Hello and welcome to the first session of Bishop Joe's course 'Six invitations to Dinner with Jesus'. Press play above to watch and listen and/or you can read the script below...

Hello, I’m Bishop Joe, and welcome to this, the first of six invitations to dinner with Jesus.

This first dinner invitation is to join Jesus not for a feast, but for a fast.

Here’s the story. It’s from Luke Chapter 4.

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, where for forty days he was tested by the devil. He ate nothing at all during those days, and when they were over he was famished. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread.” Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”

Then the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And the devil said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been given over to me, and I give it to anyone I please. If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” Jesus answered him, “It is written,

‘Worship the Lord your God,

and serve only him.’”

Then the devil led him to Jerusalem and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written,

‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you,’

and

‘On their hands they will bear you up,

so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.’”

Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.” When the devil had finished every test, he departed from him until an opportune time.

So, Jesus crosses the Jordan and then goes out into the desert for forty days where he finds nothing to eat. He invites us to join him in the desert.

But do we want to join Jesus in the desert? I’m not sure most of us do, most of the time. An invitation to a feast sounds like a good thing. But an invitation to a fast sounds much less appealing.

So what’s going on in this story?

Well, I think one key to understanding this story is to ask whether it sounds a bit familiar.

Where have we seen something like this before?

This is a story about crossing a body of water and then spending forty days in the wilderness, finding no food and becoming hungry, and being tempted in a variety of ways. What’s that? It seems to me the same shape as the story of the Exodus, isn’t it?

In the Exodus story, you’ll remember, first the Hebrew people cross the Red Sea, escaping from Egypt; then they spend forty years in the wilderness; and in the wilderness Satan tempts them.

What’s more, he tempts them in the same ways that he tempts Jesus in our story.

Let’s look at the temptations in turn – and see for ourselves.

In Exodus Chapter 16, if you look it up you’ll see that the Hebrew people get hungry in the desert, and they give in to the temptation to believe that God has abandoned them (that’s why they’re hungry) ‘Oh, it was better back in Egypt,’ they complain.

Well, Jesus gets hungry in the desert too in our story. But Jesus doesn’t give in to the temptation to believe that God has abandoned him. Jesus continues to trust his Father’s promises to care for him. Even if he were to die of hunger, yet he will trust that God’s love will never abandon him.

OK, that’s the first temptation. Here’s the second one. In Exodus Chapter 32 – why don’t you look this one up too? Moses is gone, he’s off speaking with God; and again the Hebrew people give in to the temptation to believe that God has abandoned them, so that they have no God to protect them and care for them. So they decide to turn to Apis, one of the false gods of the Egyptian people. It was absolutely better in Egypt, they decide. Even the gods were better.

So too in our story, Satan tempts Jesus. ‘”Worship me,” he says to Jesus, “and I will look after you.” But Jesus does not give in to the temptation. He continues to trust that God is caring for him.

Thirdly, and finally, the Hebrew people are tempted over and over again during their time in the wilderness to test God – to demand that he proves that he’s caring for them. For instance, in Exodus Chapter 17, they’re longing for a drink of water. And in their desperation, they demand that God proves that he loves them. They “quarrelled and tested the Lord, saying ‘Is the Lord among us or not?’”

So too Satan tempts Jesus with the thought that he can be sure of the Father’s love only if the Father performs a miracle to save him. But once again, Jesus does not give in to the temptation – he continues to trust in his Father’s love, and does not ask the Father to prove his love.

So Satan tempts the Hebrew People in the wilderness in the Old Testament story of the Exodus. And then Satan tempts Jesus in the same ways in the New Testament story in the wilderness.

That’ really interesting, isn’t it? But surely – and in many ways this is the key point – surely, we have also seen these same temptations in our own lives too. When we sense mortality enter the room, the devil whispers in our ear that death is stronger than God’s love for us. When things go wrong in our lives, the devil whispers in our ear that it would be better to give up on God and turning our attention elsewhere. When we long for something but cannot attain it, the devil whispers in our ear that if God loved us he would prove it by giving us what we want.

Do you see, in the Exodus story, in the story of Jesus’ temptation in the desert, and in our lives too – the devil has just the one song to sing. He’s a one-hit wonder. Throughout our lives, he whispers again and again the lie that God does not love us and cannot be trusted to care for us.

And this is why Jesus invites us to join him in the desert.

It’s not that Jesus has gone into the desert and invites us to join him there, so that we can suffer with him.

No, that’s not it. Rather, what’s true is that at times we all find ourselves in the desert, and Jesus comes looking for us there. He invites us to keep company with him in the desert moments of our lives, when we are feeling unloved and tempted.

When we turn to Jesus in these moments, he will speak again to us the truth which Satan wants to hide from us. Jesus will speak the truth to you – that God loves you with an everlasting love, a love stronger than your grave, a love which will never leave you, a love which will in the end answer your deepest longings.

So let us take courage, with the great sixteenth century theologian, Teresa of Avila, as we listen to her words: “Let nothing disturb you, let nothing frighten you. All things are passing: God never changes. Patience obtains all things. Whoever has God lacks nothing; God alone suffices.”