Lent: No More Happy Talk

It's the first Sunday in Lent, so Christians know what that means: no more happy talk.

The Gospel was from Luke 4, which describes how Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness, where the devil tempted Him to use His power to feed Himself, seize authority over all the kingdoms of the world, and show that the angels will guard Him from harm. Jesus, of course, turned down the devil. On the latter temptation the lady minister said:

And then there’s what I see as a temptation to see God as the cosmic protector. If we believe all will be well, our lives will run smoothly. We’re going to be sheltered from all those bad things that happened to other people, people who don’t believe like we do, right? We won’t even dash our foot against the stone-- that’s what scripture says, right?

But God doesn’t prevent bad things from happening to us. That’s not how it works. Some people are miraculously healed. Others aren’t. Some might lose their home in a flood or a fire. Others don’t. Some people die at the hands of others, or in plane crashes or natural disasters, and some people seem to live lives of ease while others endure great suffering. I don’t know why. Things happen and at times it seems that there is no rhyme or reason.

Lent is a time of reflection, and of the testing of the faith with age-old questions of why bad things happen to good people and innocent babies, and why a just God would allow a terrible thing to happen. The usual words of comfort seem hollow, and we are in the wilderness.