It is known as the marshmallow experiment.  Back in 1960 the behaviorist Walter Mischel created an experiment to test a child’s level of impulse control or deferred gratification.  The experiment has been recreated over the last couple decades resulting in a number of recent articles and books as well as some very fascinating YouTube features.  What the marshmallow experiment is really about is temptation.  Four year old children were seated at a table in a room with few distractions.  A marshmallow was placed in front of them and they were told they could eat it now or if they waited until the test giver returned they would be given a second marshmallow.  Then the test giver left the room and the child was made to wait an excruciating (for the child) 15 or 20 minutes.  The child was observed and video taped sitting in front of the marshmallow.  Almost all the four year olds smelled and touched the marshmallow.  Some began to play with it, rolling it around on the table, on their face.  Some licked it, pinched it, squeezed it into different shapes.  And some could not resist and ate it.  When the test giver returned, those who did not eat the marshmallow were rewarded with the promised second marshmallow.  While it was interesting to see how some of the children fought off the temptation to eat the marshmallow.  What makes this experiment most significant, was that the 4-year-old children who participated in the experiment were then observed for the next 14 years.  According to the data from Mischel’s research, 100% of the children who did not give into their sugar craving ended up doing well in school and scored an average of 210 points higher on college SAT tests.  On the flip side, 80% of the children who could not wait had problems in school, often had trouble paying attention, and found it difficult to maintain friendships.  This research has been revisited over the last decade by behaviorists recognizing that our society has become a culture with limited ability to resist the temptations to pursue and embrace short term gratification. It is estimated by one behaviorist that the average child in our modern times, sees more than a million commercials and messages inviting them to say “yes” each year. 

Yes to toys, clothing, fast foods, electronic gadgets, music, movies, sports, and the list goes on and on.  Many have suggested that the economic problems our country and the world now struggles with are a direct result of our inability to say no. 

Our Gospel lesson for today is a story of temptation and the struggle to say “no”.  It is the familiar story of Jesus’ temptation.  To refresh our memory, the setting for this story is the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry.  He has just been baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River and then our lesson tells us Jesus retreated into the desert wilderness.  Later in his ministry Jesus would periodically retreat into the wilderness apparently to be alone with his thoughts, to have time to center his life, to pray and assess where he was headed next.  But at the beginning of his ministry, immediately after he had received the clear affirmation from God that he was called to be and do something truly unique, Jesus goes into the wilderness for 40 days.  That number 40 has some interesting history.  When Noah goes into the ark it rains for 40 days and 40 nights, Moses spends 40 days on Mt. Sinai receiving the 10 commandments, the Israelites wonder 40 years in the wilderness before entering the promised land.  Each time the number 40 occurs in the Old Testament it refers to a time of testing so it is no surprise that Jesus spends 40 days in the wilderness being tempted.  And then there are our 40 days of Lent.  A time when many people decide to give something up for lent which means they are creating a temptation to their faith discipline.

Now we should be clear that there is nothing wrong with a temptation.  As I have said many times, Sin is that which separates us from God, ourselves and others but temptation is what unites us.  There is not a human being alive who has not been tempted.  It is a defining mark of our humanity.  Jesus actually had to be tempted.  The story told in our lesson for today serves first and foremost to establish that Jesus is one with all humanity.  Truly human is how the Nicene Creed says it.  It has been suggested that without temptation the world would be a very dull place.  The plots of books, plays and movies always revolve in some way around temptation and sin.  And the media loves to report on the failures of celebrities and politicians to resist the temptations of the world.  Thus it is no surprise that the beginning of the story about Jesus’ ministry starts with all eyes looking to see how he does in handling the most defining moments of our humanity. 

Our text tells us that Jesus went into the wilderness “where for forty days he was tempted by the devil” but then the story focuses on three archetypal temptations as the devil speaks to him.

“The devil speaks to him…”As I indicated to the adult forum last Sunday, nowhere in the Old Testament is the devil ever described.  There is a serpent that tempts Eve in the story of the Garden of Eden and the book of Job mentions Satan as the one who tests Job’s faith but the source of evil in the Old Testament comes from human beings rebelling against God.  There are attempts to blame others for causing them to sin or rebel against God but nowhere in the Old Testament does anyone claim that the devil led them into sin.  And it is interesting that our lesson for today does not describe the devil.  (There is no little guy in red with horns and a pitch fork.)  The devil does not appear to Jesus but simply speaks, “If you are the Son of God…”  If we are honest we would all have to admit to hearing this voice time and again in our lives.  It starts at a very early age.  The voice saying, “No one is watching.  Go ahead, take a bit of marshmallow.”  And a little later in life, “This test is really hard.  I wonder if Jim has any answers?  I mean, does it really matter how you get the answer as long as it’s correct?”  That voice, we know it well.

