It Sounded So Convincing

sermon by Carrie Eikler
Lent 1
Luke 4:1-13
Deuteronomy 26:1-11

I drew the short straw one day early last week. It was my morning to get up with Alistair, or whichever one of the boys gets up first, but usually it’s Alistair. I always feel lucky if we make it to 6am before I need to slip downstairs in the cold. Hoping I don’t step on the cat, Alistair and I find our way to the thermostat, tempted to turn it up higher than we need, and settle on that ambiguous place on the dial—somewhere between 63 and 67.

This particular morning we were doing some random play that you do with one-year-olds. The oddly fascinating “put a clothespin in an empty juice bottle” game, or “I’ll follow you around while you empty out all the drawers—I’m too tired to care” game. Around 7:00 the phone rings and it is Bev, Torin’s mom. She needed a favor from us.

Apparently they woke up this particular morning and found out that their yahoo email was inaccessible. In the midst of this, they also found out that someone hacked into their email account and sent an email to their entire contact list. This email that everyone received from them gave the following story: They had made a last minute trip to London. Something happened in London (the exact details I’m not sure of), but the message said they had all their possessions and money stolen, and to top it off, Joel was in the hospital. Please wire $2,000 immediately to the following number.

Now since their email wasn’t working, what they needed from us was to email all our family members to tell them this was a hoax: they weren’t in London, Joel wasn’t in the hospital, they didn’t need rescuing. I sat down in our study to remedy this simple problem with coffee in hand, Alistair playing in the paper recycling box.

Now, if you want to know how much you are loved, have someone send out an email scam saying you are stranded in London, no money, and in the hospital. A friend in Paris, France emailed us to check out the situation, and he even called Joel’s work to ask what was going on. Fritz, a family friend in Switzerland called our house twice before we could answer, called Bev and Joel’s home three times, and finally got through to us.

I talked with Fritz a while. He had never received an email scam like that before. I told him we are always suspicious here in the US when we get the random email similar to this. He laughed and said, “You know, it seemed ridiculous but how was I to know? I mean if Bev Eikenberry writes me and says she is in trouble, I’m going to help her. It sounded convincing.”

It sounded convincing. So knowing how this drama ended makes how it began all the more interesting. Some of you knew that Torin’s parents spent 3 weeks on a medical practicum in Nicaragua this January. A physically and emotionally exhausting trip, they returned to Managua, the capital, filled and depleted at the same time. They found an internet café, logged onto their email account, and found a message, supposedly, from Yahoo administrators, their email provider. The email made a pretty convincing argument that Bev and Joel needed to confirm their login name and password, or their email account would be terminated within 24 hours. The email was sent the day before…time was literally ticking down.

Now my in-laws are no suckers. They are pretty travel and internet savvy. So they quickly deliberated and responded: it was from their email provider after all…it seemed legitimate. And the thought of being without email as there only means of communication while out of the country seemed frightening. And so the saga began. Whoever was on the other end took advantage. It was clear that it was a perfect storm of events: tail end of a difficult trip, physically and emotionally exhausted, ready to go home, to connect with family, to rest, to bathe.

Afterwards they felt duped, apologetic for the worry it caused, and bit embarrassed as well. They felt like they should have known better . After twenty-one days so completely out of their element, in a somewhat physical and emotional wilderness, it all sounded so convincing.

It seems strange doesn’t it…that the most powerful temptations exploit our ability to be reasonable creatures? The temptations that are too easily accepted are the ones that really make sense. It’s our ability to reason and have sound judgment, our capacity to deliberate and discern that can be our pitfall. But as we all know, when we’ve been in the wilderness for too long, there is a tipping point, and all our faculties begin ebbing away.

For Jesus it was the desert of Palestine, for my in-laws it was the forests of Nicaragua. But for you it might be the caves of depression or stress or loneliness. It may be the ocean of too many commitments. It may be the exhaustion from too many early mornings and not enough sleep, or too much work when you’re not compensated fairly, or when you don’t know from month to month what your health prognosis will be, or…or what? What is it for you?

I was recently looking at a painting called the Temptation of Christ by Lorenz Katzheimer. Jesus and the tempter, or the devil, or however you understand it, are in the wilderness. The creature tempting Jesus is terrifying, a combination of real and imagined creatures, horns, claws, even feathers and fur. When we read about Christ’s temptation, our image of the devil probably falls somewhere along the spectrum between the comical red devil of Halloween and this hideous tempter presented by Katzheimer.

Either one seems easy to reject, don’t you think? If a devil looking like this was to offer us even the most scrumptious bread, most tantalizing gifts of power, we would likely stop, look at the bearer of such temptations, and with skepticism say “Wait a minute…I know better. You’re not going to dupe me.”

