Lent is “in between” time that stretches down the lonely road
between the glorious Transfiguration of Christ and the Passion of
Christ. The road before us during this season calls us to the
wilderness where, like ancient Israel and like Jesus, we are tested in
order to move to a new place of growth. Though the in-between journey
from ashes to palm branches is not easy, we don’t have to make it
alone. Our three passages that begin our journey converge at the same
place—the place of testing and the impact of our actions. These
marvelous passages will only intersect once in the three-year
lectionary cycle, so I invite you to enter into the two stories for
this Sunday and then look at them from a further distance away—as Paul
does—to draw out the lessons we can learn on this first Sunday in
Lent.
PSALM 32—I HAVE SINNED
This psalm is instructional--it teaches us about the importance
of repentance as an ongoing spiritual discipline. The psalmist
begins with a beatitude about the blessedness of being forgiven by
God, then moves on to personal experience: when silent about
confession of sin, such unconfessed wrongs spread like a virus
through the petitioner’s being leaving bones desiccated, strength
gone, and groanings. On the other hand, when one acknowledges
personal sin, such confession leads us to pardon and thus to a place
of trust
GENESIS 2:15-17; 3:1-7 / MATTHEW 4:1-11—TEMPTATION
The creation story that begins in Genesis 2:4b suggests a much
closer relationship between Creator and creation than the preceding
creation story (1:1-2:4a). In our lesson God gets up close and
personal with creation and breathes something of God’s own spirit
into the human creations. Such closeness, however, does come with
risk: the temptation to wound the relationship. So goes the story:
one, then the other of the human couple, is enticed to break trust
with their Creator. This rich, ageless tale of how the breakdown in
relationship between Creator and creation occurred is probably what
Matthew had in mind as he thought about Jesus in light of the
temptation story in Genesis 2. As the first human beings failed to
resist temptation, so Jesus is successful in the same arena.
ROMANS 5:12-19—REINTERPRETING THE STORY OF TEMPTATION
We’re not the only ones using parallel vision on Genesis 2 and
Matthew 4. Paul has both stories in mind, too as he teaches in our
epistle lesson for the day. Employing a midrashic form, Paul makes
connections between Adam and Christ. Adam now stands in the midrash
as the human representative who brought sin into the world through
disobedience in the Garden. It is intriguing how Paul views the
impacts of both Adam and Christ. Through the first action, the
impact is universal and deadly: “many died” but with the actions of
the second man, Jesus Christ, salvation “abounded for the many” (v.
15).
