God's Presence in the Wilderness
GOSPEL - Mark 1:9-15
9In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. 10And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. 11And a voice came from heaven, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” 12And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13He was in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him. 14Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God, 15and saying, “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.”
Well, welcome to the wilderness, people of God.
Now I want to do something very ambitious for the next ten minutes. It is so ambitious, in fact, that if you are a historian, or a scholar, or just someone who appreciates good, careful, factual presentations, there is a good chance you will be horrified by these next ten minutes. See, what I would like to do is give a comprehensive history of the Hebrew scriptures, the New Testament, and the last two thousand years of Christian history by tracing with you the stories that take place in the wilderness. Which, if you know scripture, you know it is a lot of stories. So to make it interesting, to keep you engaged in this very fast, very selective, highly subjective history lesson, I am going to put you on two teams – the pulpit side and the lectern side. And we are going to see which side gets the most points. You can call out the answer if you know it.
Alright? Here we go…
The very first story that takes place in the wild is… The Garden of Eden, that’s correct. That’s an easy one. The creation story. Where it all began – was a garden.
Now, fast forward a few chapters and we find ourselves in Genesis 9, which I think is the next important story having to do with a wild earth. Anyone know Genesis 9? Clue: it was our first reading today? That’s right – Noah’s ark. The rainbow. God’s promise found in the clouds.
Next we find ourselves looking up, gazing at the stars with – Abraham. God’s promise found in the night sky.
This one is trickier. Expelled into the desert with her son, ready to die, we find – Hagar. Called from the desert to mother a new people.
Encountering a burning bush, receiving the ten commandments, wandering for forty years – Moses.
Listening for the sound of God in the winds, an earthquake, and a great fire – Elijah.
The Lord is my shepherd, lie down in green pastures, beside still waters… The Psalmist.
The list goes on. Throughout our Hebrew scriptures, the wilderness is a place of formation, a place to hear God’s voice, a place of profound encounters with God. If you were to make the wilderness its own character, it would always be a character that moves the story forward. A revelatory character. The one you keep an eye on.
Which is no surprise then, that Jesus’s ministry begins in the wilderness, which is our reading today. 40 days in the wilderness, 40 days of being tempted by Satan, 40 days to understand himself and his call. Forty days between his baptism and his public ministry.
Now that is a story you likely know well. And based on your responses, you know pretty well many of the other wilderness stories in scripture.
But what you might not know is where the wilderness picks up after Jesus in our more recent history. For example, do you know about the desert father and the desert mothers?
These were early Christians in the third century who retreated to the desert, to a life of solitary prayer. Pilgrims came out to seek the wisdom of these desert dwellers, because just like in the scriptures, it was thought that God could be more clearly heard in these spaces and by those who had dedicated their life to prayer in the wilderness. We have books of wisdom from the desert fathers and the desert mothers. And because of them, monastic communities began to grow – monks and nuns. Whole communities in the wilderness.
These communities would continue to grow for centuries until – well, until Luther, who in the 15th century declared that the more faithful way was not to retreat from the world, not to live in monastaries, but to live in families. In fact, just as he had left the monastic life, so he encouraged parents to pull their children from monasteries and nunneries and find spouses for them instead. The home life, he claimed, is more faithful. Hence the Small and Large Catechism, which is intended for parents to use with children.
While there is much value in this, while Lutherans still proclaim that God can be found in the intimate details of home life and family life, what this is also mean was that Lutherans in particular began to lose a sense of wilderness as transformative. This is my interpretation, at least. Lutherans began to lose a sense of the transformative power of the wilderness.
So it is perhaps no surprise that just a few centuries later, the US Lutheran summer camp movement began in 1919. If we could get our youth outside of the confines of city life and into the wilderness, the thinking went, so they might encounter God in new ways.
And one hundred years later, we still know this to be true. That a positive experience at summer camp is among the strongest indicators of lifelong faith engagement. The investment is high because the transformational power of the wilderness is proven.
See, the thing about all this history, the reason I am telling you all of this history is because I need you to understand that things happen in the wilderness.
God happens in the wilderness.
The untamable Spirit of God comes to our untamable spirits and speaks to us in the wilderness in profound ways.
You only have to glance at scriptures and history to see that God has a thing for wild spaces. Or maybe, we have a thing for wild spaces.
We hear better in the wilderness.
We see better.
We feel God moving more acutely.
Something about the wilderness speaks to our human spirits. And when we get there, well, all bets are off. Right? An angel might appear. Or a voice. Or an insight. Or a calling. Or clarity. Or your own life. Wild things happen in the wilderness.
But here is what is even more interesting than that, here is what I also need you to hear. We aren’t designed to stay there. We aren’t. Not most of us. Maybe some of us. But for most of us, God calls us out of our life, out of our everyday life, so that God can call us back into it.
God calls us out of our life so that God can call us back into it.
See, the God we meet in the wilderness is a transforming God.
But God doesn’t transform us because it’s good for us. Even though it is. Even though we may then want to spend all of our lives in the transforming presence of God.
No, God transforms us because our neighbors need transformed people to neighbor them.
God meets us in the wilderness because our neighbors need transformed neighbors.
How tempting it must have been for Jesus to want to dwell in the company of the angels, who waited on his every need. Just 40 days? I wonder if it felt short.
How tempting it must have been for Moses to want to stay in the presence of the burning bush, because never had he felt so alive or so seen. Did he have to leave?
How tempting it must have been for Elijah to want to stay in the wilderness, listening again for the voice of God. The miracle of God.
How tempting to want to spend our lives in the places that we know God most clearly.
But Jesus left the wilderness to show the people God. And Moses left the burning bush to show the people freedom. And Hagar left the wilderness to mother a new people. And the Psalmist left the green pastures and the still waters to answer God’s call.
In our scriptures, wilderness, you see, is temporary. But not until they were ready. Not until they had encountered, fully encountered, the God who loved them and called them and promised to journey with them all of their days.
It is the season of Lent. It is the season of wilderness. You have been gifted with 40 days in the near presence of God. Forty days in this wilderness. Forty days to encounter Love and and listen to Love and be transformed by this love, this remarkable, surprising, unpredictable God of love.
This is God’s gift to you.
This season, this space, and whatever discipline helps you encounter that God. Prayer or walking or Communion or lighting a candle or meditating on art or sitting beside someone you love or singing or playing bells or going to class or writing a prayer rock – or getting outside. Or giving up whatever you have given up – we give it up to find ourselves in the longing of the wilderness.
Lent is God’s gift to you, a season of wilderness built in to our life together that we might encounter the call of God, then return to our lives, knowing God more deeply, hearing God more clearly. That is why we are here.
And how good to be here. How good to be here with you.
So welcome to the wilderness, people of God, your wilderness. And welcome to Lent. May you hear the voice of love calling. Because love wants to know you.
Thanks be to God. Amen.