And He was led by the sprit into the Wilderness
It is traditional to spend the first Sunday in Lent reflecting on the three temptations Jesus endured and resisted in the Wilderness, though it is also possible to extend this meditation throughout Lent and this is what I propose to do within my sonnet series. Over the course of the next three weeks or so I will post three sonnets each reflecting on a different Temptation in the wilderness starting this week with the Temptation to turn stones into bread, which prompts Jesus profound reply ‘Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. A word which certainly needs to be heard by Christians living in affluent western societies dominated by consumer culture. I believe that Jesus underwent this ordeal on our behalf, to break open the ground of the heart and make real choice possible for us.
However I think its essential not to see the temptations entirely in negative terms. All good things come from God and those things which the devil pretends to offer, but in the wrong way or for the wrong reasons, are cheap imitations of the very things that God does indeed offer and that Jesus himself recieves, enjoys, and crucially, shares. He does not turn stones into bread for himself on this occasion, but later, in the very same wilderness he takes bread, gives thanks, and breaks it, and feeds five thousand with all they want, and twelve baskets full left over! If Edmund had turned down the Witch’s turkish delight he would have come sooner to Aslan’s feast!. So here is the first of the three ‘temptation’ sonnets.
These Sonnets are all drawn from my new collection Sounding the Seasons published by Canterbury Press and available from the publisher and from Amazon etc.
As always I am grateul to Margot for her thought-provoking images. you can hear the poem by clicking on the title or the play button.
The Fountain thirsts, the Bread is hungry here
The Light is dark, the Word without a voice.
When darkness speaks it seems so light and clear.
Now He must dare, with us, to make a choice.
In a distended belly’s cruel curve
He feels the famine of the ones who lose
He starves for those whom we have forced to starve
He chooses now for those who cannot choose.
He is the staff and sustenance of life
He lives for all from one Sustaining Word
His love still breaks and pierces like a knife
The stony ground of hearts that never shared,
God gives through Him what Satan never could;
The broken bread that is our only food.
His love still breaks and pierces like a knife
Malcolm Guite 