Luke 4:1-13

First Sunday in Lent | March 6, 2022 | Lk 4:1-13 | David H. Brooks |

Who am I?

It is the supreme question of our age—we are people profoundly wrapped up in finding an identity. The child starting school, sitting amid new faces not yet friends, hearing his or her name called by a strange voice from the front of the class, hesitates: is that me? Should I answer? The athlete in the heat of competition draws the roar of the crowd, the praise of teammates, even the “way to go!” of the parent and smiles: I did that! I am that worthy one! The coworker who joins a new company, works hard and contributes, is invited to share a lunch table or come along for after work socializing, and happily accepts: I belong! I contribute. I am noticed.

Of course, we are not the only or the first society that wondered about identity. The story of Jesus in the wilderness is a story about answering the question “who am I?” However, this story is not framed in the way we typically seek answer to the question of identity. We use relationships for our purposes. In our world, relationships are initiated, cultivated, and terminated based on whether other people will recognize and celebrate who we are and what we are becoming. Jesus, led by the Spirit and tempted by the Evil One, is focused on one relationship: who am I before God, with God? What does God expect? Where is God at work?

Our world, flattened as it is, with no sense of heaven above or God nearby, struggles with the answer Jesus discovers to his question. We expect our relationships to serve us; we believe our identities are self-created, the result of a journey of discovery into our inner psyches; we live in a strange tension that presumes flexibility, even pardon for our self-experiments but demands agreement from others. We seek only to answer our desires, and no relationship, no matter how “important,” can override us. But Jesus, alone in the wilderness with no food, no friends, no comforts and only the echo of that word beloved spoken at the Jordan in his brain, roots himself deeper in that relationship that had driven him out to the middle of nowhere in the first place! Faced with the question of identity, Jesus deflects the clear desires before him:

1. He will not satisfy his need for food or other physical requirements because it is more important to hunger for God.
2. He will not satisfy his desire for power and authority because it is more important to remain under the protection of God’s power.
3. He will not satisfy his desire for celebrity, fame or societal significance because it is more important to seek significance in God’s purposes.

As we begin in earnest our forty days of reflection, repentance and renewal, let us remember above all that we also have the same thing that Jesus does: the word “beloved” echoing over us. We who have been baptized into the death and resurrection of the Son sent by God have had an identity bestowed to us. Who we are is rooted in the relationship that God initiated, that God sustains, and that God will ultimately fulfill. When we find ourselves tempted, let us dig in deeper into that relationship that God establishes with us. Let’s hunger for his presence. Let’s desire his protection. Let’s seek significance in pleasing him. All the world is asking the question “who am I?” We can be secure in the answer “I am his.”

___

Pastor David H. Brooks

Raleigh, NC

Pr.Dave.Brooks@zoho.com