Don't prepare to fail

One day a boy went out with his friends – before leaving the house his father had warned him not to go and swim in the canal. When the boy returned with a wet bathing suit his father asked where he had been – the son confessed that he had been swimming in the canal - "Didn't I tell you not to swim there?" asked the father.  

"Yes" answered the boy.  "Then why did you?" he asked.  

"Well, Dad," he explained, "I had my bathing suit with me and I couldn't resist the temptation."  

"Why did you take your bathing suit with you?" he questioned.  

"So I'd be prepared to swim, in case I was tempted ! " replied the boy.

Many people, it seems, prepare to fail – they prepare to live life expecting something less than God would hope for from them… In fact, perhaps we all do that at times as we settle for less either in our own lives or in the lives of those in our community or the world as a whole than God would hope for… 

Temptations are all around us – the temptation to do something wrong, or not to do something which would very definitely be right ! 

Our gospel reading (Luke 4:1-13) reminds us of the temptations of Jesus. After he was baptised Jesus went away to spend time alone to reflect on the work ahead of him, and there in the wilderness he receives these temptations. 

Firstly there was the temptation of being fed. Sometimes when we read these passages it’s easy to forget the reality of these situations – in the wilderness Jesus could have been desperately hungry and so he was asked to turn a stone into a loaf of bread. Next, he was shown and offered the kingdoms of the world. He was being offered incredible power and authority. And thirdly Jesus was asked to show his own power by jumping from the pinnacle of the Temple and being saved… 

So what was the problem ? Jesus could have done these things and yet he didn’t and the reason was that the motivation would have been completely wrong… 

Jesus may have been hungry, but he didn’t need to prove himself to the devil. He needed instead to stick to the words of scripture, ‘one does not live by bread alone’. Sometimes the desire to take the easy route is one that challenges us all. Sometimes the offer of making life easy is something that just seems to make sense, but we constantly need to ask ourselves the question ‘Where is God ?’ in what we are doing.  

The bible doesn’t say we can’t enjoy material things, but it does say we need to care for others and think about what we’re doing and receiving and giving…

And what about the temptation of inheriting the world with all the power and the authority that came with it… Well, what use would that be for Jesus ? Poor, and with a ministry that could only be exercised relatively locally at that time, he still had the whole world in his hands – and he held, and he holds the world not with a desire to exercise authority and power, but compassion and love…

Jesus had the chance to lay out his own plan, to protect himself, to set up the society he wanted, but to do so in the way that was being offered meant to deny God… 

And so it seems an obvious choice for him, but how often do we actually face similar dilemmas – to do what the world expects rather than what God wants, to let what’s normal in society govern our thoughts and expectations and desires… 

Jesus had all the power and authority he wanted or needed – he would exercise it by showing his love and his care, by offering people a message of hope and salvation… And I think sometimes today the church needs to have more confidence to express not what the world expects but what God expects… 

The church is us and we can be confident not in trying to conform to the world but in serving God who confounds the expectations of the world. 

Security in the world isn’t found just in trying to seek peace between nations but in sharing hope and love, and by truly seeking to recognise every person we meet as someone born in the image of Christ himself. It’s not what society is telling us at the moment – a society that too often says that to keep power we need to protect ourselves from people that are different. 

God’s message is that the world is a family – that security isn’t found in seeking to control others but by extending love and compassion… And there will be some, maybe even here, who think that’s a bit of a woolly liberal sort of message, idealistic, even simplistic – but actually truly loving our neighbour whoever that neighbour may be, and however difficult to love they may be, is one of the hardest things we can ever do – but if we proclaim Jesus as a Saviour, it is a non negotiable that we keep trying to do this in every circumstance…. 

And then the third temptation – Jesus was asked to go to the very top of the Temple and jump off and allow God to save him… Jesus never tried to prove himself by dramatic miracles. He didn’t do deals with people. He didn’t take the chance to show off and he knew he would never gain love from someone just by basically showing off… 

Sometimes we try to do the dramatic things, sometimes we do them for the publicity we can get, but what really changes lives are the things that touch them personally – not the entertainment we provide, but the love we offer revealed through our actions…

In this season of Lent we think of the temptations we face in life, we think of what we’re really doing to put God first in our lives, we think of those things that we do when we think nobody’s looking that really aren’t what God would want us to be doing, we think of our relationships with others… 

And when we think of these things we do so with some regret at times – because the truth is we can always do more for God as we seek to be like Jesus.

But that regret isn’t something that we need to be depressed about because I don’t think that’s what God wants from us. Lent is a time of self discipline and sometimes harsh reflection, but we live Lent as we live our whole lives, secure in the knowledge of the unconditional love of God for us all. 

In our old testament reading from Deuteronomy (26:1-11) we are reminded of the promises of God – promises that he always delivers… We hear of the wandering Aramean, a lovely phrase, who went to Egypt and was treated badly, living as what’s described in our reading as an alien in a foreign land, but they cried out to God and he rescued them…. 

And this passage offers us two great thoughts – firstly who are the wandering Arameans amongst us today and how do we treat them ? Who are the aliens in our country and what do we do for them ? And secondly we’re reminded of the incredible love of God who takes people into his care, who delivers on his promises. We think of the God who has indeed brought us to a land of milk and honey, a land of abundance, not only materially but spiritually as we recognise his blessings day by day… 

And in Paul’s letter to the Romans (10:8b-13) he reminds us that God doesn’t actually expect a lot from us – but he offers everything. ‘Confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, and you will be saved’, whoever you are… 

And so I return to the boy swimming in the canal – the boy who prepared to fail – and wonder, what are we making excuses for in our lives ? Where do we think we’re not good enough or able enough ? Which neighbour do we think it’s ok not to love because they really aren’t very nice ? Where are we preparing to fail to live as Jesus wants us to live ? When was the last time we truly sought God and his will for us in prayer or in the reading of our bibles ? 

God doesn’t want our excuses, he wants our lives…. He wants us to seek his help and his guidance and his power to be the people he wants us to be…

And so, what will you do this Lent, not just to make a difference for 40 days or so, but to change your life forever ?