A journey to life
Lk 4,1-13

    It is not the first time that Satan tempts a man. I recall for instance Adam and Eve (true peoples but the first ones), Cain, the inhabitants of Sodom, Pharaoh, and Israelites asking to return to Egypt, Saul, David, Job, Jude and Jesus. Each one was tempted according to his nature.

     Christians mind for Jesus’ temptations, because he is a “new Adam”, a beginner of the renewed humanity. Satan is much interested to separate Jesus from God and to have him sharing his own destiny of darkness and sorrow.
We read Jesus’ temptations at the beginning of the Lent Season, taken as a journey lasting more than the liturgical forty days but until we reach the life, which essentially is “resurrection”, and consequently also “re-birth and re-creation”. 

    “Resurrection” reminds us of Jesus, the only one to have been resurrected from dead. He likes matching his incarnation to the arch of human existence until the limbo, which is the last life region for men.

    Jesus chooses to go trough the human journey led by the Holy Spirit, reviving the Israelites’ exodus towards the Promised Land. By this he is at the middle of our normal existence as the manifestation of the Holy Spirit, avoiding any illusion of power and becoming a humble person.

    He wisely honours God. He doesn’t look for bread in an easy way as in the tale of king Midas but he longs for the substantial bread, which is the Word of God. He refuses richness leading him to deny truth and to live on treachery. He doesn’t put God in ridiculous, asking him for miracles. He really recognises the influence of God in His life and likes wisely to serve him.

    The effects of Jesus’ victory over Satan are not noticed at once. We have to wait for his death. Diabolic endurable power works in his passion. All are in coalition against him. His disciples too betray and deny or abandon him but love stands at his side. His Mother Mary, some women and friends, his disciple John are under his cross. The love for God the Father and for men makes Jesus very humble up to the death so that Satan easily takes advantage on him and buries him.

    All the more the truth goes beyond visible realities, covering them by love and giving birth to the life stronger than death’s power, which enslaves Satan.

    Saint Luke lets us framing Jesus’ life as the confrontation with Satan, because he encloses it all in all under the action of the Holy Spirit. He in fact takes dwelling in Jesus at the baptism, he leads him into the desert and sustains him in the passion, and he makes Jesus able to enlighten the disciples, oppressed by the visible events, obscuring the full vision of the truth.

    In this frame Christian life is naturally included. We too have been baptised and signed by the Holy Spirit. Our exodus towards the life goes along with the every day life responsibilities. Looking at Jesus, we don’t require any miracle to easy our journey, because we believe that God is with us always, especially in time of temptations. The Holy Spirit makes us humble to recognise the tenderness of God the Father, by trusting in His word and making it the base of our behaviour.    
  
Fr Tiziano Pegoraro
Missionary priest
at St Ladislav Church in Bratislava         

Bratislava, February 21 2010