The First Sunday in Lent

Luke 4:1-13

Jesus walked that lonesome valley…had to walk it by himself. Nobody else could walk it for him…had to walk it by himself.

The old African-American spiritual that many of us learned to sing as children powerfully captures the feeling of today’s reading from the Gospel of Luke. Jesus has just been baptized in the River Jordan. The Holy Spirit, in the form of a dove, descends upon him and a voice sounds from heaven saying, “You are my Son whom I love, with you I am well-pleased.”

What a moment of spiritual ecstasy! It is one of those mountaintop experiences Tim spoke about last week – a spiritual high of all highs – a life-changing encounter with the living God. I remember my mother telling me about when she was baptized as a twelve-year old girl and how God became real to her in that instant and she was drawn as close to God as one can get. It was a moment she never forgot, a time that changed her life forever. Many of you have had such close encounters of a spiritual kind too, haven’t you? And aren’t they wonderful experiences!

You’ve been to the top of the mountain and, as Martin Luther King so eloquently described it, you’ve looked over to the other side and seen the glory of God.

Which is why it puzzles me what happened next to Jesus.

I was reading an article the other day about a man whose life fell apart. He lost everything of value and ended up living on the street, in the gutter. For many years, he lived the life of the living dead whose prayer for daily bread is really a prayer for another drink or another fix.

But then he got saved! The words of a street preacher hit their mark deep inside his soul one night and he had a “come to Jesus” moment. He was baptized that very night in the river that ran through the town, and experienced the cleansing power of the Holy Spirit, and the redeeming power of the love of God – just like Jesus at his baptism..

And he left the streets that night, overcame his addictions, got a job, found a woman who loved him, got married, had kids, bought a house and found a good life in suburbia.

And that’s the way faith is supposed to go, isn’t it? Come to God and be made whole, come to God and find abundance, come to God and be blessed, come to God and solve your problems, come to God and discover the joy of life, come to God and overcome your temptations…

But that’s not how it happened with Jesus.

Jesus met God that day at the River, and there was glory in the experience, but almost immediately, the Bible tells us, the Spirit drove him out into the desert where life got tougher than it had ever been before. Not only did his problems not go away, but he faced temptations stronger than any he had ever faced.

Jesus walked that lonesome valley…

From the mountaintop of spiritual ecstasy all the way down to the valley of temptation. For forty days Jesus wandered in the desert wilderness – hungry, powerless, tempted by the devil.

You would think the script should have been written differently! Jesus should have left the Jordan River that day and gone and started a church, and maybe wrote a book about how to find spiritual fulfillment, and perhaps got married and had a happy and successful family – maybe even built a huge Christian television network to proclaim the Gospel all over the world! After all, that’s how Christian testimonies nowadays go don’t they? I was lost, but now I’m found, and that’s why I have a lifetime.400 batting average in the major leagues, or that’s how my broken marriage got put back together, or how I got to be successful enough to build this big, beautiful house, or that’s why my children have become so obedient. God has blessed me with all this! If it wasn’t for God, my life would be nothing!

That’s how the story usually goes!

Not many people testify to the opposite. “I found God, and then my life hit the skids. It became worse than ever before. I ended up hungry, powerless, tempted by the devil there in the valley below.”

But that’s the testimony of Jesus. That’s how it went for Jesus. Jesus walked that lonesome valley…

Why do you suppose it happened that way?

Do you think its possible that God does not intend life to be lived on the mountaintop? Do you think its possible that God understands where people like us really live?

One of the sobering discoveries of life that has shaped my faith over the years is that we human beings live most of our lives in the valleys. Yes, there are mountaintop experiences that come along from time to time, but most of our lives are lived down below. Let me confess some things to you. Perhaps you will judge me as not having a strong enough faith for saying them, or perhaps you will identify with what I’m going to say.

I have known more unanswered prayers in my life than answered prayers. And you don’t need to hand me the excuse that all prayers are answered but sometimes the answer is “No.” That’s not the point. “No” is as good as no answer at all. I have also experienced fewer miraculous outcomes to life’s challenges than I have needed. All the Bible verses in the world have not addressed some of the burning issues in my life, and my life is full of unresolved problems despite the fact that I believe in God with all my heart.

