Sermon for
Lent 1
Deuteronomy
26.1-11
Luke 4.1-13
Learning to love again.
It cannot have escaped anyones notice, that we meet this
year the first Sunday in Lent on what is popularly
held and remembered as St Valentines day? That great commercial
event in the calendar when lovers are supposed to spend inordinate
amounts of money on gifts and celebrations for eachother. Personally
I always valued the gifts that came at other times of the year
more spontaneously as holding far more romance....
but then maybe that is me just being cynical! No doubt there
is much pleasure given and received throughout the land today
along with the red roses, the breakfast in bed and the gushing
or slightly riské greetings cards.
But this is the beginning of Lent so naturally I want
to turn our thoughts away from commercial marketing opportunities
and more towards what I think the Holy Spirit is trying to say
to us this morning through our Scripture and reason.
Well, our Lent course kicks off this week on Tuesday (not
too late to join in!) and the first session is entitled
Learning to love again. Which seems sort of apt
for today! [and in fact we are planning to preach throughout
Lent, picking up some of the themes in that course so
those of you who attend will have plenty of opportunity to comment
on or argue against the sermon if you want to!]
Was that why the HS drove the newly baptised Jesus out into the
wilderness to be tempted? To teach him how to love again? If
this Man was indeed the son of God, he already knew quite how
much God his Father loved him. It was an awareness that I think
was with him from a very early age. It enabled the teenager to
follow his calling and run off to learn from the scribes in the
Temple worrying his parents half to death! He saw no reason
for their concern he was about his Fathers business
and his Father loved him of course he did!
But just maybe Jesus needed to learn or to be reminded quite
how much God loved all his creation and especially his
creatures, humankind... Loved them so much, that he would be
prepared to give his very life for their sake...
Learning to love again. When are the times when you have had
to learn the hard lessons (as well as the delight) that come
from love? When we love, we are so all consumed by the beloved,
that our sense of self can even disappear at times. If
you love someone, there is nothing you wont do for them
how often have we heard that said when someone goes off the rails
yet again and a parent or a partner breaks the law themselves
in an attempt to save them from inevitable justice?
The whole of our Lent Course (Learning to Dream Again) carries
the subtitle Rediscovering the Heart of God
which neatly fits with one of our Diocesan aims. And Sam Wells
the author reminds us that Christians have often
characterised the God we see revealed in the Old Testament, as
being mainly about war and revenge and punishment ; while the
God of the New Testament is all about peace and love and mercy.
But such simplifications wont hold up to serious study.
And in todays readings we were reminded how God deals kindly
with his children; how he rescues them from slavery and puts
them into a position of relative prosperity so that they
are able then to offer as a sacrifice the fruits of the their
labour.
And in reading of the struggle that Jesus has with the Tempter
in the wilderness, we can sense the harshness, the real dilemma
that troubles him. Should he take the easy way of celebrity?
Pander to the needs and wants of the people to courtrapid popularity?
Or should he hold to the more difficult and personally painful
way to serve God and his kingdom?
Gods love is not all hearts and roses. Gods love
is hard and tear-stained and worked out in the most difficult
and desperate of circumstances. But it is a love that endures
everything as Paul was to tell us later. A love that cannot,
and will not die whatever we as the beloved may say or
do. A love that once given, is for ever.
We all know if we are honest with ourselves, - that we
are pretty unloveable really. We mess up. We get things wrong.
We forget important dates and anniversaries. We allow our selfish
inclinations to get in the way of our desire to serve God and
model ourselves on the person of Jesus. We turn a blind eye to
so much suffering in the world arguing that our interests
should come first. Because surely God loves us more than
any other people?! It may be unspoken, but that is the
underlying belief perhaps?
It is the classic mistake that people have made through the centuries.
To be Gods chosen people his beloved ones, does
not imply we will receive better treatment than any others rather
that we have a greater responsibility to share Gods love
with a needy and desperate world!
Learning to love again.
It is a lesson that Jesus learnt so very, very well. And it is
one that we struggle with. But that does not mean the struggle
is not worth the effort. Jesus was acknowledged as Gods
beloved Son the one in whom he is well pleased; the one
to whom we are told to listen. And Jesus was homeless, rejected,
betrayed, tortured and executed. We cannot be surprised if we
get a taste of these things too as Sam Wells reminds us.
But that does not mean that God no longer loves us and that
at the last we will know that love in resurrected joy.
So what is the wilderness that God has led you into? In order
that you may learn to love again with him?
Amen
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