Encounter: Temptation
Jesus Removes Concupiscence
Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7; Matthew 4:1-11
Rev. Tim Callow
Preached Sun. Feb. 26th, 2023
The Venerable Fulton Sheen told a story about Adam going out for a walk with his young sons Cain and Abel. Heading west they come across the entrance to Eden. From a distance they can see the cherubim with his flaming sword, baring the way. Preventing Adam from ever returning to paradise again. He looks back to his sons and says with a sigh, “kids, this is where your mother ate us out of house and home.”
Of course, Adam is not being honest here. Perhaps, we can chalk up his comment to the effects of sin. We heard this morning how God planted a garden and appointed Adam to till and keep it. It was a very good deal. He was allowed to eat freely of every tree in the garden. But there was only one tree whose fruit was forbidden: the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil.
True it is Eve who encounters the serpent. A creature, we are told, who was craftier than any other wild animal God had made. The serpent tells Eve that if she eats the fruit she will certainly not die, but will be made like God. With the words of the serpent in mind she notices the fruit is desirable to the eyes, looks good to eat, and can even make her wise. Now it was Adam who received the command not to eat it, and Adam’s responsibility to intervene. But he doesn’t. You see, he’s there the whole time. And when Eve offers him the fruit he eats.
It was not just Eve who ate the first family out of house and home.
This story of of the temptation of our first parents, and their fall, is contrasted with the account of our brother and Lord Jesus Christ. He too is tempted by Satan. And they are enticing temptations. First, the starving man is tempted to break his fast by turning stones into bread. But he counters with Scripture, “One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” The words he awaits in his fast.
Seeing he’s getting nowhere Satan takes him to Jerusalem and places him on the pinnacle of the Temple. He tells him to cheat death and jump because the Bible promises God’s protection. But Jesus says “it is written, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
Getting frustrated Satan takes Jesus to a very high mountain and gives him a vision of all the kingdoms in the world, all their wealth and splendor. And he promises Jesus it can all be his, if he will only bow down and worship him. That might seem like a bargain. But Jesus will not take the world by the devil’s means. So he casts Satan out.
Adam is disobedient, Jesus is obedient. Adam sins, Jesus is righteous. When we sin we are like our father Adam. But when we have faith we are like our brother and Lord Jesus. Jesus confronts Satan and resists his temptations to show us that it is possible: through him.
But what makes Jesus different than Adam? Or Eve? You might say he’s God, and very well, but he’s also completely and utterly human. You might say Jesus is without sin, but so where Adam and Eve. There is something that goes wrong for Adam, wrong for Eve, that also goes wrong for us. But it doesn’t go wrong for Jesus. And identifying that will help us as we continue our journey through Lent.
When the serpent tempts Eve, and reveals the fruit of the knowledge of Good and Evil will not kill her, we are told she, “saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was a delight to the eyes, and that the tree was to be desired to make one wise.” She looks at the tree and her desire is inflamed. And while she once looked at the tree as something harmful or dangerous, she now looked at the tree and saw it was “good.”
When we sin it is the same. I do not think anyone sins because they wish to do something harmful or dangerous. At least not in the moment. We sin because we think it’s good to be angry, or it’s good to be greedy, or our envy is justified. We sin because our desires are inflamed, and we have delight in the wrong things.
But it’s more than simply having our desires inflamed. Because surely Jesus’ desire was inflamed by the notion of warm bread. Few things are better when you’re starving. Or surely Jesus was enticed by the promise of cheating death. Who wouldn’t be? It’s about acting on those desires, looking for nothing more than self-fulfillment and disregarding the commands of God.
There’s a big word for this in Christian moral theology. Consider it our word of the day. And that word is concupiscence. The word comes from latin, literally meaning “I desire strongly.” It names our tendency to earnestly and deeply desire the wrong things. To have our hearts inflamed for things of the world, things of the flesh, and not the things of God. Martin Luther characterized it as being curved in on oneself. Sin in our life makes us self-absorbed, and desire nothing more than simple self-satisfaction. But the more self-absorbed you become, the more self-satisfaction you satisfy, the more miserable you become. Because we are not meant to be curved in on ourselves, we are meant to be open to God and others. The creatures that curve in on themselves, in the end, are the dead.
Adam and Eve have this concupiscence, this curving in on themselves. They desire the fruit, against God’s commands, because it looks good to eat and offers a promise they don’t quite understand. Jesus does not have this concupiscence. He is not curved in on himself. He lives for others. He is truly free. And would free us as well.
The next few weeks we will witness Jesus encountering others who are burdened by the effects of sin, and how he opens them up to grace. By extension too, we will see how we may be opened up.