Lent 1  

Opening Verse of Scripture Psalm 25:4

Show me your ways, O LORD, teach me your paths; guide me in your truth and teach me, for you are God my Saviour, and my hope is in you all day long.

Collect Prayer for the Day—Before we read we pray

Almighty God, whose Son Jesus Christ fasted forty days in the wilderness, and was tempted as we are, yet without sin: give us grace to discipline ourselves in obedience to your Spirit; and, as you know our weakness, so may we know your power to save; through Jesus Christ your Son our Lord, who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.

Heavenly Father, your Son battled with the powers of darkness, and grew closer to you in the desert: help us to use these days to grow in wisdom and prayer that we may witness to your saving love in Jesus Christ our Lord.

First Bible Reading Genesis 9.8–17

Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, ‘As for me, I am establishing my covenant with you and your descendants after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the domestic animals, and every animal of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark.I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of a flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.’ God said, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the clouds, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.’ God said to Noah, ‘This is the sign of the covenant that I have established between me and all flesh that is on the earth.’

Second Reading 1 Peter 3.18–22

For Christ also suffered for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, in order to bring you to God. He was put to death in the flesh, but made alive in the spirit, in which also he went and made a proclamation to the spirits in prison, who in former times did not obey, when God waited patiently in the days of Noah, during the building of the ark, in which a few, that is, eight people, were saved through water. And baptism, which this prefigured, now saves you—not as a removal of dirt from the body, but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers made subject to him.

Gospel Reading  Mark 1.9–15

In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’ And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him. Now after John was arrested, Jesus came to Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God,15and saying, ‘The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God has come near; repent, and believe in the good news.’

Post Communion Prayer

Lord God, you have renewed us with the living bread from heaven; by it you nourish our faith, increase our hope, and strengthen our love:
teach us always to hunger for him who is the true and living bread, and enable us to live by every word that proceeds from out of your mouth;
through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Commentary

The account of the flood was one of our readings for the Wednesday morning Zoom service a few weeks ago.  It’s an ancient story coming as it does, very early in the bible.  Earlier in Genesis we’ve had the creation accounts, followed by the story of Cain and Abel and then we are straight into the account of Adam’s lineage down to Noah, the story of the flood and, of course, the rainbow, literally ‘My bow in the clouds’.  Flood stories are not unique in ancient literature. In the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, Utnapishtim, the survivor of the flood, tells his story to Gilgamesh, and speaks of a vessel being built and birds being used to show an end to the flood.  In another, even earlier story, the Atrahasis Epic, the story again has parallels with the flood story in Genesis, and is an account of creation, a flood of destruction and subsequent re-creation.  However, what makes the Genesis story unique and separate from any earlier similar accounts or literary traditions is the relationship between God and humanity.  This is no Babylonian Epic saga, but a dramatic account of God’s intimate involvement with the world and its people all of which He created.  Genesis makes it clear that humankind, and creation itself, is valuable in God’s sight, so valuable in fact, that they can become parties to a Covenant with God Himself.  ‘I now establish my Covenant with you and your descendants after you….  … and with every living creature on earth’.  This is where we pick up the story in our Old Testament reading today.  Every time the Covenant is mentioned in the passage, living creatures seem to be deliberately included as if one of the elements of the Covenant is to bind human and animal destiny together.  Humans and the rest of creation bound up in the created order of things with a responsibility given to humans to take care of all creation on God’s behalf.  Noah, taking the animals into the ark is an example of this, humans taking responsibility for, and stewardship over, the preservation for another part of God’s creation.  The flood story reflects the first chapter of Genesis, where God takes the initiative, speaks, and creation happens.  Through Noah and his actions and the flood and its outcomes, the same Creator is in action again with His unilateral Covenant.  Salvation and blessing are at His prerogative and His alone, but they are offered to all.  Again, as He did to Adam and Eve earlier in Genesis (Gen 1 v 28) God commands that Noah and his descendants to ‘be fruitful and multiply’ (Gen 9 v 7).  Now also God promises never again to destroy the earth and its people, and gives a sign of the Covenant, the bow in the sky.  As sign that God Himself will remember, a reminder for God and a reassurance for Noah and his people.  It might rain again, but the sun would also shine again, and the rainbow would shine through.  Rainbows that appear when it’s raining, not when it’s only bright sunshine.  Rainbows that need rain to exist and remind of the everlasting Covenant that has been established between God and His people.  A reminder too that all life is dependent on God.

