Genesis
9.8-17; 1 Peter 3.18-22; Mark 1.9-15
+ While I was on vacation in Florida, I
ended up talking with friends about the subject of a film that has been very
important to my life came up.
When I was little, there was an event that would happen, about
twice a year. Twice a year, The Wizard of
Oz would come on TV. This, of course, in the days before Cable and DVDs and
BlueRay and Netflix.
I LOVED The Wizard of Oz.
I’ve preached about my love of The Wizard
of Oz before. I’ve peached about my views that Dorothy is a wonderful example
of leadership. She is. She leads by
example.
But there is an aspect of that movie that I have never preached
about. And when I was talking about that aspect of The Wizard of Oz in Florida, people were a bit surprised by my
observation. I said—and I still maintain to this day—that there was one thing
about that movie I hated. The ending. I think I must be the only person in the
world who hated the ending of The Wizard
of Oz. While everyone else applauded
and felt good for Dorothy clicking her ruby slippers together and waking up in
at home in Kansas, I remember just hating that ending.
Why? I wondered. Why would she want to go back? Here she was in
this beautiful
Technicolor world in which she is loved and lauded. Any dangers
that might exists she’s already defeated. Why would she want to go back to that
ugly, black and white, miserable world of Kansas, with the pig sty and her mean
Auntie Em. What kind of future would Dorothy have there? She’ll probably get
married young and live on a farm for the rest of her life (Not that there’s anything
wrong with that)
And, if you notice, there’s one little story line that never gets
resolved in the movie. Miss Almira Gluch, the mean neighbor, whom Toto bites—well,
she’s gonna come back for Toto. Toto just jumped out of the basket. That
situation was never resolved. Things
look kind of bleak for Dorothy—and definitely for poor Toto. No, I did not like that ending at all.
And, as we head toward Holy Week, the future seems kind of bleak.
Look at what awaits there. Betrayal. The whipping. The carrying of the cross. The
crucifixion.
But on this first Sunday in Lent, if we were expecting, in our
scripture readings, doom and gloom, well, we don’t get any of that. Ah, no. Instead, we get… water? We get Noah and the ark? And baptism? Now, this is my way to begin Lent!
We begin Lent as we begin any important
step as Christians—with solid footing in our baptismal understanding. We begin Lent with a remembrance of our
baptismal covenant—that covenant that we formed with God at our baptisms—a
covenant that is still binding on us, even now. This covenant is a covenant very much like the
covenant God made with Noah after the waters of the flood that we hear about in
our reading from Genesis. I wasn’t
expecting to do it, but here we are on this first Sunday of Lent, and I am
preaching about, of all things, baptism.
As if that wasn’t enough, we also get
another special treat. In our Gospel
reading, we get, in a very brief scripture, an upheaval. What? You missed the upheaval in our Gospel reading?
You missed the reversal? You missed, in
that deceptively simple piece of scripture, a mirror image?
It’s easy to miss, after all. Our Gospel reading is so simple, so sparse. But then again, so is haiku. But let’s look a little closer at what we’ve
just heard and read.
In today’s Gospel, we find three elements
that remind us of something else. We
find the devil. We find animals. And we
find angels. Where else in scripture do
we find these same elements? Well, we
find them all in the Creation story in Genesis, of course. The story of Adam is a story of what? --the
devil, of animals and of angels. But
that story ends with the devil’s triumph and Adam’s defeat.
In today’s Gospel, it has all been made
strangely right. Jesus—the new Adam—has
turned the tables using the exact same elements. We find Jesus not in a lush beautiful Oz-like place
like Eden. Rather we find Jesus with wild animals in that Kansas-like
desert—animals who were created by God and named by Adam. We find him there waited on by the angels—and
let’s not forget that an angel turned Adam away from Eden. And there, in that
place, he defeats the Devil—the same Devil who defeated Adam.
I have found this juxtaposition between Adam and Jesus to be a
rich source of personal meditation, because it really is very meaningful to us
who follow Jesus. If we lived with the
story of Adam, if we lived in the shadow of his defeat, the story a somewhat
bleak one. It would seem like the end of
The Wizard of Oz There doesn’t seem
to be much hope. The relationship ruined
with Adam hasn’t been made right.
But today we find that the relationship has been right. The story isn’t a story of defeat after all. It isn’t a time to despair, but to rejoice. The Devil has been defeated. And this is very important.
We, in our baptisms, also defeat the
Devil. Now, by the Devil, I am not
necessarily talking about a supernatural being who rules the underworld. I’m not talking about the horns, forked tail
and pitchfork. By Devil I mean the
personification of all that we hold evil.
In our baptisms, we renounce all the evil
of this world and the next, and by renouncing evil, we are assured that it can
be defeated. By renouncing the devil and
all the evils of this world, we turn away from the evil inherent within us. Our
baptism marks us and in that mark we find the strength to stand up against
evil. This time of Lent—this time for us
in the desert, this time of fasting and mortification—is a time for us to
confront the demons in our lives. We all
have them.
In our wonderful collect for today, we
prayed to God to “come quickly to help us who are assaulted by many
temptations.”
The poet that I am, I love the tradition
language of Rite I better here.
“Make speed to help thy servants who are
assaulted by manifold temptations.”
We all understand that term “manifold
temptations.” We all have those triggers
in our lives that disrupt and cause upheaval. Sometimes this upheaval is mental and
emotional, sometimes it is actual. We
have our own demons, no matter what name we might call them.
I certainly have my own demons in my life and sometimes I am
shocked by the way they come upon me. I
am amazed by how they lay me low and turn my life upside down. They represent
for me everything dark and evil and wrong in my life and in the world around
me. They are sometimes memories of
wrongs done to me, or wrongs I’ve done to others. Sometimes they are the shortcomings of my own
life—of being painfully reminded of the fact that I have failed and failed
miserably at times in my life. They are
reminders to me that this world is still a world of darkness at times—a world
in which people and nature can hurt and harm and destroy. And their power and influence over my life is,
I admit, somewhat strong.
Trying to break the power of our demons
sometimes involves going off into the deserts of our lives, breaking ourselves
bodily and spiritually and, armed with those spiritual tools we need, confronting
and defeating those powers that make us less than who we are.
For me, I do find consolation when I am confronted by the demons
of my life in that covenant I have with God in my baptism. I am reminded by that covenant that there is
no reason to despair when these demons come into our lives, because the demons,
essentially, are illusions. They are
ghosts. They are wispy fragments of my
memory. They have no real power over me
despite what they make think sometimes. Because
the demons have been defeated by God.
Again, returning to our collect for today,
we prayed, “as you know the weaknesses of each of us, let each one find you
mighty to save.” God has been “might to save” us. The demons of our lives have been defeated by
our Baptismal Covenant and the waters of those baptismal waters. The real power they have over my life has been
washed away in those waters, much as all evilness was washed away in the flood
in Noah’s time.
So, as we wander about in the spiritual
desert of Lent, let us truly be driven. Let
the Spirit drive us into that place—to that place wherein we confront the
demons of our lives. But let us do so
unafraid. The Spirit is the driving
force and, knowing that, we are strengthened. Let us be driven into that place. Let us confront our demons. Let us confront the very Devil himself. Let us face the manifold temptations of our
lives unafraid, knowing full well that God is “mighty to save.” And in confronting evil and temptation, let
us, with Jesus, defeat those demons. Strengthened
by our Baptismal Covenant let us then be able to return from this place,
proclaiming loudly, by our words, and by our actions, “The time is fulfilled
and the kingdom of God has come near, repent, and believe in the good news.
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