First Sunday in lent

Sunday 9th March 2025 – Luke 4:1-13

We are now firmly in the season of Lent. It’s a very special time of the Christian year where we once again draw to mind the parts of our lives that need correcting and improving upon. 

I once heard a sermon that described Lent also as being a season of longing for Christ to return. We know of course that Jesus will one day return to gather the faithful to Himself, Lent like Advent are seasons to help us prepare and be ready for that day when it comes.

A good number of us came out on Wednesday for the services with the imposition of ashes. The putting on of ashes is something we even see in the Old Testament, a way of showing our lament. An example of Old Testament ashing is in the book of Esther, Mordecai adorns sackcloth and ashes when he hears what the King is intending to do to the Israelite people. Job also puts on sackcloth and ashes, alongside Daniel and the King in Ninevah among many others.

This practice is something that goes way back to the very beginnings of faith, as a means of showing our deep regret of the sinful things that we do. It’s a personal act of remembrance and a sign of our witness to others of what Christ has done in our lives and continues to do for us as we pursue to grow more like Him every day. It is the outward sign of the inward sorrow we bare for our sins and a sign that we are repentant and desirous of change.

Interestingly the early Church used ashes far more regularly than we do now. It was a common sight to see a Christian in both sackcloth and ashes as a sign of their repentant nature. It wasn’t until much later that any of the established Churches made it a part of a particular event and around the year 1000 that it became the marker for Lent in the Catholic Church. And we get to claim the credit as it was a young Anglo-Saxon priest that we find mentioning ashes first. Named Aelfric he wrote the following, “We read in the books both in the Old Law and in the New that men who repented of their sins bestrewed themselves with ashes and clothed their bodies with sackcloth. Now let us do this little at the beginning of out Lent that we strew ashes upon our heads to signify that we ought to repent of our sins during the Lenten fast.”

So, Tim interesting history lesson but what has any of this got to do with us? Either everything or nothing.

Lent, fasting, repentance, etc mean nothing if we are not serious about it. The traditions of the Church are meaningless without their meaning.

If the intention we have behind the action is not genuine then it just becomes another action or worse a way of showing off. Look everyone look how pious I am!

Now we know, and our reading from Roman’s confirms, that if a person confesses with their lips that Jesus is Lord and believes that God raised Him from the dead they will be saved. But preceding this statement a few chapters prior in chapter 6 Paul writes “What then are we to say? Should we continue in sin in order that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin go on living in it? Do you not know that all of us who have been baptised into Christ Jesus were baptised into his death? Therefore we have been buried with him by baptism into death, so that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too might walk in newness of life.”

There is total forgives for sins and true reconciliation to the Father in the gift of grace given to us by Christ. But that does not entitle us to live a live that is not right with Him. Less so to actively live in a state of sin which we know is contrary to the word of God. Jesus has brought us out of sin and into a state of grace. More now than ever, knowing what He did on that cross, should our sins weigh heavy on us and we be sorrowful for them. Not because we are fearful for our ticket to heaven, but because of the love we are shown by Christ and the love we should have for Him. If when we hurt a loved friend or partner we feel hurt, how much more should we feel by hurting the one who bore it all for us on the cross? His grace is the reason why we do not need to fear for our eternal state, not an excuse to do the things we know to be wrong.

Now when we think about Lent one of the things that comes to mind is the question, “So what are you giving up?” I’ve lost count how many times I’ve heard this question in the last week or so. And this is where I want to bring in our Gospel reading.

Chapter 4 of Lukes gospel begins with this, “Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit.” Before all else we are told that Jesus is full of the Spirit. Being filled with the Spirit we are then told He is prompted to enter the wilderness where for 40 days he was tempted by the devil and ate nothing.

Notice how in Lukes retelling the devil’s temptations don’t start until we know that Jesus is hungry, in a weakened state. The first temptation comes in the form of meeting His physical needs.

The second temptation concerns itself with power and authority.

The third is a taunt, a jibe at His Sonship.

On Thursday I was the Bishop’s study day and there was a New Testament scholar there leading the day. As a biblical scholar I picked his brains a bit over lunch. Something really interesting, which I hadn’t realised before, that he told me is that in the Greek there are two meanings to the word used for if. There’s if as in if this then this, but there is also an if which is closer to the word since. And in this passage it’s the since meaning that is being used not the if meaning. Reading the Gospel again with this new understanding is interesting.

Since “you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” Since “you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here,”

To me at least, it makes the temptations almost more taunting, more sinister. Because what is going on here is much more than just trying to get a person to break their fast, the devil is trying to use these moments to try and get Jesus to deny his Divinity. It’s one of those moments where someone boasts about something and then someone challenges them, well go on then do it, and then they sort of wiggle their way out of doing it. Only of course Jesus is truly the Son of God and answers the devil’s temptations in a way which the devil cannot overcome.

Thinking about the season we are in, Lent, and our gospel reading this morning, and in praying and thinking on this this week I think we can draw the following from it.

The first thing is that before Jesus did anything He was filled with the Spirit. Lent has 40 days to mirror the 40 days Jesus spent in the wilderness. Are we going into this 40 day fasting season filled with the Spirit or are we going in trying to battle on in our own strength. It’s the Spirit that strengthens us and holds us up, we cannot hope to get through Lent in our own strength.

Secondly, I think we can draw from this is that we should only do what the Spirit prompts us to do. How many of us have heard people say, I’m giving up x y z only to find out a week later they’ve given up. At school it was a way of showing off, even the nonreligious children would pick something wild to show they could do it. The intention was way off. It became meaningless in its false intention. We should seek the prompting of the Spirit in our fast this Lenten season.

Thirdly, maybe we can gleam something from the temptation of Jesus. What are the areas that tempt us most. Where might the devil be prodding us this morning. Is it something we want physically? Are we lacking something and the temptation is to do something silly to get it? Maybe its money and power, all the worlds laid out before you, all you have to do is worship what is evil… or is it a temptation to lead you astray from the truth of the Gospel. Do you find your faith weakening and need the Spirit to help keep you strong.

Whatever it may be trust in the Spirit, draw on His strength and not your own and hold fast to what is true. When we deny ourselves and seek the Lord the devil tries all the harder, and it is all the more important to focus ourselves entirely on Christ.

At the evening service in February, we focused on the person of Christ. Part of our four part series focusing on the Cross and Easter. One of the things that came through so loudly to me in my preparing that sermon was God’s love, and desire for relationship with us. We see throughout the bible this language of Groom and Bride and God wishing to be the Groom and we the Church His Bride. It’s a sign of the intimate nature of the relationship God wants with each of us. As I draw this to a close let me leave you with this.

This Lent, whatever you do or don’t do, do it or don’t do it at the prompting of the Holy Spirit. Seek to hear His voice. We do this and do it properly through our relationship with Him.

Brothers and Sisters, the lord will return, pray then that He might find us ready and waiting for Him.

Amen.