March 10 Sermon

Luke 4:1-13

This past year a man by the name of Jay Speights, a minister who lives in Rockville, Maryland, found out something very interesting from the results of a DNA test. He had used the company Ancestry, which, among others, traces the ethnic backgrounds of one’s forebears, including the parts of the world in which they had originated.

Well, “[h]e was identified as the distant cousin of a man [who was] a descendant of a royal line in [the small African nation] of Benin. He then used another DNA database, “the website [of which] lit up with the following information. It said ‘royal DNA!’”

Not later, by chance, Rev. Speights met a man from that country visiting in the U.S. The minister mentioned to him his ancestral name, which the man immediately recognized. The visitor then gave him contact information for the present-day king. The minister spoke with the king’s wife

—who knew how to speak English, and was later told that he was a prince! The royal family invited him, for a time, to be their houseguest, an offer he quickly accepted. So, in January he flew to Benin. Disembarking from the plane, “he saw what looked like a festival, hundreds of people dancing and playing instruments and singing. It took him several minutes to realize it was a welcome party—for him.”

After “learning local customs and visiting various sites and dignitaries,[in a special ceremony, h]e was enthroned by the king, given white lace robes to signal He [was] a holy man, and several crowns.” All in all, it was a wonderful trip!

Isn’t that something? I’m now thinking since such a thing happened to that minister, why not me? So I can’t wait now to get my DNA analyzed! (But with my luck, I’m probably descended

from a family of scoundrels.)

A person’s basic identity can make such a difference in life. And that’s what’s at the heart of today’s gospel—the identity of Jesus. In the passage that immediately comes before today’s reading, Jesus is at the River Jordan, being baptized by John. It’s a reading that always comes near the beginning of the Epiphany Season. As we know, immediately after Jesus’ baptism, a voice from heaven speaks these words: “You are my son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.” That is Jesus’ identity. That’s who he is—the Son of God.

But when the Spirit drives him out into the wilderness, where he fasts for forty days and nights, the devil tries to take away from him who he is. As one commentator has suggested, the devil tries to commit identity theft against Jesus. That’s what the temptations are all about. As the commentator puts it: “…each of the temptations seeks to erode and undercut Jesus’ confidence in [his] relationship with God and therefore undermine Jesus’ identity.” “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become a loaf of bread….If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from [the roof of the temple]…”

In Jesus’ weakened state after all those days alone and without any physical sustenance, the

devil thinks he not only can damage his relationship with his heavenly Father, but even destroy it. Yet Jesus knows who he himself is. And he refuses to give that up. So, for the time being, the devil leaves him.

Like Jesus in today’s Gospel, our identity, our relationship with God is something often enough in danger of being stolen. In baptism, each of us becomes a child of God—a daughter, a son claimed by our heavenly Father. That’s our bedrock identity. But look at how much the pressures of the world—temptations, if you will—that try to redefine us. Think of the images pushed on us by what buy or the services that we receive—or don’t. Are we not tempted to identify ourselves by the clothes that we wear, the cars that we drive, the zip code that we do or don’t live in?

Or how about what we do for a living? Or what we did before retirement? May not that be a temptation? Seeking to find one’s identity in what one does? Here’s an example. My father’s father was addicted to alcohol. In turn, instead of becoming an alcoholic, my father became a workaholic. When he decided to retire from farming, he also decided to sell his machinery. At the auction—as each piece of equipment was sold—he began feeling a small part of himself disappear. At the end—as it seemed to him at the time—there was really very little of himself left, because he had relied too much of what he did than on who he was.

Another example is a dear friend of ours. She and her husband are now empty nesters. He being a good provider for the family, she wanted to and was able to stay at home with the children. Since their son and two daughters are virtually on their own, a big role in her life has finally come to an end. She asks herself, “What now?”

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The identity of Jesus led to his vocation, his mission in life. Who he was—and is—determines what he did and continues to do. Not the other way around. God’s words at his baptism come first. Only later does his actual ministry begin—when he preaches in his hometown synagogue, declaring he has come to bring good news to those who so desperately need to hear that, to know that.

As Christians, we find our identity flowing from the waters of baptism. We are born again and declared daughters and sons of the Father—as children of God—all of us. Only later do we take up our vocations, that is, what we do for a living—or when we serve as volunteers in one place or another. But again, those are roles that we play. Those are things that we do. But they do not actually define who we are. Instead, they flow from, they come from that, rather than being in and of themselves the same thing as our identity.

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A few years ago, at a commissioning and ordination ceremony for those about to serve 

congregations in a particular conference of the United Methodist Church, a longtime pastor, Kenneth Carder, shared with them how important it is to keep that constantly before them—

who they are rather than the various roles, duties, and other responsibilities they would soon take on, that they would soon perform. 

Although his message was addressed to them, the words that he spoke can be applied to any Christian. In his message, he referred to them as “beloved daughters and sons of God” no less than 10 times! He wanted that burned into their minds and their hearts. Finally, he reminded them that their mission is to show in word and deed how true that is for everyone. This is what he says near the end of his message: 

God is bringing [in] a new world—a world in which all persons know and are treated as beloved sons and daughters of God, a world in which all barriers are removed and the human family is one, a world in which the least and most vulnerable have all they need to be fully who they are as God’s beloved…”

In our baptismal identity, you—and I—we know who we are and whom we belong to. So our job, our mission, our vocation is simply to tell, to let others know—that through the love of Jesus they also will discover who they truly are.