cried, “Hosanna!  Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord!” shortly thereafter cried, “Crucify Him!  Crucify Him!” just as loudly.  We are no less vulnerable to sin than they.

Dear Father, guide us through this holy Lent that we may be conformed to the image of Your Son, Jesus Christ. Help us to put on the full armour of God, and lead us in the power of Your Holy Spirit to put to death the lies of satan, the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches which so often keep us from being the people You have called us to be.  We ask this through Jesus Christ our Lord.  Amen!

Remember, o man [or woman], that you are dust, and to dust you shall return. Repent, and believe the Gospel!

(A portion of today’s Old Testament reading, Genesis 22:1-18, from the NKJV):

Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, “Abraham!”

And he said, “Here I am.”

Then He said, “Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.”

So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.  And Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey; the lad and I will go yonder and worship, and we will come back to you.”

We all know the story of Abraham and how he was willing to sacrifice his son Isaac when God asked him. Isaac was the son of promise, the one through whom God specifically vowed to make Abraham’s descendants like the stars of the sky and the sand on the seashore.  Abraham believed, he held nothing back from the Lord, and the New Testament tells us he was a type – a foreshadowing of what God the Father Himself did in giving His Son to be sacrificed for the world.

Today in this reading I noticed another parallel I hadn’t seen before. Abraham took his son and two servants and headed off to the destination God had appointed.  “Then on the third day Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off.”  Abraham journeyed during those days … days of uncertainty, of doubt (or at least strong temptation to doubt), of dread, of sadness; heading toward an outcome he could not see … and arrived on the third day.

Jesus was crucified on a Friday … and on the third day He rose from the dead. For the disciples and the women who were with them, those days were filled with uncertainty, of clear and definite doubt, of dread, of sadness, and of fear.  They were heading toward an outcome they couldn’t see, and though Jesus had promised them He would arise again they just didn’t understand … so they didn’t grasp the certain promise in the way that Abraham had.  They had no journey, they merely sat in a room and waited … for what?

The point is that we don’t always know the outcome of the trials we are facing. Even if we know God’s promises by heart, we do not know exactly how He will bring them to pass.  We have Abraham’s example of strong faith, and the disciples’ example of weak faith, but in both instances God was faithful to do what He had promised, and everyone involved was overjoyed to see the result.

We can build our lives on this fact. God’s sufficiency is not dependent upon the strength of our faith.  God’s sufficiency is Truth, and we can depend upon it and take hold of it.  Whether our grip is strong or weak, He is faithful and He will come through.

Thanks be to God!