Luke 4:3 – March 7, 2022

The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” Luke 4:3 NABRE                

Jesus is ready to leave a time in the desert and is greeted by the devil. The devil challenges Jesus with three temptations. Henri Nouwen a popular spiritual author declares the three temptation have meaning for us, the temptations try to make us believe, we are what we have, we are what people say about us, and we are what we can do. These are false identities. This is the true trick of these temptations, the devil says to Jesus, “If you are the Son of God.” It is about getting us to doubt who we are. We are not who our ego wants us to be, we are created in the image and likeness of God. We are the beloved children of God, united with Him. God has been trying to tell humanity from the beginning we are united to Him. The great illusion, or the trick the devil is using, is that we sin making us doubt, so we believe we are separated from God. This is often the representation of sin, to be separated and we often are told because we sin we are not worthy of God. We fail some worthiness test and are made to doubt God’s love for us.

But in fact for us sin is not a separation, it represents little naughty behaviors. This is merely a symptom, it does not represent who we are. We are connected. We are invited to the kingdom of God and we can’t “do” anything to earn our way there, we just have to be there. We think we must be moral to be with God but this is not the case. First we are with God and then we are almost naturally moral, not even wanting to sin. We hear a sinners prayer, “O God, be merciful to me a sinner.” (Luke 18:13.) The question isn’t about sin or worthiness, God has already made us His. Don’t listen to the doubts, you are God’s; united, connected, beloved. Nothing else identifies you.

Can you earn God’s love? Who do you say you are?

The question isn't about sin or worthiness, God has already made us His. Don’t listen to the doubts, you are God’s; united, connected, beloved. Nothing else identifies you. Click To Tweet

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