Thursday, March 6, 2014

EMMDEV 2014-03-06 [Lent2014] 39. Forty...

MT 4:1 Then Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. 2 After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 The tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." Matthew4:1-3

40 is a lovely number in the Bible - it's about preparation and letting God break through to/for us. Just some examples:
- Moses was on the mountain with God for 40 days
-It took the spies 40 days to search out the promised land
-The Israelites spent 40 years in the wilderness
-Goliath taunted Israel for forty days before being killed by David
-Elijah walked for forty days to Mount Horeb
-Jesus fasted for 40 days in the wilderness at the start of His ministry

Waiting is hard!
- We feel powerless and out of control
- We end up having to confront the worst in ourselves
- We often discover that our faith is shallower than we thought

Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness. Waiting.
After the waiting came temptation - but I think the waiting can be tempting too. You can watch a lovely video and song about Jesus' fast and temptation at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWKRhk-yYI0

As we prepare for Easter, there is waiting.
This waiting brings to mind the times we have waited outside an operating theater, waited for test-results, waited for a job-application to be responded to, waited for a lost child to come home, waited for forgiveness after an apology.

Waiting is hard - but Matthew reminds us that Jesus waited to and was tempted face to face by Satan. He knows what we are going through. He waits with us.


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Theo Groeneveld theo@emmanuel.org.za
You can see past EmmDevs at http://emmdev.blogspot.com/