Marking Memories

1st Sunday in Lent (C)

Readings: Jeremiah 17:5-8; Psalm 1:1-4, 6; 1 Corinthians 15:12, 16-20; Luke 6:17, 20-26

Picture: katiebordner on Flickr

My dear friends, what happens when we take off a watch, or a ring, or a pair of glasses that we’ve worn for some time? Don’t each of these things often leave a mark on our skin? The watch on the wrist, the ring on the finger, the glasses on the bridge of the nose. The body bears a memory of the burden it once carried. Of course, marks like these often fade with time. But some do not. Like how our muscles retain the memory of riding a bicycle. So that once the skill is acquired, it’s not easily lost. Which is fine, when it’s something helpful, like cycling. But what if it’s something harmful? What to do when, for example, the body is marked by trauma or addiction, leaving painful memories that refuse to go away?

Isn’t this the question Moses is helping the Israelites to address in the first reading? For generations, they had suffered the trauma of harsh slavery in Egypt. Until God heard their cry of distress, and sent Moses to rescue them. But even after the yoke of oppression was lifted, Israel continued to bear its ugly marks. The people kept acting like slaves. Resisting the guidance of the Lord, and even begging to return to Egypt. Isn’t this why their journey to freedom took so long? Forty years of wandering in the wilderness. And now, even as they finally arrive at the doorstep of the Promised Land, the people are still marked by slavery. Which makes their destination a dangerous place for them. For the land doesn’t just flow with milk and honey. It’s also occupied by many other peoples, who worship foreign gods. Gods by whom the Israelites could easily allow themselves to become enslaved. What to do? To counteract the effects of the old memories of slavery, Moses helps the people form new memories of freedom. He prescribes rituals for them to observe, including the one in the reading: the offering of the first fruits of the harvest. Which includes a pronouncement with the lips, an offering with the hands, and a bow––a sign of the heart’s submission to God. Through these rituals Israel allows her body to be inscribed with the moving memory of all that her merciful God has done for her. The Lord heard our voice and saw our misery… the Lord brought us out of Egypt…. He brought us here and gave us this land…

With the Israelites, we Christians share a similar spiritual itinerary. We too have been rescued from slavery. Not the oppression of Egypt, but the burden of sin. By his Passion, Death and Resurrection, Jesus mercifully leads us from the slavery of sin to the freedom of God’s kingdom. But again, like the Israelites, we too continue to bear the marks of oppression. We remain prone to enslavement by false gods, like money and popularity. We need to allow our bodies to be inscribed with the life-giving memory of what Jesus has done for us. Isn’t this why he allows himself to be led by the Spirit through the wilderness? By fasting for forty days––just as Israel wandered for forty years––the Lord shares our experience of vulnerability, and shows us the way to safety. By suffering temptation, Jesus also helps to uncover for us the devil’s devious tactics. Showing us how evil keeps trying to turn good and beautiful things toward crooked and ugly ends. Good things like the ordinary human appetite for food, the Lord’s own precious identity as Son of God, and his merciful mission to establish God’s kingdom on earth. All these the devil tries to subvert into an idolatrous quest for control. Control over one’s surroundings (tell this stone to turn into a loaf), control over others (I will give you all this power and the glory of these kingdoms), and even control over God (He will put his angels in charge of you to guard you). In contrast, what Jesus models for us isn’t control, but utter submission, and trust in God.

Still, it’s not enough for us simply to listen to this consoling story of the temptation of Christ. We also need to let it be inscribed in our bodies through practice. Isn’t this the deeper significance of the season of Lent? Traditionally a time for catechumens to prepare more intensely for baptism, and for us the baptised to dispose ourselves to renew our baptismal promises. Through bodily disciplines––like signing our heads with ash, and kneeling for the Stations of the Cross, curbing our appetites, and assisting those in need, along with many others––we allow the Lord not only to draw close to us, but to actually become part of our very bodies. Isn’t this what St Paul means when he says that, in order to be saved, we have only to confess with our lips that Jesus is Lord and to believe with our hearts that God raised him from the dead?

Some of us may still recall these words from an old song: In your time, in your time, you make all things beautiful in your time. Lord, my life to you I bring, may each song I have to sing, be to you a lovely thing, in your time… Sisters and brothers, what can we do help one another allow the Lord to transform all the ugly marks, left in our bodies by trauma and sin, into beautiful memories of his love and mercy this Lent?