As we’ve all seen recently, the kind of rain that leads to flooding leaves behind it lots of mud when the sun comes out. Perhaps not on biblical postdiluvial levels, but mud which messes things up, can even ruin some places, and can take time to dry out and let the ground recover.  If we’ve been cycling, running, or walking through it, the mud needs cleaning and removing from the things we have used, our bikes, boots, shoes and clothes.  Ironically, it’s a component of mud, water, that we use to wash the clinging earth off and clear the mud away.  Lent can be a time for clearing away some of the metaphorical mud in our lives.  The things that cling to us that need washing away.  Perhaps Noah coming out of the flood waters and Jesus coming up out of the Jordan at His baptism are images for this.  Like the story of Noah and the Original Covenant, the account of Jesus baptism occurs early in the story of the creation of the New Covenant world.  As Jesus comes up out of the water, so the Spirit comes down from heaven as the skies are opened and God speaks his words of affirmation and commissioning.  The dove of life appears once again.  Water that symbolises cleansing, new life and salvation.  Symbolises passing through tribulation and trials, even death, so that we too can stand with the mud washed off before God.

But we know that story doesn’t end there, doesn’t end with God glorious declaration of who Jesus is, God Son, with who He is well pleased.  After coming up out of the Jordan, the Spirit doesn’t send Jesus to Jerusalem or the Temple, where we might have expected His ministry and mission to commence, the Spirit sends Jesus out into the desert where He was tempted by Satan and was with the wild animals.  Yet in the mud and desolation of the desert, Jesus was not deserted, angels attended Him.  Sometimes we think it never rains but it pours, we seem to go from one life crisis to another, often feeling that things happen all at once, one thing after another, often when we are feeling down.  It’s as if were lifting one foot out of the mud only for the other one to get sucked in.  The story of Noah, the account of Jesus’ baptism tells us that we are never alone, the God of all creation is with us always.  The mud can never win, even if it seems to suck us down sometimes.  Jesus offers the living water to wash it off.  Lent gives us the opportunity to reflect on what we might want to offer up for cleansing and renewal so we can finally see what God sees, that which is under the mud.

Sam Cappleman

Additional Material

Jesus begins his ministry in Mark’s Gospel with his baptism in the wilderness by John. There is no time for celebration, the same Holy Spirit of God which enters Jesus at Baptism drives Jesus directly out into the desert for a confrontation with the Devil. That confrontation will be prominent throughout the pages of the Gospel as Jesus is seen to confront evil and go about restoring to wholeness that which had been corrupted. It is God’s intention to take on evil and not to see Jesus avoid it. 

Perhaps the first thing to remind ourselves is that it is not possible to climb a mountain and see the whole world. We know that the world is round and not flat. So we must not be literal about what is 

taking place. What is going on is not that different from what goes on in each of our minds as we weigh up choices in life and try to make the right decisions. We are told that Jesus speaks with Satan, a Greek word, but in the New Testament lots of different names are used for the personification of evil including Beelzebul, the prince of demons Matt 12:4, the tempter Matt 4:3, Beliar 2 Cor 6:15, evil one 1 John 5:18 and Apollyon Rev 9:11. The depiction of this battle with a supernatural real being - an evil one (Eph 6:16, 1John 2:13-14), becomes explicit in the New Testament, especially in passages such as our reading from Mark today. Since the enlightenment there has been a tendency to move away from the personification of a Devil, to drop the ‘D’ and speak more of an impersonal force of evil. Nevertheless what is not in doubt is the presence of evil in our world and Mark shows that defeating evil is a priority for Jesus. 

