Gospel Reflection

Luke 4:1-13

Temptation is an experience familiar to us all, and we know that it has been part of human life since the beginning. But it is not something experienced by other creatures, with the exception of the angels at the first stage of their existence. Animals do not know temptation, because they are not rational. Their behaviour is governed by instinct, training, and adaptation. They are not really free in the way we are. They do not see into the future, reflect on the past, or know what is beyond their senses. Here on earth only men and women are tempted. They are tempted when they experience a desire to harbour some thought, utter some word or act in some way which their reason, their conscience, dictates is wrong. This knowledge— we call it morality—is based on a deeper understanding of life and the way we should live it as human beings. It takes into count the final and most important goal of our existence—to be with God and to be like Him. To love as God loves. To be in communion with Him and with others. We are capable of understanding that this is our definitive happiness, in which all other goods will be contained and in the right proportion. 

 Unfortunately, since the time of Adam and Eve, we have all too often failed to resist wrongful desires. Once Adam committed that first (original) sin, which was really very deliberate and not the result of strong emotions, temptations have multiplied and so have sins. This was because the intimacy with God was lost and, therefore, an imbalance arose in our very selves, who were meant to live in communion with Him.

A sin is a wrongful action committed with an awareness that it contradicts the love of God and the love God has shown toward us. But sin and temptation are not one and the same thing. We may be tempted many times a day and yet not sin, because we say “no” to the temptation and “yes” to God, “yes’ to what is the greater good.

 Temptations arise because of things which may be good in themselves, but which for us, or for us in that moment or circumstance, or for others involved, represent a disorder, a danger or a definite harm. Once we see that, we ought to say “no.” Yet how weak and quickly confused we can often become! Bad habits, selfishness, pride, vanity, the bad example of others, peer pressure, laziness and love of comfort, money, power or sensual pleasures all can rear their heads at one time or another. All too often we might find ourselves giving in. 



 Our Lord Jesus Christ took upon himself a human nature that was as real as ours and he became like us in everything except sin. Jesus knew what our human experience of temptation was like. He submitted himself to it, as we see in Luke’s Gospel account today. In resisting certain extreme temptations which Satan himself devised to test the mettle of this man he suspected was the Messiah, Jesus has helped us to see beyond the fantasies and fallacies we experience. He has reminded us of the loyalty we owe to a loving and generous God. He has shone us the way to true freedom and the fullness of our human vocation to love and to reflect the goodness of God.

As Saint Augustine put it: “If in Christ we have been tempted, in him we overcome the devil. Do you think only of Christ’s temptations and fail to think of his victory? See yourself as tempted in him, and see yourself as victorious in him. He could have kept the devil from himself; but if he were not tempted he could not teach you how to triumph over temptation.” And again: “For our life in this sojourning cannot be without temptation: because our advance is made through our temptation, nor does a man become known to himself unless tempted, nor can he be crowned except he shall have conquered, nor can he conquer except he shall have striven, nor can he strive except he shall have experienced an enemy, and temptations.” (St Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 61, 2)