1 The Wilderness The season of Lent, beginning with Ash Wednesday, helps us to remember the 40 days and nights that Jesus spent in the wilderness fasting at the very beginning of his three year ministry. The Scripture says that Jesus was “led” by the Spirit...
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1 The Wilderness The season of Lent, beginning with Ash Wednesday, helps us to remember the 40 days and nights that Jesus spent in the wilderness fasting at the very beginning of his three year ministry. The Scripture says that Jesus was “led” by the Spirit (or, in the Gospel of Mark, “sent by the Spirit”) into the wilderness of Judea. This wilderness is not lush forests and trees. It is the desert. It was there he had his conversations with the devil. In the wilderness. Bleak. Barren. Harsh. Dry. Why would God want Jesus to encounter wilderness? Perhaps it is because wilderness is so much a part of being human, and in Christ, God was made fully human. There are some marvelous days in life, days of great adventure, joy and love. But there are some days of wilderness as well, days where dry, bleak, barren and harsh seem to be the landscape. And those are the days we are tempted to give up and count only on the bread that we can see and touch, and listen only to the seductive voices of t
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