A homily for the First Sunday of Lent, February 26, 2023
Gn 2:7-9; 3:1-7, Rom 5:12-19 , Mt 4:1-11
Out in the backyard of my boyhood home in Lincroft, my brothers and I built a treehouse. Not just any treehouse. This was a classic, enough to make the Swiss Family Robinson jealous.
The development where we lived was carved out of a massive 1950s horse farm, and new batches of houses were still being built when I was around 13 or 14. That meant that every afternoon, we could ride our bikes around the neighborhood with wagons or carts attached to them and scrounge up some fine, fine lumber scraps.
Which we used to build our superb treehouse in a huge tree that had evaded the developers’ ax.
We framed out the floor and two walls with two-by-fours the way we had seen the carpenters do it, and we didn’t skimp on the 10-penny nails — 19 cents a pound at Lincroft Hardware. The floor deck was three-quarter-inch tongue-and-groove planking. Solid.
Mom was sure we’d break our necks. Dad actually climbed up and sat on it and pronounced it super-safe.
We even had enough material left over to build a crow’s nest, which we proudly called our second floor.
First floor or second floor, for three seasons a year for two or three years, we had a place to read comics and Mad magazine or complain about our parents and teachers or just watch the ever-increasing traffic on the Parkway just a stone’s throw away.
And no, we never threw stones at the Parkway.
Back in the house, we used to take a blanket or two and tuck one end of them under the upper-bunk mattress so they’d hang down like a tent and turn the bottom bunk into a Fortress of Solitude. Yes, another place for comics and griping.
For being left alone.
Don’t we all need a place like that sometimes? Maybe a lot of times? Especially during Lent?
Today’s Gospel passage is a familiar one, and from year to year, we’re reminded of how Jesus resisted temptation even after 40 days of fasting in the desert. Our Gospel details how Jesus gives us a perfect example of how we should resist the siren song of evil every day of our lives.
And we should resist. Absolutely.
But I think Matthew is giving short shrift to the part about the 40 days. In just 26 words he tells us about six weeks of Jesus’ life, and then in the next 150 words or so, we get the one-day conversation between Our Lord and the tempter.
At that time Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. He fasted for forty days and forty nights…
Forty days. Half a season. Longer than baseball spring training.
What was it like for Jesus? We can only wonder.
Did he have a tent or some other kind of shelter? Was he cold at night or sweaty during the day? Did he set up camp or did he mosey around the desert the way the ancient Israelites did?
We have every reason to believe Jesus was alone, but is it possible somebody stopped by occasionally to check up on him? If so, did they chat, or just nod to each other silently, knowingly?
Was his fast an absolutely nothing-at-all fast, or did he allow himself to nosh on, oh, I don’t know, bugs and berries and spring water the way John the Baptist did?
What was Jesus thinking about, and whom? Whatever he thought about, it definitely strengthened him against temptation.
Forty days of fasting and praying by Jesus. Which is why, for us, Lent is 40 days of fasting and praying and strengthening against temptation. Makes sense.
Now, interestingly, a poll taken right before Lent this year revealed that many people said they were fasting from social media. Chocolate still tops the list of things people are giving up, but, hey, at least they’re fasting.
So do the people fasting from social media have treehouses or other places they can escape to? Do they have places where they can think and pray and strengthen themselves against temptations?
Do we?
Our world is loud, busy, noisy, distracting, over and above the drone of social media and cable news. All year long, but especially in the spring and summer, people, places and things are competing for our attention.
God wants our attention, too, but God calls us quietly, à la the gentle breeze that Elijah felt. God wants our attention, which means we need to look and listen for the soft signs that God spreads before us. We need to be open to them. We need to make time for them. We need to shut out the roar of the world every now and then and go to our tent, our bottom bunk, our treehouse so that God’s love and grace and wisdom can wash over us.
Yes, we need to carve out time and place and peace. Fortunately, we have Lent.