Jesus spent forty days with the voice.  Forty days pondering the questions.  Questions about self, values, calling, faith and God.  Questions that tempt and define each of us.  In the end it came down to three temptations that have haunted humanity for all time.  The first temptation was quite simply the marshmallow experiment.  Forty days of fasting.  Saying no to things.  To recognize that all that we have, possess, use and abuse, does not give ultimate meaning, purpose or even direction to our lives. The tradition of giving something up for Lent can remind us that there are few things in our lives that we cannot live without.  We may not like it or be as comfortable without it but life is more than any possession or thing.  Intellectually we know that we can live without computers, cell phones, electricity, television, designer clothes, cars, even chocolate.  But the temptation to possess, to have, to own because we can is too real.  “Turn these stones into bread.”  It’s no big deal for the Son of God.  Charge another item to your credit card.  It’s no big deal to a north suburbanite.  You’ll even get reward points.”  And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘One does not live by bread alone.’”  The temptation is to make lent a time for proving that we can defeat the temptations that surround us.  To give up something for Lent to prove that we are stronger than the temptation.  But do we really think that God cares if we are stronger then chocolate or whatever sacrifice we claim to make.  Jesus was not opposed to food.  He was battling a much darker force.  The evil that takes the good God gives us and turns it.  The rich diversity of the races of the world becomes the darkness of racism; the gift of sex becomes sexism, the abundant principles of economics are turned to exploitation.  The answer to this temptation is found in the confidence of our prayer, Give us today our daily bread.  It is not our power to possess, to have or to hold but our faith that God gives all that we need, and more.  At this communion table it is enough that there is a taste of bread and wine.  There is grace enough here for all.  And when we fail, when the temptation wins, and we repent of that sin, there is grace enough to forgive and say start again.

Forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness and the devil led him up and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world.  In 1973 Secretary of State Henry Kissinger observed that power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.  There is nothing more seductive in the world than having the power to control, direct, decide.  There is nothing that makes one feel more the center of the universe then power over others.  We all know the old saying that absolute power corrupts absolutely.  The world has been witness time and again to the best intentions of those in power falling victim to their own hubris and ego.  It is not by accident that the Lord’s Prayer ends with our yielding to God the ultimate power over our world and our lives.  For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours.  Let God be God and the temptation, the will to power, passes.

Forty days Jesus spent in the wilderness and the devil took him to Jerusalem, and placed him on the pinnacle of the temple saying to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written ‘He will command his angels concerning you, to protect you.’”  In the end, all temptation is about faith.  What we really believe, value, and know to be true for ordering our lives.  The choices are never easy.  If you are the Son of God.  Do you really believe or is it just words.  If you really believe, why don’t you live like it?  The ultimate temptation is a question of faith.  Most of us would have no difficulty in deciding to tithe, to give God 10% of all we make, if we could be sure that God would provide us enough in the other 90% of our earnings to live the way we want to live.  If we could only be sure.  Back in the 60’s there were many good people willing to take a public stand against segregation if they could be sure nothing would happen to their business, job or family.  But the great temptation is to doubt.  To lack the trust to live into the promises God gives us.  In the Lord’s Prayer we pray, Save us from the time of trial, in the traditional version the words are Lead us not into temptation.  This is a question of faith.  When Martin Luther explained this prayer petition he wrote in the Small Catechism God tempts no one, but we ask in this prayer that God would preserve and keep us so that the devil, the world, and our flesh may not deceive us or mislead us into false belief, despair, and other great and shameful sins… 

A marshmallow, and the devil says…The temptations of life are more than an experiment in human behavior.  Scripture is more than an answer to temptation.  The holy words we pray and quote are more than memorized answers to the questions of life.  The forty days of Lent invite us not into the wilderness of sin but to walk instead in the pathways of faith. 

When the marshmallow experiment was over, those who had resisted the temptation were rewarded with another marshmallow.  But we now know that the real meaning of the experiment, the findings that were most important had nothing to do with marshmallows and everything to do with life 14 years later.  When the 40 days were over for Jesus and he walked out of the desert still sin free our lesson tells us the devil departed from him until an opportune time. And we all know what that means. Jesus may have resisted but the power of sin is not limited to just forty days.  At the end of our Lenten journey we will come to Good Friday.  We will find that the sins of humanity will not allow the good to go untouched.  Sin is the sickness unto death.  No human being can escape it.  Not even the Son of God can escape if he is truly human.  But the Lenten journey does not end on Good Friday.  The story of faith and God’s power reaches beyond the grave to Easter morning and an empty tomb.

It was never about the devil.  It was always about sin.  Jesus went into the wilderness of sin because that is where humanity walks every day.  Jesus enters into our world, our temptations, our sin and leads us into God’s grace.  That is what this morning is really about.  Our Lenten walk into God’s glory.

Amen