Scholars are in agreement that we should interpret this passage as Jesus facing an adversary that comes across as some sort of helper who offers things that are completely reasonable and even good. As Kate Huey reflects, “After all, why shouldn’t Jesus satisfy his hunger with a little bread, and wouldn’t it be great if Jesus ruled the world (instead of the hated Romans), and how impressive would it be if Jesus flung himself off the temple roof and a thousand angels came to rescue? ”[1]

And the same convincing temptations are there for us: Why shouldn’t we satisfy our hunger for notoriety by getting involved in all the committees or studies we can—after all, we owe it to ourselves, and owe it to our institutions, right? Why shouldn’t we feel we should be in control of every emotion and every situation our young children put us in—after all, it is our responsibility as parents to be perfect, right?

So we begin forty days of Lent, confronting the convincing temptations of our wilderness. We don’t need to enter into it, because we live in the midst of it. We just might not be able to see it for what it is. I’ve only recently begun to appreciate the opportunity Lent provides for me to explore my wilderness. In my life, I need lists. I need a schedule. I need a google calendar reminder telling me “look at your life for these 40 days. It’s a good life, but you’ve got lots to work on.” And I guess I’m lucky that I don’t receive that as a negative thing, but an empowering opportunity. My life can be such a wilderness that I’m rarely given permission to stop and deal with it. Do you need that? Do you need to be convinced that your life needs assessment?

It’s not a convincing argument in most of our lives. Time could be better spent, energy better directed. It’s too depressing to look at the dark spots in our lives, and more effective to try to do something better. Now, I’ve taken different approaches to Lent, depending on how I feel each year. Sometimes I give up those things that are of no real consequence, to just see if I can do it. Can I really give up…chocolate? But, sometimes instead of giving something up, I’d take something up, focusing more on instilling spiritual disciplines in my life, or finding ways to really take care of myself, and hopefully, my spiritual life.

But that’s not what I’m feeling this year. Not with our theme of holding on and letting go. Not with the realization that the temptations in my life are the convincing invitations to replace the first fruits to God with the dried and tart leftovers of my own ego and ambition. I need to let go of those things that I have no power to make better on my own.

During Lent we often either give up those things that are convincingly “bad” or take something up something that is convincingly “good,”—those things that are likely quite obvious. But I wonder if we could choose a more difficult Lenten discipline together this year? What if we tried to let go of those things we are so convinced that we need to hold onto? Those things that make sense in our lives, that give us identity, that help us feel in control, that fill our schedules with meaning, that others look upon with such admiration, but in reality…those things that leave us famished, powerless, and falling deeper into our own, personal wilderness. It takes some convincing, doesn’t it?

Now before I get in trouble with our leadership team for giving you all permission to not sign up for one more thing, I want to assure you, I’m not saying don’t take on one more thing. Maybe seriously, that is what you need to do. But maybe, for just 40 days, you unearth what is at the heart of your wilderness, not just the fruits of it. Maybe for 40 days that could be your Lenten prayer, to identify the workings maybe, of pride, self-doubt, fear of abandonment, perfectionism, need to control, or…or?

In our practical minds, it doesn’t seem very convincing. There’s not much tangible we can do with this sort of Lenten discipline right away. But maybe that can be at the heart of what we let go of—the notion that we can do it all, fix it all, without the power of the one who has faced it all before us, blessing us and strengthening us along the way. Maybe we can let go and just be in the wilderness, “For the [wilderness] is not God-forsaken nor does it belong to the devil. It is God’s home. The Holy Spirit is there, within us and beside us. And if we cannot feel that spirit inside of us or at our side, perhaps we can at least imagine Jesus there, not too far way, with enough in him to sustain us,”[2] to hold onto us, convincing us we can let go.
---
As we enter into a time of confession, reflection, and reconciliation, I invite you to close your eyes (hopefully they haven’t been closed for too long yet), take a few deep breaths, and clench your fist tightly. Enter into a time of exploring the wilderness with me…

You are a beloved, beautiful child of God. You have so much going for you, so much going in your life. Yet in the middle of the world’s beauty you find yourself in a wilderness. Maybe it is obvious to you. Or maybe you only feel the effects of it: tired and distracted, doubtful of yourself and your abilities, distant from those around you and your God. You are so convinced of those things that give you strength, and yet in some way, you feel depleted, drained, troubled. What is one thing you are so convinced of? Clutch your hands tightly. You’re holding onto it.

Now, slowly release your grip. Open your hands and turn them so they are facing up. Let go of the convincing arguments that tempt you. Walk into the wilderness with release.





[1] Huey, Kate. Wilderness Companions http://www.ucc.org/worship/samuel/february-21-2010.html
[2] Stendahl, John. New Proclamation 2001.