The difficulty for Christians is where to identify evil. It is very easy to point the finger as politicians often do towards the behaviour of other countries. However it is transparently obvious that evil lies everywhere including the supposedly civilised and democratic west. To avoid the danger of identifying evil with anything or anybody controversial I would draw attention historically to the evil which pervaded churches and theology. Christians were corrupted by evil when they burned each other for supposed heresy. It was mainstream European culture which produced the Holocaust whose deep roots lay in several strands of European thought, including the writings of the protestant reformer Luther which fuelled a hatred for the Jews which would pave an easy path for Hitler to follow.

There are some familiar themes in these verses from Mark. The number of forty days is a significant feature, again not to be taken literally, it was to be taken less as a specific number and more a general expression of a long time. Think back through scripture and you will remember key events 

· God had caused it to rain for forty days and forty nights to cleanse the earth (Genesis 7:12). 

· The Israelites were in the wilderness forty years. 

· Moses spent forty days and nights on Mount Sinai (Exodus 24:18; 34:28), 

· Elijah journeyed forty days and forty nights to Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19:8).

We are told that Jesus is tempted by Satan and that word peirazo can mean tempt or test a person to do what is wrong. The assumption is made that Jesus can use this opportunity to choose what is right and there is a chance for failure and the devil hopes for success. This is significant and I am not sure our painting in a Picture Paints a Thousand words comes to terms with this. Jesus was not a comic book super hero. This was a time of trial for Jesus in which he was really hungry, this was a real battle with a real voice inside his head encouraging him to do the wrong thing, perhaps suggesting that it could be done for the right reasons. If it wasn’t then Jesus was not tempted in every way as we are it was just a sham. 

Jesus wrestled with real demons and real dangers during those forty days of temptation. 

Unlike Matthew and Luke, Mark does not offer us details about Jesus’s experience in the wilderness. We don’t learn what Satan’s specific temptations were, or how Jesus responded to them. All Mark gives us are a few terse sentences which tell us that the Spirit drove Jesus out into the wilderness, he was forced to take on evil by God. I believe that Mark wants us to know that Jesus struggled in that lonely inhospitable place filled with wild beasts. I have been to this area and seen the desert which has I am sure remained unchanged for thousands of years. It is very flat and very hot and dry, but I never saw any wild beasts and I am not sure what there would have been living there. There may be an allusion here to Psalm 91:11-13, which says:

“For he will put his angels in charge of you, to guard you in all your ways. They will bear you up in their hands, so that you won’t dash your foot against a stone. You will tread on the lion and cobra.

You will trample the young lion and the serpent underfoot.”

Mark’s Gospel was written at a time when Christians were being tortured by being thrown to wild beasts in Roman amphitheatres. Perhaps Mark is trying to say to those tempted to give up their faith that Jesus has a bad time of it as well. Even though he was faithful to God and was given the Spirit at his baptism, still he suffered great torment. 

Given the failure of Israel in the wilderness this is a moment for Mark to show the contrast between the old Israel and new. The Israelites had turned against God when Moses was too long on the mountain and instead made and worshipped a golden calf, Jesus will on his own take on the powers of darkness and prevail. Jesus was offered a way out, an escape, and so often we pray for escapes from the reality of the desert in which we live. In the temptations of Jesus we can see that like him we can be clearly both loved by God and still have to suffer the wilderness. The good news is that whilst there were wild beasts in the wilderness Jesus also discovered angels. There was no place where Jesus could go in which God was absent. Charles Royden 

Meditation

For the gospel writer Mark, Jesus’ baptism is the moment when Jesus’ true identify is given the seal of God’s divine approval.  From now on there can be no doubt.  The heavens being torn apart show a manifestation of God and a revelation of the Trinity as God the Father speaks over His Son and the Spirit descends on Jesus like a dove.  It’s a glorious moment of light and life and new beginnings.  Yet after His baptism, Jesus goes into the wilderness where He is tested for forty days.  Mark account of the temptation of Jesus is much shorter than the threefold challenge we read of in Matthew or Luke and there are less details regarding the specifics of testing and temptation.  But what we are told in Mark with no uncertainty is that Jesus emerges from the wilderness victorious against Satan.  It’s a scenario we’ll see repeated through the gospel where Jesus confronts and challenges the forces of evil in exorcisms and battles with unclean spirits.  Just as the wilderness experience revealed, Jesus is victorious over them.  It’s as if Mark is giving us a clue and a key to at least what part of Jesus’ mission and ministry is all about.  As the gospel unfolds, and as we move through Lent to Easter and beyond, we will see what the ultimate victory over such forces revealed as God’s indestructible love blazes out in the iridescent light of the resurrection and ascension.  As we journey through Lent, we are reminded that we too may have our own wilderness experiences, but through them all, the Son of God can never be overcome and remains with us always, whatever the circumstances and what we might feel.

