“The Desert Warrior Saves You With The Word”
Saint Matthew 4: 1-11
Invocavit: 10 March Anno Domini 2019
Father Jay Watson SSP
At first blush there appears to be no clear proclamation of Gospel in this morning’s Gospel according to Saint Matthew—and event which occurred even before Levi was called from receipt of custom to be a Disciple.
We have more than a skirmish, more than a mere battle or opening salvo. We encounter a small war, a vicious and bloody campaign in a long cosmic struggle.
The traitor, your father, Adam—and all subsequent men, was forcibly driven from Paradise by a Cherub with a flaming sword. After destroying perfection, Adam the failure, Adam the now, aging, aching, sweating, continuing towards treason every day, and ultimately dying and decaying “fallen man,” was to live his “40” years in the desert of a groaning and misshapen world.
Something had to be done. Well, no, not if one looks at and only considers the blackened creature—Man. But something had to be done when one is brought to believe by Grace, that The Lord God “IS love!” [1 Jn. 4.8b]
Cain, Lamech, the men of Noah’s day, and the builders of Babel were just as treasonous and foul as Adam. And lest you in a self-justifying moment try and put yourself “above” and “better” than them…because you are a Christian, disabuse yourself. Don’t spurn Grace. Don’t confuse mercy of God with merit of self. Even believers sin daily because daily they are attacked by their own “old Adam.” Thus Moses. Thus the reality of the children of Israel. They were freed and redeemed from bondage in the desert of Israel. They quickly back-slid in ungrateful and blasphemous apostasy. They too were driven into the desert for 40 years. Those spurning and rejecting the Gospel promise of the typological Gospel Land of Canaan, a “type” of paradise dripping with “milk and honey,” were given to die and decay in the wilderness. Stung by scorpions, serpents, plague, and pagan blade, they could fix and solve nothing. Moses, Aaron, could not fix what Adam had broken.
The greatest of the Prophets, Elias, spent his own 40 days in the wilderness. He too was there for doubting God’s love and provision, for fearing Jezebel more than The Living God. God fixed things even then, temporarily for the Prophet. God fed him with water from a brook—in the midst—of a nation-wide draught, and with bread and meat brought by ravens, morning and evening. [1 Ki. 17. 2-5]
Your Desert Ranger, Your Flame of Fire and Pilar of Cloud, goes into the wilderness so that you will never go into perdition. Adam was driven unwillingly, but Jesus was “led up of The Spirit” joyously and willingly. He shed His blood at 8 days from His Nativity. He stepped into the filthy Jordan with filthy sinners. And, “for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame…” [Heb. 12.2]
You are not to seek out Satan. You are not called to perform works of one-on-one combat with the devil. You are to resist him. You are to flee from the roaring lion seeking to devour you. You are enabled to do so by The Holy Ghost Who places you in the wounds of Christ, through The Word. Jesus has already defeated the old serpent. He crushed Beelzebub’s head at Calvary but He also slapped him senseless during the 40-day dustup.
It wasn’t easy. It was more difficult than you can imagine. It was lonely, painful, tiring, and even frightening. Jesus experience the desert fast in all its intensities, but without sinning. You usually meditate during Passion Week on what it must have been like for The Lord of Life to hang on The Tree for six long hours. But think of what His righteous retreat into the broken earth of the desert of your sin was like for 40 long days and nights.
Three diabolically clever temptations for The God/Man Who with The Father and The Spirit is Triune, yet one-in-three and three-in-one. Satan like a televangelist “kind of” quotes Holy Scripture. Jesus is Holy Scripture—for He is The Word made Flesh. The Lord doesn’t argue with the devil but merely restates The Word of The Lord, in context, precisely, and always with the Holiness of God at the forefront, buoyed up with the purpose of God…to obey where Adam did not…to be the perfect Adam that you cannot. Israel failed the test. You fail the test. Jesus completed the test, the task, and fulfilled the Law perfectly.
He was thereafter nourished and comforted by angels…at the very least given food and drink. The devil has been driven from you by The Blood of Jesus. You are baptized—forgiven, clean, in your Desert Warrior’s purity. He is here. He has sent another angel, minister here to feed you now.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of The Holy Ghost
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