I have known many more valleys than I have known mountaintops.

Our family was on the mountaintop when our daughter and her husband shared the great news that they were expecting their first child. But then came the news that their baby had a defect that could not be survived. And so at 20-weeks – just about halfway through the pregnancy – they had to deliver the baby. Stillborn. A boy. Looked just like his dad.

From the mountain to the valley – in an instant. And I don’t know about you, but when my kids are going through times like these, the valley seems all the more deep and painful.

I’ve heard from many of you who have had similar experiences. Thank you for that – for letting us know we are not alone. More people than we knew have walked this same valley that we are walking today.

And there are other people in the valleys too – some have seen their health become frailty – some worry incessantly about children going in the wrong direction – some suffer through the pain of broken relationships – and all around us, of course, people go hungry, and children are sexually abused, and soldiers lay down their lives, people of color are discriminated against, and nations groan under the strain of famine, pestilence and war. And then there is death. It is our common reality. No one gets out of here alive, no matter how many miles we jog, how low we get our cholesterol to go, or how much money we throw into our medical care. The valley of life always leads to the valley of the shadow of death.

So why was Jesus sent into the valley?

Because that’s where we live.

And we need Him! We need a Guide. We need a Friend. We need a Savior who can bring us HELP in the midst of the valley, and a WAY OF LIFE for living through it, and a HOPE for life beyond the grave!

That’s why Jesus walked that lonesome valley. Because you are in it, and God loves you, and Jesus comes to find you, and surround you with heavenly love, and give you strength-beyond-yourself for the journey that lies ahead!

But then there’s another reason Jesus comes into the valley. I think I would describe it this way: Jesus comes to us in the valley and not only saves us, but sends us. It is in the valley of life that we discover our own ministries.

People who live on mountaintops don’t need anyone’s help. But people who walk in the valleys do. We need not only Jesus. We need each other.

Some time ago I had the opportunity to visit the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis. The museum incorporates the old Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King was assassinated, and traces the history of the Civil Rights movement from the very beginnings of the slave trade in America. I was very moved by the stories of how individual people stood up to oppose slavery in the earliest days – people like Nat Turner, Sarah Roberts, Dred Scott, Harriet Tubman, Isabella Baumfree who changed her name to Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, John Brown – black people and white people alike who dared stand up for the freedom of others. I wonder if I would have been so brave! And then, as you move through the museum to later years, the faces become multiplied, and the numbers become greater, and – despite the horrible violence done to stop these courageous people – you soon pause before a picture of the march on Washington and hundreds of thousands of all kinds of people joined hand-in-hand singing, “We Shall Overcome!”

It is in the valley of life where we discover how much we need each other and how each of us has a ministry to others. And that is true whether we are addressing a great social issue like racism, or a personal issue like alcoholism.

We need each other. Others need you. You have a ministry to which you are called. You have a responsibility to help others through the valley!

And one more thing. It is in the valley that we discover the essence of what it means to be a church.

It seems to me that people wandering through the harsh valleys of life don’t need a church that condemns them and associates their valley experience with some lack of faith. Jesus, after all, walked that lonesome valley, and I for one am in no position to question his faith. And the people of the valley don’t need a church that teaches success as the goal of faith. That would rule out all the great women and men of faith who, over the years, have given up success for justice, and social acceptance for social change. The martyrs were hardly successful in the eyes of the world, but in the eyes of God they are brilliant stars!

The valley people don’t need judgment, and they don’t need a success and prosperity gospel.

What they do need is a safe place along the way – where they are welcomed for who they are and in whatever circumstance they are living. The people of the valley need a church whose arms are always stretched wide, whose love is without measure, and whose faith is anchored in this reality:

Jesus walked this lonesome valley…

As the Lenten Season begins, I invite you to open your life and its unique circumstances to Jesus who loves you and will walk with you. And I invite you to prayerfully consider and discover what your ministry gift is. People NEED you! And I invite all of us to work hard at becoming a church of the valley and not of the mountain.

Just like Jesus, we have been called to walk this lonesome valley…