Sam Cappleman

Additional Material

'Clean your room well, for good spirits will not live where there is dirt." 

At this time of year many people will be thinking of spring cleaning. Lent is a time when we are able to start clearing up after winter, it is not to cold to open the windows and clear away accumulated dust. This spring cleaning is something which Christians are encouraged to do in their own lives. We have an invitation to share with Christ in tackling our demons, to face temptations and to confront within ourselves the things which need clearing out. This is the time to sweep out the destructive habits that keep us focused on ourselves and our own selfish desires in order to focus on the truly important things of God. This takes time, which is why we church meetings in lent, to make a symbolic and practical statement about the need to think differently. Hopefully people will take time to share in our Lent Course which will have new things to think about. We can take time for special prayers and perhaps use the Bible reading scheme which Sam has prepared for us. Time will allow us to uncover the broken areas of our lives and have Jesus build us into people fit for his kingdom and ready for Easter ! Charles Royden 

Hymns

• As we are gathered
• When morning gilds the skies Tune: Laudes Domini
• God is building a house
• As the deer pants for the water
• The Kingdom of God Tune Hanover
• To him we come Tune Living Lord

Prayers for Sunday and the week ahead

Lord take our minds and think through them

Take our lips and speak through them

Take our hearts and set them on fire

With the desire to do your holy will

In the name of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

Loving Father, today is the first Sunday of Lent. 

Over the next six weeks, with your help, we are going to prepare for Easter.

From today we are making a new start with a bigger effort to be more loving and kind. 

Help us to show concern for the less fortunate, the hungry and the poor, and especially help us to speak to you more often.

We ask this through your Son, Jesus, whose death and resurrection we will be thinking about in the next few weeks. Amen. Tony Castle. 

Grant, we beseech thee, O Lord, that by the observance of this Lent we may advance in the knowledge of the mystery of Christ, and show forth his mind in conduct worthy of our calling; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Gelasian Sacramentary 

Come, our Light, and illumine our darkness.

Come, our Life, and raise us from death.

Come, our Physician, and heal our wounds.

Come, Flame of Divine Love, and burn up our sins.

Come, our King, sit upon the throne of our hearts and reign there.

For you alone are my King and my Lord. Dimitrii of Rostov

Additional Material

The passage from Mark tells us about the titanic struggle with evil which took place right at the start of the ministry of Jesus. He has just been through the uplifting experience of hearing the voice of God and seeing the heavens torn apart, then it is back down to earth with a bump and he is tempted to do the wrong thing. 

This is a struggle of cosmic proportions, Jesus takes on the Devil and the scene is played out in the wilderness where the nation of Israel had spent 40 years after their escape from Egypt. Jesus was in the wilderness forty days and the number is significant. Forty is a number often associated with intense spiritual experiences. God caused it to rain for forty days and forty nights to cleanse the earth (Gen. 7:12). The Israelites were in the wilderness forty years. Moses spent forty days and nights on Mount Sinai (Exod. 34:28), and Elijah journeyed forty days and forty nights to Mount Horeb (1 Kings 19:8).

We might think that, following the baptism, the angels would come to minister to Jesus or there would be some sort of celebration with the song of heavenly hosts. Nevertheless in all of the Gospels Jesus goes straight from his baptism into his temptation. We might think of his baptism as a commissioning and his temptation as a strengthening, toughening, hardening experience. Having made his choice of service to God, he immediately goes through basic training. 

