Revised from 2019

Deut. 26:4–10; Rom. 10:8–13; Luke 4:1–13

There’s a song by Rascal Flatts that Gina and I have always considered our song, mostly because of what transpired in our early lives and how we came together. The chorus goes like this: “God blessed the broken road that led me straight to you.” If you’ve heard my reversion story, you know that it’s had some interesting twists and turns, and Gina’s had her own broken road. I’m sure that many of you who have seen a few decades have your own broken-road story as well.

It’s fair to say that the people of Israel had their own broken road, one marked by poor decisions, good and bad fortunes, and finally, deliverance. In Deuteronomy 26, Moses explains to the Israelites how they will offer the first fruits of the land of Canaan, to which they are about to pass after 40 years of wandering in the wilderness. In that ritual, the men who offer their first fruits recount their journey:

My father was a wandering Aramean who went down to Egypt with a small household…. When the Egyptians maltreated and oppressed us, imposing hard labor upon us, we cried to the LORD, the God of our fathers, and he heard our cry and saw our affliction, our toil, and our oppression.

The first thing I want to point out here is completely incidental. Even at the time of Moses, the Hebrews acknowledged their roots as Aramean, who were a semitic people. The language of Israel at the time of Jesus was Aramaic. Even today, the people of that region speak Aramaic, and the Chaldean and Syriac Rite churches use a form of Aramaic as their liturgical language. In any case, God brought the Hebrews out of their oppression and into a land flowing with milk and honey. Moses exhorts them to remember that God, the God of their fathers, remained with them and responded, and led them on their own broken road back to the promised land.

In our second reading, St. Paul writes to the Christian assemblies in Rome, which were made up of both Jewish and Gentile Christians. One of his primary goals was to reconcile these two parties in the Church and to clarify the role of the Law in the lives of Christians. Many Jewish Christians elsewhere had attempted to impose the ritual law of Moses on Gentiles, and in more than one epistle, Paul noted the futility of imposing these external restrictions as if they were the whole of gospel. But he says, “No, that’s not how this works.” Faith is not something imposed on us from without. It is on our lips and in our heart. He’s quoting Deuteronomy 30 here, which was Moses’ point about the law: “‘The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart’—that is, the word of faith that we preach.” Paul is saying that it’s not about the ritual observance, not about imposing rules from outside on us. It’s about accepting the truth, that is the Word of God, and letting it dwell in our hearts. That’s not to say we don’t follow the moral law, but it comes out of us because it is written on our hearts. It comes from a space of love for God rather than simple subservience. Just as in our actions in the public space, merely submitting to norms imposed on us by the mob on social media shows nothing of virtue, character, or faith. We can only truly live and act from what is in our heart.

In our gospel reading, you see that Jesus gets the same treatment from Satan. After 40 days in the desert, Jesus is hungry and weary, and Satan comes to test Him. Notice how Satan works. He starts by questioning Jesus’ credentials: “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” He has a dual purpose here. First, he wants to know whether this really is the Messiah he’s dealing with, and second, he wants to get Him to “prove” Himself, to get into that one-upmanship we see so often on Facebook. “Oh yeah? Prove it. I saw on Snopes that you can’t really turn stone to bread. The fact checkers all say that you’re lying. Five Pinocchio’s!”

Jesus opts out, which is what we should all do when we’re tempted. Opt out. Don’t engage in the debate. When we are tempted to do wrong, we turn the other way. It’s hard to do when we’re exhausted, when we’re hungry, when we’ve already been tried to the last inch. Notice that Satan then swings to quoting scripture to tempt Jesus. Isn’t that rich—Satan using the word of God against the Word Himself? But don’t we see this too all the time—the battle of dueling bible quotes? Satan says, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written:

He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you, and:

With their hands they will support you, lest you dash your foot against a stone”

You see this kind of proof texting on social media all the time, and you probably hear it from some of your non-Catholic friends. They pull a verse from scripture to prove their point, but it contradicts many other points made in scripture. Imagine the gall Satan must have to try to use the word of scripture against the Word Himself? And Jesus, the Word become Flesh, shuts him down, which is warranted. People can justify anything when they take verses out of context. Jesus is the context, and we must always remember to read scripture in the context of the Body of Christ.

            We’re in our own time of fasting, the 40 days of Lent. Jesus emptied Himself out before He began His ministry. He spent this 40 days letting go of Himself in His human nature so that He could be fully open to the will of God, that is, fully submitting His human nature to His Divine nature. He emptied Himself to be filled with what He needed to take on the burden of our redemption.

            We can’t redeem ourselves. We have to rely solely on Jesus, and that’s not easy. We have our own time in the desert being tempted. We have the same need to empty ourselves. That’s what Lent is for—letting go of our comfort, our security, and our self-reliance and trusting on God’s providence. We have to empty ourselves out as Jesus did. The giving of first fruits as temple offerings was much the same. The Israelites gave the first of the produce trusting there would be more. They had to empty themselves of their own anxious grasping toward things and trust God. That’s what Lent is for us as well—a time to empty ourselves to allow God to fill us. Jesus shows us the way in His own temptation. Jesus’ road wasn’t broken, and He showed me the way back to the narrow path.

            Sometimes, I think back on the broken road of my life and I am so grateful for where I am. Sometimes I ask why I still fall into broken stretches of the road through which Gina and I pass. Jesus placed His trust in the Father in all His ordeals, and it only seems fitting that I should do the same, even if I don’t understand. I don’t know why I followed a broken road, and I often struggle with it. But I am so grateful that God brought me to this place, even this place of penance and self denial, because I know that it has led me to life. I don’t understand, but I don’t need to. “It’s all part of a grander plan that is coming true.”