There was an old man who was found lying on the street while grasping his breath called for help. Some bystanders responded and rushed him to the hospital. When they arrived at the hospital, the attending nurses tried to look for some possible identification cards from the old man’s pocket. They found nothing except a calling card of a lawyer. The nurses called up the lawyer and told him his father is in the hospital. They asked him to come over after they gave him all the details he needed. After some hours, the lawyer arrived. He went to the room of the old man and he saw he was catching his breath. The lawyer held his right hand and said, “It is okay. I am here for you.” Then the old man died peacefully. The attending nurses and the bystanders who brought the man to the hospital tried to console the lawyer regarding the death of his father. But the lawyer said, “I am sorry but I do not know that man. He is not my father. I just stayed with him because I sensed he needed help. I wanted to assure him, that he could count on me especially before he passed away.”
My dear friends, sometimes we experience we are drained emotionally, financially, psychologically, sociologically, intellectually, physically and even spiritually. If we use the imagery of our scripture passage for today, we call it a “desert experience”. It is a kind of experience similar to the experience of Jesus in the desert that we feel we are alone in isolation or desolation with no more energy to go on with our lives. During such hard times, we need to hear from someone saying “It is okay. I am here for you.” Why? It is because on such moments we find ourselves vulnerable and weak. We cannot think clearly and objectively. We are prone to commit sin as well as the greatest blunder of our life. We need someone to give us strength. We can learn about this from the scripture itself. In our Gospel, it says, At once the Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert, and he remained in the desert for forty days, tempted by Satan. This suggests that the Spirit allows us to go through a desert experience. With the presence of the Spirit, we are therefore never alone. God is with us along the way to the desert. The Gospel indicates that God allows us to experience a desert in life but not without His help. It is on such very moment that we have to recognize the source of our strength as we go through a desert experience. And in all cases we need God’s strength. If we rely solely on our strength, if we try to do things alone, Satan takes this instance as an opportunity to tempt us. How many are there who commit suicide or kill people when they are depressed, stressed out or tensed? How many people are there who use drugs, engage in illicit sexual activities and drink liquor everyday to find some relief from their problems? These would only happen when we fail to take our strength from God. To emphasize that God allows us to go through a desert experience but with His help, He sends us angels to assist us aside from His Spirit. In our Gospel, it says, Jesus was among wild beasts, and the angels ministered to him. God therefore does not really leave us alone. He sends us someone –an angel at our side. If we try to evaluate our past desert experiences, at first, we asked why some things happened in our life which we never wanted to happen. But at the end, we realize that it was during those moments that we have found our angels in disguise –our family, our true friends and even strangers or people we least expect to help us. This makes us realize that a desert experience is not that bad at all. On this first Sunday of Lent, we have to recognize that in our desert experience, we do not only find temptations, Satan and wild beasts, but also angels and the Spirit of God who give us strength.