We might be surprised that it is when Jesus makes the right decision and accepts the path of God that he is thrown into such immediate confrontation with the Devil. But if we are honest, it is when we are seeking to do the right thing that we are often brought into situations of conflict. If we want an easy life then we turn a blind eye, we avoid trouble and in so doing become collaborators, we are tainted also. 

Through the life of Jesus we can clearly see that he was not prepared to keep quiet about the abuses which surrounded him, much of which was organised by the religious leaders. It is good to remember that peace and tranquillity is not promised to the faithful Christian. Jesus lays down the expectation that the life of a Christian will not be characterized by a long series of high moments, but a rhythm of hills and valleys.

Mention is made of Jesus being with wild beasts, why would Mark mention wild animals? It is thought that Mark's Gospel was probably written in the 60s when Nero was having Christians torn to pieces. Given the ravaging of Christians by ferocious animals during Nero's reign, it is not difficult to imagine Mark including the unusual phrase 'with the wild beasts' in order to remind his Roman readers that Christ, too, was thrown to wild beasts, and as the angels ministered to him, so, too, will they minister to Roman Christians facing martyrdom. 

Wild animals also intensify the foreboding character of the wilderness, as Jesus confronts the horror, the loneliness and the danger with which the wilderness is fraught. Throughout Israel's history, the wilderness has been where the Israelites have been tested, often failing, but it is also where they have been deepened spiritually. Unlike the Israelites, Jesus will not fail his testing.

People do speak of evil, we all remember President Bush who famously declared that there was an ‘axis of evil’ out there somewhere, and that we have to find the evil people and stop them doing any more evil. Prime Minister Blair once declared ambitiously, that our aim must be nothing short of ridding the world of evil. The public and press cry ‘Evil’ at events such as the terrible Soham murders; and we say the same about the sudden rise of gun crime on our streets. 

The awareness of Evil and the willingness to use this spiritual word is perhaps surprising. As Christians our message must be clear, Jesus is not overpowered by evil - he has triumphed over the Devil and trust and obedience to him is the only way for us to defeat evil in all of its forms. Charles Royden

Commentary 

We have a wonderful reading from Mark today as we start Lent. We are told that Jesus sees "The heavens being split open." The Greek word is ‘schizomenous’. Schizo means "split," schizophrenia, for example, literally means "split mind." Perhaps Mark intends a reference to Isaiah 64:1: "Oh, that you would tear open the heavens and come down." After the splitting of the heavens, Jesus also sees "the Spirit like a dove descending into him." Not only did the Spirit "come down," it went into Jesus. As Jesus went into the Jordan, the Spirit now goes into Jesus. The plea of Isaiah is answered, and we are given a dramatic glimpse into how Jesus is fulfilling the hopes of generations. So also the baptism reminds us of the Red Sea and the forty days in the wilderness recalls the forty years the Israelites spent in the wilderness. The Promised Land now becomes a reality not in geographic terms but rather as Jesus opens the door to the kingdom of God. 

Jesus is baptised and we might expect that afterwards there would be some kind of celebration. Instead we read that Jesus is tempted in the wilderness by Satan. We are told that he is also "with the wild beasts." What is meant by this reference to wild beasts ? People in the first century might have identified the "wild beasts" with those spoken of by the prophet Daniel: "I, Daniel, saw in my vision by night the four winds of heaven stirring up the great sea, and four great beasts came up out of the sea, different from one another (7:2)." The "great beasts" of Daniel have been identified as the political powers of the world, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. Mark might therefore be proposing this confrontation: Satan and worldly political powers on the one side versus Jesus and the angels on the other. This theme will continue throughout Mark, for we are reminded that the worldly political powers are continuing to assert their influence. Immediately after Jesus' encounter in the wilderness, Mark tells us that John the Baptist has just been arrested by those same powers. Throughout the Gospel, Mark delivers a devastating political commentary. He is saying that the powers of the world--the Jerusalem establishment and Rome--are in league with Satan. Jesus' struggle with these demonic powers takes place in the political realm, i.e. this world, but Mark also wants his readers to understand that that struggle is also a spiritual, i.e. cosmic, battle. 

