The First Sunday of Lent
Year A

By the Rev. Ann M. Smith

Based on the Gospel reading: Matthew 4:1-11

In the Old Testament lesson we heard the account Adam and Eve's disobedience and the resulting tragic story of fallen humankind. God begins by giving human creation freedom and limits, leaving us with choices to make: "You may eat freely of every tree of the garden;" God tells Adam and Eve, "but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat."

The serpent, one of God's creatures, poses a tempting question. "Did God say, 'You shall not eat from any tree in the garden?'"

The woman explains. "We may eat of any of the trees but the tree of good and evil. If we eat any of its fruit we will die."

The serpent continues, "You will not die; your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God." What a temptation that was. What a choice to have to make! To be like God! In fact, it was so tempting that they began to recognize the state they were in – their nakedness and their sense of shame – and ultimately their sense of brokenness, of broken relationship with God, the alienation that is part of our human condition.

Our lives are filled with opportunities to make choices. Most are simple. What should I wear today? What would I like to eat? What time should I get up? Most choices do not even require much thought. They are automatic.

But there are choices in our lives that require considerable reflection. Is this the right person with whom to spend the rest of my life? Should I change jobs? Where should I live? These are choices that may affect the very fabric of our lives.

Take for example the choices that Olympic athletes must make. It is not enough to have talent. Competing in a sport sounds glamorous but when you are standing outside ready to begin practice at five o'clock in the morning and your muscles still ache from yesterday's workout there is nothing to hold you there except your goals. To make it to the top, athletes put aside everything else – family, friends, relationships. The final performance at the Olympics may seem effortless but those athletes have chosen to put everything else aside.

Choices can even be a matter of life and death. In one of my favourite Star Trek episodes, Jean Luc Picard, the Captain of the Starship Enterprise once again encounters his nemesis, an immortal being named Q. Picard is dying because of some damage that was done to his heart in a youthful accident. Q takes him back in time to the place where it happened, and forces him to consider whether he chose wisely. He shows him how it would have turned out had he chosen other paths. Picard knows that he would survive if he changed his early choice. But in the end he realizes that the changes would not have been for the better.

Choices – particularly moral choices – are difficult for us to make. Sometimes the distinctions between them are unclear. Society constantly presents us with choices between what the world chooses and what we know as Christians to be right. Can we live with integrity in the business world? Should we shop on Sunday? Is abortion right? Should we buy lottery tickets? Is it right to go to the Casino to gamble? As Christians in a secular world, we very often fear making unpopular choices. We do not want to be seen as different. Yet this is a society that very much needs us as Christians to take a stand – to be at the forefront of ethical decision making. If we, the church will not take an ethical stand, who will? Yet when we do we are so often ignored or branded as fanatical.

Now I do not believe that any of those moral choices or any other secularizing movement in society will cause the downfall of the Church. The Church may decline. But it will not be because of secularization in our world. We have a choice. Our choices can be God's choices for us. We can choose not to participate in activities that we know to be detrimental to society. If we were to choose good over evil in each situation, how would our world change?

Jesus was confronted by three basic temptations. "You must be hungry. Use your power to turn those stones into bread. Throw yourself down from the temple. You will not be harmed. Fall down and worship me. Everything you see will be yours." By his response, Jesus demonstrates to us that we are not compelled to choose evil.

Certainly times of temptation occur in our lives. We may have a deep sense of loss because of the death of a loved one. We may lose our job, or go through the pain of a broken relationship. We may suffer through sickness, or depression. We may be tempted by power or by wealth at the cost of integrity. How we allow such times in our lives to bring us into relationship with God and with others is the measure of the temptation.

Each of us has the power through our choices to shape and give meaning to life. Living as a Christian is a response to a deliberate choice. It calls for a decision to place our faith in Christ. It is a call to commitment.

Lent is a wilderness time in the Church year. It is a time of commitment to spiritual growth. It provides us with an opportunity to reflect on the meaning and consequences of our choices. Our life is a series of choices. What has shaped your life? What shape would you like it to take? How can it take new shape during this holy season of Lent? It is an opportunity for us to reform ourselves, to allow God's Holy Spirit to re-shape us so that our whole community is re-created. It is said that forty days is the optimal time in which to re-shape some aspect of one's life. Let us use this time, not primarily as a time to give up something, but as a time to bring ourselves into a closer and more open relationship with our creator. Let it be a holy and life-giving Lent for each of us.