The User Guide to Avoiding Sin

Jesus provides practical illustrations of how to confront temptation - we just need to remember that we are all tempted at a human level, as Jesus was tempted in a divine way.

By Mark McDermott

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Having not personally experienced an apparition of Satan (I pray), the forty-day struggle with fasting and temptation of Jesus in the desert may not seem very realistic to us. But there is a quite practical message underneath: this encounter with Jesus’s humanity is a “user’s guide” for sin and its reciprocal, the love of God.

            Fully divine, Jesus could have destroyed Satan and shirked all temptation. Jesus doesn’t for the same reason that God created us with freewill: love must be a choice. Love of God, and rejection of evil, is something that Jesus, being human, also chose to do to show how we humans can choose to love God amidst any trial. Indeed, this choice of love shows how to identify sin in each dimension of our being: physical, mental, and spiritual.

            In the physical temptation, Jesus is taunted by Satan: “ ‘If you are the Son of God’ ” (Luke 4:3). It is this imperative, and not the hunger for bread itself, that comprises Satan’s invitation to sin. It is not sinful to eat – in fact, if we could invent a machine that rendered bread from stones, world hunger might be immediately resolved. Rather, the sin in this temptation would have been for Christ to use his gifts only to prove his own power, and not for the love and service of the Father. The Son of God is asked for a deific deed to win the devil’s esteem. None of us are God Incarnate, so the devil stoops down to our level:

“If you are the most fit, show it with your media posts and outfits.”

“If you are so stressed, you should eat so much/so little, watch this program, avoid these tasks, etc.”

The devil invites us to use our bodies for our own glorification and comfort, not for God’s. Jesus rejected sin, not by staying hungry, but by committing his physical self to “every word that comes forth from the mouth of God” (Deuteronomy 8:3, Matthew 4:4).

Likewise, in the temptation of the mind, Satan appeals to ambition by offering Jesus reign of the kingdoms of the Earth. This part of the reading reveals yet more about the nature of sin: Jesus already was and is the King of the Universe, so Satan is offering what is not his. This shows that it is in fact the ploy of evil to gain influence to pretend that what God has given is not ours. Many of us struggle with a notion that we are not enough as we are, as God created us. This leads to the urge to devote ourselves to something other than our God-given purpose in order to be satisfied, or to flaunt our achievements to demonstrate our worthiness:

“If you are the best at the company, earn more than everyone else and have a fancy house and car.”

“If you are the best on your team, win the championship and sport the fanciest equipment.”

Jesus’s response in the desert reminds us that God has made us who we are meant to be. Any wish for more than that for our own sakes brings not only ourselves, but whatever we accomplish into the realm of evil.

Finally, there is the temptation of the spirit, of our souls, as the devil recites the psalm extolling the devotion of God to the faithful, inviting Jesus to show how he has the favor of God. The significance of this particular sin traces back to the commandments: “You shall not invoke” – or, more literally translated, “carry” – the name of the Lord, your God, in vain. For the Lord will not leave unpunished anyone who invokes his name in vain” (Exodus 20:7). Only this commandment appears to revoke the prospect of forgiveness. Indeed, if forgiveness stems from faith, but even our faith in God is devoted to self-interest, then “we have received our reward” in this world instead of salvation with God. Our faith in God must be for the power that is truly His. Our God is not like the Gods of mythology, who are summoned by human requests for human needs. Our faith entrusts our lives to God and His judgement, which surpasses any human trial or test.

Jesus thus shows how we can overcome all manifestations of sin: the sins that claim we are more than we are, others that degrade us as not enough, and others that ask God to serve us rather than the other way around. Threading all of these sins together is a discord between how we see ourselves and what God intended us for. God created us, “and found it very good”: we have all the ability, power, and conscience that we need, if we stay open to God’s presence.