The New Testament gives us this idea of Satan who is the arch-enemy of God. And Jesus is engaged in a titanic battle and goes out for confrontation, note that Jesus is not tempted into the wilderness, it is the Spirit which takes him there. The Holy Spirit of God takes Jesus directly out into the desert for a confrontation with the Devil. That confrontation will be prominent throughout the pages of the Gospels as Jesus is seen to confront evil and go about restoring to wholeness that which had been corrupted. It is God’s intention to take on evil and not to see Jesus avoid it. What is evil and what should we do about it, does it exist and should we be afraid?

You might like to ask yourself whether you really believe in evil at all. Just as some people take God out of their world view and deny his spiritual force in the universe, so too others deny any evil force. On a daily basis we are confronted by stories and newspaper reports of terrible things taking place in our world. It can be tempting to think that humanity is progressing, becoming more civilised. But we know that the world doesn’t just advance steadily towards a better future. As soon as we become optimistic about human behaviour or the world in which we live, we are confronted by the terrible reality of all that is wrong within and around us. History repeats itself and as we look back we see the world express the same shock and surprise when things go wrong. It happened with events such as 9/11, or the holocaust. .

Some people do refuse to acknowledge the existence of evil and suppose that the world is basically a good place but they do so in the face of so much evidence to the contrary. The world and its problems are not solved by human means. Technology, education, development or ‘westernization’, political ideals of western democracy. None of these save us. There is no day when we will make things better, we must recognise the inevitable truth that there is no moral evolution, no social Darwinism. There is no steady march towards freedom and justice. Humankind does not have the solution to its core problem and so is not able to make itself advance. It’s not all about money as Marx said, it’s not all about sex as Freud said, neither is it all about power as Nietzsche said. There does exist evil and we must recognise evil so that we are not surprised by it and are able to deal with it.

Christian tradition has spoken of evil very seriously. Since the enlightenment there has been a tendency to move away from the personification of a Devil, to drop the ‘D’ and speak more of an impersonal force of evil. Nevertheless evil and its effects have been recognised. An understanding of evil resonates with what we instinctively know to be true. There is no need to go into great explanation of what is meant in ‘Star Wars’ when it speaks of the ‘Dark Side,’ because we all have one! 

Christians believe that evil really does exist as a power separate from God. Call it by whatever name you choose it was a real choice which Jesus had to make of what authority to follow. There is such a thing as a force, or forces, of evil which are supra-personal, supra-human, which appear to take over humans as individuals or, in some cases, as entire societies. Is it not also true that big commercial enterprises, corporations and institutions, industrial companies, governments and indeed churches, all of these have a have a kind of soul themselves? This corporate soul can become corrupted to the extent that even those running the enterprise can be subject to the power of the corruption and evil which has become endemic within. 

But as Christians we do not believe in any dualism, that is, an equal power like God. Evil comes out of creation, Satan is described as a created being, God has no equal and cosmic order will be restored. So we know that it is entirely to be expected that evil will not triumph over God. Humanity is seen locked in a struggle with evil. A battle is waged in every human heart and by heart I mean our spiritual, emotional and intellectual centre. The battle with evil is not something which was reserved for Jesus alone. We too are called to recognise evil when we see it and refuse to go down without a fight.

Life is about choices and decisions, how we live our lives, bring up our children, spend our money. The values which we think are important, education, consideration of others. When we do bad things, we can blame someone else, our upbringing our peers, yet most decisions are at least partly our own choice. In those choices we can all be influenced by God or evil. As Jesus had difficult choices to make so must we. We can choose as individuals to follow evil, it cannot overpower us. The choice is yours and mine.

