Text: Exodus 15:22-27, Luke 3:21-22, 4:1-2a, 4:14-15<\/p>\n

This year, we are taking a journey through the wilderness during the season of Lent.<\/p>\n

Most years, we spend one Sunday, if that, focused on the time that Jesus spent in the wilderness at the beginning of his ministry.
\nHowever, the wilderness is not something to be glossed over.<\/p>\n

So over these six weeks of Lent, we will take our time with these stories.
\nWe will slow ourselves down and really chew on them.<\/p>\n

Today, we focus on what the wilderness itself represents for Jesus and the Israelites.
\nIt is the In-Between place, a liminal space, a transition between what was and what would be.<\/p>\n

While it looks like we have a collection of random verses in our gospel text today, what we have are bookends of a transition into ministry.<\/p>\n

Jesus was born and grew up in the home of Mary and Joseph. He was obedient to them and matured in wisdom and years, Luke tells us. But we don\u2019t really know much else about his life as a child or a young person. Not until he suddenly shows up on the banks of the Jordan River to be baptized by John.<\/p>\n

There, the heavens split open and the Holy Spirit descends and Jesus is named the Son of God.<\/p>\n

But what next?
\nHow do you go from a nobody to a viral sensation who teaches and preaches across the region as our third set of verses tell us?
\nHow do you transition from a quiet life in Galilee to a world-transforming movement of love and grace and justice that challenges the religious and secular leadership of the world?<\/p>\n

You pause for a minute.
\nYou take a breath.
\nYou figure out who you are and whose you are.<\/p>\n

That same Spirit that descended upon him, led Jesus into the wilderness. Led him into a time of temptation and wrestling. A time to clarify his values, his power, his mission, his message.
\nOver the next several weeks, we will look individually at each and every one of those temptations and what they tell us about who Jesus is and how we are supposed to live.<\/p>\n

For today, we simply want to remember that he took this time, this beat, this moment between those two realities to get ready for the future.<\/p>\n

And when he was ready, the Spirit sent him back into the world.<\/p>\n

When he was ready.<\/p>\n

Scripture tells us that Jesus was in that wilderness for forty days, but the reality is, Jesus was in the wilderness for as long as it took him to get ready.<\/p>\n

That number, forty, shows up 159 times in scripture and it is not a coincidence.<\/p>\n

Instead, the number itself is a representation, a symbol, a clue as to the significance of the moment. It speaks to the reality that this is a time of testing that is meant to form the person or the people into a more faithful future.<\/p>\n

The earth was flooded in the days of Noah for forty days, Jonah warned Nineveh for 40 days of its impending destruction, and Ezekiel laid on his side for 40 days to symbolize Judah\u2019s sins \u2013 all represent a transition from our sinful past to the possibility of a new future.<\/p>\n

Moses and Elijah, like Jesus, fasted for forty days in the wilderness \u2013 and these times were important transitions as they waited upon the Lord to give them instructions for leadership.<\/p>\n

And then there were the Israelites.
\nThey had been slaves in the land of Egypt.
\nAll they knew was oppression and toil.
\nThey didn\u2019t know what it meant to live without Pharaoh\u2019s rule, much less what it meant to live as the people of God in a new land.<\/p>\n

The wilderness was not just the path they had to travel to the land of milk and honey.
\nIt was also a time of transformation and testing where they would be strengthened and learn how to lean upon the Lord.<\/p>\n

Exodus tells us that as soon as the Israelites were truly liberated on the other side of the Reed Sea, they celebrated their victory and began to move forward into this new land.<\/p>\n

Together, they traveled for three days. Three days is all it took for the Israelites to journey through the wilderness without water before they started to grumble and complain and fall apart.<\/p>\n

And God does a miracle in that place. The Lord has Moses throw a stick into the bitter, undrinkable water they had discovered, and suddenly it is sweet and refreshing.<\/p>\n

They are learning to lean on the Lord.
\nThey are learning to trust in God\u2019s power.
\nBut they are really just beginning to learn.<\/p>\n

I look at this map and you know what really strikes me\u2026. Where Marah, this place of bitter water is situated.<\/p>\n

It only took them THREE days to travel this whole distance.<\/p>\n

And it took them forty years to make the rest of their journey.<\/p>\n

Because days were not enough time.<\/p>\n

Years were not enough time.<\/p>\n

It was going to take a generation of testing and transition and wilderness wandering before the people of Israel could leave behind what was and truly be ready for what was coming next.<\/p>\n

Forty days\u2026. Forty years\u2026 it took however long it needed to take for the people to be ready.<\/p>\n

Right now, the wilderness is calling out to us.<\/p>\n

Matthew, Luke and Mark all tell us that Jesus is led by the Spirit out into this liminal space, but Mark uses even stronger language. The Spirit forced him to go. He was pushed out there.<\/p>\n

Just because you are led doesn\u2019t mean you have to go. You chose to obey.<\/p>\n

But to be forced\u2026 it means I don\u2019t want to do something, and I don\u2019t have a choice.<\/p>\n

Did Jesus want to be in the wilderness?<\/p>\n

Did he want to spend forty days wrestling with Satan?<\/p>\n

I get the sense that any rational person wouldn\u2019t choose this situation.
\nJesus didn\u2019t want to be there, but he had to do it.
\nHe had to spend this time apart.
\nHe had to get ready for what was to come.
\nJesus had to make sure his head and heart and body were aligned before his ministry started.
\nIt was going to be a rough journey and he was going to be working with some knuckleheads of disciples\u2026 not to mention the cross that would loom before him.<\/p>\n

This time apart was necessary, because after the wilderness, there was a job to do.<\/p>\n

Friends, we also have a job to do.
\nWe are called to be disciples of Jesus Christ.
\nWe are called to be God\u2019s church, the Body of Christ, and to live according to his example.
\nWe are called to make other disciples and to transform the world.<\/p>\n

Are we ready? Have we prepared ourselves?
\nOr are we like those Israelites who are only a few days into a journey and already we are making excuses and want to go back to the way things were and we need to be forced to stop and take it slowly and re-orient ourselves to God.<\/p>\n

I think some of us have to be forced into the wilderness of Lent\u2026 and that includes myself.
\nI\u2019m too busy to spend any extra time in prayer and fasting and study\u2026 I\u2019ve got a job to do, right? That\u2019s what we tell ourselves.
\nBut when we force ourselves to stop\u2026
\nWhen we hand a piece of our lives over to God for a while\u2026
\nWell, then suddenly we find that all those priorities re-align.
\nWe remember it\u2019s not about me or my desires or my needs\u2026 but about God.
\nAnd about getting ourselves ready for what God needs us to do in the world.<\/p>\n

To be God\u2019s people.
\nTo repent and live differently.
\nTo lead in a new way.
\nTo offer ourselves for others.<\/p>\n

This time of testing and preparation and wilderness is not about suffering for the sake of suffering. It is not in itself pleasing to God for us to be tempted and tried.<\/p>\n

Remember, after all, that Jesus was already beloved, dearly loved, just the way he was before being sent into the wilderness.<\/p>\n

No\u2026 the wilderness, these forty days, are only pleasing to God because they get us ready to come back OUT of the wilderness.<\/p>\n

I am reminded of that old gospel song, \u201cCome Out the Wilderness.\u201d<\/p>\n