The Temptations, February 10, 2008

Genesis 2:15-17, 3:1-7
Matthew 4: 1-11
Having grown up in the 1960s in Detroit's Motown, I cannot see a Title like this morning's sermon, without hearing the velvetty voices of five men singing
“JUST MY IMAGINATION/ JUST MY MAGIN-A-TION RUNNIN AWAY WITH YOU”...

But, that's not so far astream,
because discussing the Temptation of Adam and Eve, or the Temptation of Jesus, what underlies the surface is The TEMPTATION of POWER: ANXIETY, IMAGINATION over against WHAT WE KNOW. The question in both passages, in most of life is “Whether we accept the parameters of Life, or out of Anxiety choose to demonstrate INDIVIDUAL POWER, ANXIETY, FEAR.”

According to Genesis, FAR MORE than a question of the Origins of Life, (Which came first and How), this is a story of WHY. Humanity was placed in the Garden with THREE INTER-RELATED IDENTITIES
1.VOCATION: Our VOCATION, our Calling, our Purpose In Being Was and is to TILL and KEEP Creation. Evolution is not a finished product, and One Identity of Humanity is to care for and nurture, plant and work Creation. Our needs and purpose are in RELATION to our Caring.
2.PERMISSION: Concerning the limits of our Abilities, we were given Absolute PERMISSION, We can go and do whatever we desire, we can eat of any plant or tree in the Garden.
3.PROHIBITION: As Creatures our authority is not limitless, we are not God, so we were given A SINGLE PROHIBITION, one Limitation, You shall not eat of the One tree God has told you not to eat.
Here the serpent is not identified as Satan or the Devil, but simply one creature out of all creation, who instead of accepting the integral inter-relationship of creation, AND of creaton with God, sought to make God an OBJECT, a 3rd Person a thing, and as such created of the words of God AN IMAGINARY PAPER TIGER. No longer accepting the Inter-relationship of our THREE Identitites Vocation, Permission and Prohibition, the question focuses on taking the one limitation out of context and misconstrues what had been said. THE POWER OF WORDS.

Eve atempts to argue with the Serpent, to defend God and preserve the balance of Creation, but ONCE SAID, once ideas and anxieties have been spoken, thoughts and fears have a reality that cannot be unspoke. What was at stake was NO LONGER KNOWLEDGE, but DOUBT, ANXIETY, FEAR.

Having made one part of our Idenitity paramount (The PROHIBITION AGAINST THE ONE TREE) and having violated that one Identity, humanity was no longer concerned with whatelse we were called to be. Never again is the question “Have we tilled and kept the Garden?” “What does Creation Need and Want?” Instead the story shifts to “I was Naked.” “I was afraid”. “I was ashamed”, “I Hid”, making eachother and God objects of blame “The Woman You gave me, She...” If anything, the knowledge we acquired by violating God's TRUST, was an in-ability to know God, to know and trust one another. Humanity that had been formed in God's hands, the creature of Dust that was given the Breath of God...The Holy Spirit as Life breathed into us, by violation of trust could only see ourselves and All Creation in response to us.

So often in the 40 Days of Lent, Believers seek a way to Give Something Up, so as to better appreciate, to repent and prepare for the coming of Easter. This Lent, we have a HOMEWORK ASSIGNMENT. For the Remainder of Lent, May we give up using the Word “THEY”. No longer to Objectify. No longer to Blame. As we describe other individuals, other peoples, political parties, ANYONE ELSE in all Creation, we do so recognizing there is NO THEM, Only us, we have an identity and responsibility for tilling and keeping one another as part of God's Creation.

IT's JUST A MATTER OF IMAG-IN-A-TION..., As we imagine the world different.
The beauty of what God did at the Fall, was that God did not GROW TIRED OF US, GOD DID NOT FORGET or Abandon, When Humanity turned away from God, to see the world only through human eyes, God created new possibilities, reached out in ways we never imagined, God gave US Children.

The other night, I tried briefly to exlain to very young children about Baptism, that this is a Claiming that you belong to God, that God loves you, that God never forgets you.
The added dimension in Matthew's telling is that being Baptized, Jesus was led into the Wilderrness to be Tempted and to imagine life different because of being Baptized. What an awesome TEMPTATION that would be? If instead of dreaming of all we wanted to be, we were tempted to imagine “We are Baptized by God for a purpose, A Calling, a Vocation, to till and keep Creation, all Creation not just the parts like us, and that we are granted LIMITLESS PERMISSION, with ONE PROHIBITION that Only God can choose to be God.”

That was the Temptation of Jesus. IF All anxieties were taken away, and we had LIMITLESS PERMISSION, provided we TRUSTED GOD TO BE GOD...
Would we solve Humanity's Hunger?
Could We?
In the last several days, we have owned an ETHICAL DILEMMA, we created a Clinic in SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA, where among the mortal ills that are causing peoples' deaths are dehydration and the malnutrition of poverty. Earlier this year we created an additional well, with a diesel powered electric generator to pump the water, for the medical staff to wash hands and clean the facility. This week, the other well in the Village, the one with a handpump, broke. We cannot possibly pay for enough diesel to provide water to the whole village and their cattle. DO we use money for medicines to treat malaria and measles or to pump water. More than the cost, using the pump for extended hours will mean the pump will overheat and burn out. But when the very ones we are trying to care for and to keep, the humanity being served by the Clinic are dying from dehydration, how can we not attempt to provide water?

Jesus was TEMPTED to solve SUFFERING and DANGER... Step off the Pinnacle of the Tower without falling.
A Hospital Ethics Committee was asked,
If you had a family who came to the Hospital because Grandma had a terminal illness, and had breathing problems, would you explain to the family, possibilities for extending life, would you give the family all the percentages of recovery, or would you allow the patient to die what is an easier and faster death? And the question came back, rather than trying to prevent death, or to explain all the options to extend life indefinitiely, could we control our Grandmother's suffering. Until she is without pain, without suffering, we cannot imagine questions of which way to extend and perpetuate life indefinitely.

Jesus was TEMPTED by being offered ALL POWER/ WITHOUT PROHIBITIONS to which he replied, “Begone. You shall worship the Lord Your God and God Only Shall You Serve.” We cannot isolate one part of our identity, I want all Permission and no Prohibition against anything, No Responsibility for Life. We cannot try to Be God, by trustig God to be God, we can be challenged to be human.

There is an INTEGRITY to this SACRAMENT. Years ago, there were churches that tried to separate the elements, Offering that you could have the bread representing paticipation in the Body of Christ, without the Cup. Or you could receive from the Cup of Forgiveness, without the Bread. But take a moment with those ideas. “Do we want to afirm our role and responsibility in a Broken World, having harmed God, with no forgiveness?” “Can we believe in a world of Forgiveness without Naming our responsibility our hope and prayer for redemption.” As Jesus did with his Discples, we thank God for this, and we break the bread and dip from the cup in hope. We are baptized into a three-fold identity of VOCATION GOD's CREATION of ABSOLUTE PERMISSION; and AN ABSOLUTE PROHIBITION that God be God. While each of us, all of us will at times be tempted, acting in communion with care and concern for God in God's Creation, IMAGINE what Dreams may be Realized.