The power of God is not compromised by evil, Satan is defeated, there is nothing about which we need be afraid. John Bunyan used the description of the Christian facing an adversary like a lion. Christian is walking down the road when to his horror he discovers a ferocious lion barring his path. There is no way that he can avoid this animal! Then to his delight he notices that the lion has been chained to a post. Someone has been that way before him and tamed the fearsome beast. Of course it is Jesus who chains evil in this episode and ultimately in the cross of Christ and we should recognise his struggles as our own. From this episode we know that we too have a choice to follow the higher power of God. Today you too can know that power of God in your situation. We should know that there is no power greater than God. Of what are you afraid? Why do you worry? There is no power stronger than the power of God and nothing of which we need be afraid. Charles Royden 

Commentary 

There are flood accounts from the Ancient Near East in other places apart from the Bible. The Atrahasis Epic and the Gilgamesh Epic speak of the chief god Enlil becoming angry at humankind and sending a flood to eliminate the ‘noise.’ The god Ea manages to warn a king and instructs him to build a boat for him, his family and skilled citizens. The pitch covered boat has seven stories. The storm last seven days and at the end birds are sent out to find land. The stories date from the second millennium and use material from the third millennium. Of course cultures looked at the flood and came to their own conclusions at that time. It is the same when natural disasters happen today, some religious folk will call a tsunami the punishment of God upon a particular wicked people who deserve punishment, others will see it as a natural disaster into which we must offer aid and support. 

Epistle 

In the New Testament reading 1 Peter we have a much more hopeful message. He compares the water of the flood to the water of baptism. Although only eight were saved in the Flood, baptism brings salvation to all. Baptism is something which cleanses, not physical dirt but the soul. It is not that the water used at baptism has some special effect, it is effective because baptism is the way that we express our trust in Jesus and in what he has achieved for us. The writer of 1 Peter, perhaps the Apostle Peter himself or his disciples, knew clearly the condition of humankind, troubled in conscience. The gift of God in Christ was to release us from that inner conflict and set us free to serve God. Peter knew that in Jesus we had God’s reassurance of sin forgiven because Jesus had gone into heaven and is at God's right hand--with angels, authorities and powers in submission to him. ‘ There was therefore no power from whom the Christian need be troubled or afraid. 

Gospel 

The Gospel reading records an episode from the life of Jesus in which he is shown to battle with the enemy in that conflict which will eventually be determined by victory over sin and death on the cross. After the baptism of Jesus he is led away into the desert and the inner turmoil of the human condition is shown to take place in the life of Jesus also. Jesus is shown tempted, surrounded by wild beast and angels. Many people will be able to look inside their own souls and understand the imagery of beasts and angels, the good and the bad at war within our own spiritual nature. In placing Jesus with wild beasts in the wilderness, Mark is making an important point. Protection from wild beasts was considered a sign of God’s blessing, remember Daniel and the lions? Yet there is more than this, the episode has the message of paradise restored. Where Adam had failed, Jesus was now setting things right. The peaceful existence with wild animals, the service of angels, overcoming Satan, all form part of the new order which Jesus brings. No wonder Jesus is shown to speak the words ‘ The time has come," he said. "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!" Charles Royden 

Prayers

Holy God, You make and remake us in your image; renew us now through the power of your Spirit that we may live our lives with integrity, not clinging to the ways of the world but choosing the way of your truth. Amen. 

Holy Lord, you made water a sign of your kingdom. Through the waters you saved Noah and his family. Through your Son, you promised forgiveness to those who are baptized. By the gift of the Spirit we are inheritors of eternal life. When our lives are shaken by the storms and droughts of this world, remember your promise and bring us to life in you. Amen

A Prayer for Reconciliation 

Gracious God, ruling the earth and its people not by terror but in love; we worship you. We confess that too often our words hurt others and our deeds are selfish; forgive us. In this time of uncertainty and fear, help us to love our enemies and do good to those who hate us, in the name of Jesus our Lord. Amen. 

Two Prayers for Peace 

Almighty Father, whose will is to restore all things in your beloved Son, the king of all: govern the hearts and minds of those in authority, and bring the families of the nations, divided and torn apart by the ravages of sin, to be subject to his just and gentle rule; who is alive and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

O God, who would fold both heaven and earth in a single peace: Let the design of thy great love lighten upon the waste of our wraths and sorrows: and give peace to thy Church, peace among nations, peace in our dwellings, and peace in our hearts: through thy Son our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen