The Ash Wednesday detour behind us, we return to our gospel passage for Sunday and its two whole sentences about Jesus’ forty days of testing in the wilderness. Mark may be short on details about the actual temptations Jesus faced, but he does include an odd note: “He was in the wilderness for forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.”
Were I an artist, I would paint a beautiful wolf and a chipmunk and maybe an owl hanging out with Jesus, with tuxedo-clad angels hovering around carrying trays. This line echoes stories about the prophet Elijah, who at one point during his time on the lam from the wicked Queen Jezebel, was fed by angels, and another incidence when he was fed by ravens. Is Mark drawing the parallel to Jesus as the new Elijah?
Wild beasts and angels: two kinds of creatures over which human beings have no control. Was that part of Jesus’ trial? To have to rely on help he couldn’t control, to prepare him for a life in which he had to depend on others for basic sustenance? Or are these two kinds of creatures over which ordinary humans have no control, but who acknowledge Jesus’ authority and help him out? Mark doesn’t tell us. Mark doesn’t even tell us that Jesus fasted for the forty days – Matthew and Luke throw that in. Maybe Jesus’ sojourn in the wilderness was not so much about withstanding deprivation as boot camp for the spirit.
Today we fully dwell in the season of Lent – we’ve left the threshold day of Ash Wednesday and make our first foray into whatever wilderness we might find ourselves led. Let’s keep our eyes out for “wild beasts” – companions who might at first seem scary, but could have gifts for us. These “wild beasts” may be other people, ambitious callings, wrestlings with failure. They may even come from inside us, what Jungians would call the “shadow,” parts of us, even buried or wounded parts, that are calling us to look, notice, welcome, re-integrate. Making changes in our daily life, allowing more silence or space, can invite these parts of us out of hiding. If we can bear with the discomfort their presence elicits, we might be able to receive their gifts and experience some healing.
And let’s stay tuned to the presence of angels bearing the gifts we need to most fully benefit from this Lenten sojourn. We do not do this work of growing in God alone.
Some American Indian traditions teach that, whenever we encounter a wild creature, it has a message for us. I pray we experience some wildness this Lent, within and without, and just enough angelic waiters, as we wait upon the Spirit.
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