The Wilderness and the Pandemic

Sermon by Andrew Krahn on 1 Peter 3:18-22 and Mark 1:9-15.

“What is a Mennonite doing preaching on the first Sunday of Lent in an Anglican church?” you may be asking yourself. I was certainly asking myself this question as I was preparing this sermon. My experience with the season of Lent to date has been much like my experience with the ocean. I’ve dipped my toes in, and even dared to swim briefly in the waves before my prairie senses sprang back to me and I hurried back to shore. Until this week I had participated in two Ash Wednesday services, and I led them both — never quite certain if I was doing it right. And I’ve made attempts at Lenten fasts before, but they were little more than delayed New Years’ resolutions, and they lasted about as long. But I’m eager, keen, even thirsty to learn from this season. So if Lent seems a foreign land to you then I’m excited to have a fellow inexperienced traveller together with me. And if you find yourself quite accustomed with the landscape of Lent, if you find it to be — if not comfortable — at least familiar and expected, then I’m rather pleased to be in the company of experienced guides.

Our gospel reading this morning comes to us in the typical rush of the Markan account. In six sentences we cover Jesus’ baptism, the heavens being torn open and the voice of God blessing Jesus as the spirit alights on him like a dove, Jesus’ trials in the wilderness, the arrest of John and the opening of Jesus’ ministry. If the gospel writer seems in a rush we might be tempted to rush onward too, abandoning these terse words for what appears to be fuller, richer, deeper fare. Let’s not. Let’s linger. At least a little.

Morna D. Hooker notes that the account of Jesus’ baptism points us from the very beginning of the account toward Jesus’ crucifixion. The gospel of Mark makes clear this connection in chapter 10. When James and John ask Jesus to sit at his right and left hands when he comes into glory, Jesus responds, “You do not know what you are asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, or be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?” Christ’s ultimate baptism is his death. The connection is further made with the words spoken over Jesus, “You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” which are echoed again at the Transfiguration when Elijah and Moses join Jesus, Peter, James and John on a mountaintop, “This is my Son, the Beloved; listen to him!” and once more finally at the moment of Jesus’ death, this time in the words of the centurion, “Truly this man was God’s Son!” Both the imagery of baptism, and the words spoken over Jesus link this scene with the crucifixion scene.

Then, with Jesus’ death firmly foreshadowed, Mark turns us quickly toward the wilderness using his favourite word, immediately. “And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.”

There’s some irony about rushing out toward the wilderness, it’s not like there’s much to do there. If we assume as the Matthew account indicates that Jesus is fasting the whole time, Jesus won’t be very busy. He’s not Bear Grylls crafting animal snares and hunting for cockroaches. If we compare, Matthew’s account has much milder language. It says, “Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness…” But in Mark it happens immediately. Jesus is driven by the Spirit. I doubt there are many of us who would rush into a wilderness experience, but I expect that there are more than a few who can identify with being forced into one. Driven, as it were.

The global pandemic we are now in is a curious sort of wilderness it seems to me. On the one hand it’s the opposite of wild. We’ve sterilized everything. We’ve returned to plastic packaging with a vengeance in efforts to keep what’s inside clean and virus free. A wilderness seems to be made for wandering, but we’re all doing our best to stay home. I hope that most of us listening here are not facing a deprivation of food — though this pandemic has inflicted economic hardship, and I expect we have not heard all there is to hear about how it has affected the poor — some of us may have even turned to food as a comfort in this time.

But there is something very wild about the virus, isn’t there. We can’t see it. It moves in secret like a sly predator. It’s altogether untamed — at least it is for the majority of the world waiting for a vaccine.

And the isolation is certainly wilderness-like. There’s a lot less to do. Certainly if your notion of “doing” usually includes being together with other people. Outside of our household and perhaps two friends, a mask and a six foot buffer exists between us and everyone else. Necessary as it may be, there is real deprivation in play here. We can’t embrace one another, or shake hands, or high-five, or break bread together — at our dinner tables or here at the eucharist table.

So what does it mean to observe Lent this year? Some of us are loath to let any comforts go when much has already been taken away. And for some, taking on a new thing, a new practice or devotion feels overwhelming. Our emotional capacities may already be overextended by this vast, strange wilderness we find ourselves in. It feels as if we’ve moved from Advent straight to Lent like some Narnian winter. Always winter and never Christmas. We’ve had enough of the wilderness and Lent has only just begun.

But as in the Exodus when God travelled with his people in the desert, so too Christ is driven alongside us into this wilderness. And as God provided manna for his people, we are fed by the body of Christ — even if it’s in our own homes and apart from one another. We don’t observe Lent because we’re so miserable and wretched that we could never see God unless we do some proper penance beforehand. We observe Lent because God entered the wilderness long before us and we’re chasing after — hoping, expecting, to meet God there. To meet Jesus there. God with us. And look, already those Advent texts from Isaiah that we are familiar with are being fulfilled in Jesus. A way for us is being paved in the desert, with Jesus leading the way. He is with the wild beasts, but they do not attack or maim. See? The Kingdom of God is near at hand. So repent and believe.

Try as I might to think otherwise, deep down I’ve been convinced that the work of both repentance and belief is up to me. That if I am to turn, to reorient myself toward Christ — toward the cross (and the resurrection, but we’ll get to that in good time at Easter), I must do it on my own. Fueled, perhaps, by some powerful belief. A powerful faith. If faith the size of a mustard seed can move mountains, surely I can muster up faith enough to turn myself. Right? After all, religion is private. My faith is personal, not public. That’s the glory of modernity.

But Jesus' words here, “repent, and believe” they aren’t singular, they’re plural. You can’t hear it in English, but in Greek it’s quite plain. Now I suppose Jesus could be saying, “you — all of you — all of you isolated monads — repent, and believe in the good news. And do it on your own.” But I don’t think he is.

What if I repented, what if I turned toward the good news — toward the kingdom of God — not out of personal gumption, stick-to-itiveness, blood, sweat, and tears, but because I belonged to a group of people who all repented together. All turned together. A group of people who believed together. Whose faith — far from rejecting those who are struggling — supports, and uplifts those who have little, who are poor in spirit. A group of people whose faith collectively carries one another as they move toward the hope of the kingdom of God. Call this group the Church. Call it the body of Christ. Who are led and guided by Jesus. Not by our own blood, sweat and tears, but by his.

So if you come to Lent this year already overwhelmed by the wilderness, without strength enough to give something up or take something up. Don’t. Instead allow yourself to be taken up by your fellow wanderers in the wilderness. Let the faith and velocity of the church around you carry you. Find ways to be together— even if we can’t be together in person. And I know we’re all Zoom fatigued, but we’ve been able to communicate with one another long before the internet arrived. Call each other. Write. Pray together. Join us at evening prayer on Facebook at 5pm on weekdays. Go to saint ben’s website and find the Fasts and Feasts link and learn how you can participate in what the church is doing together.

And if you find yourself already buoyed up, already carried, with energy to do — by all means don’t keep it to yourself. Reach out in faith, hope and love to others around you. Especially those who may be feeling without the capacity to reach out on their own. And let’s repent together. Let’s turn together. Let’s turn toward Christ. Let’s turn with Christ. I think we’ll find that the wilderness is not as empty as it seems. There’s food enough to be sated with Jesus leading and feeding us.