With the Wild Beasts: An Exposition of Mark 1:9-15
We have now come to the First Sunday of Lent which is a forty-day season of reflection and repentance. During this time, we remember that Jesus was tempted for forty days by Satan in the Judaean wilderness. In turn, the time that Jesus spent in the wilderness makes us think of the forty years the children of Israel. We remember the temptation of Jesus today on the first Sunday of Lent.
The selected Gospel for this year is the Gospel of Mark. This presents some challenges as the account Mark gives is very brief. Both Matthew and Luke give details of what these temptations were. Another problem is that the Lectionary has gone back and forth in its text selections this year from Mark. The texts began in Advent with 1:1-8. We then went to the Baptism of Jesus. We then skipped over the Temptation to do the rest of the first chapter. Then we skipped last Sunday to the 9th chapter of Mark for the Transfiguration and now back to chapter 1 this morning. Next week we will skip to chapter 8. This makes it hard to keep continuity. In addition to this, the first few verses of this passage were already covered in the Baptism of Jesus and the last verses in the calling of the fishermen. In-between are these few short verses about the Temptation. How does this missing piece of the puzzle fit in to the Gospel of Mark as a whole?
One of the connections is that the Baptism of our Lord was immediately followed by the Temptation. Jesus had just been baptized by John. The Spirit had come down upon Him like a dove which is a symbol of peace. This was followed by the words of affirmation by the Father. The Father was pleased with the Son.
Then the text makes an abrupt turn. The Greek says that the Spirit immediately thrusts Him out into the Wilderness. The Greek word, ekballo, is used forcefully in the Gospel of Mark. It is associated with Jesus casting out demons, for example. It is also used in Jesus’ curtly dismissing the leper he had just cleansed: “He bristled with anger and threw him out.”( Mark 1:43) So it seems strange that it is used here for the Spirit casting out Jesus into the Wilderness. The present tense of the verb makes this more vivid as well as the use of “immediately.” Immediately after the Spirit had gracefully descended upon Jesus, the Spirit drives Him into the wilderness. The same Father who had approved of His Son then puts the Son out into the heat and barrenness of the desert. So why did this happen? It hardly seem like approval having just commended the Son to send Him into the harshest of time-outs. But this was all part of God’s plan. Ultimately, we will see that God approved of Jesus as much in the wilderness as His eternal glory.
Mark simply mentions that he spent forty days in the wilderness being tempted by Satan. The vivid pictures of the temptation itself are not mentioned. But the other gospels said that during these forty days, Jesus had nothing to eat or drink. One can think of how awful even the attempt of such would be in today’s air-conditioned society. How awful would it be in the scorching hot desert. When the gospel said He was hungry, He was desperate.
However, Mark has one detail which is not mentioned in Matthew or Luke. It says, “He was with the wild beasts.” In a way, we can look at this detail and wonder why Mark mentions it. Of course, if one is in the wilderness, one will be with wild beasts. Commentators suggest that Mark was the son of a Roman soldier and a Jewish woman. The Gospel also contains some Latin (Roman) words. There is a mention of a Bar-Timaeus, a name which seems to have been familiar to Rome. The confession of the Roman Centurion of Jesus being the Son of God is another Roman theme. As a result, these commentators see a connection between Mark and Rome, in particular the Roman-Christians. When one looks at the time of Emperor Nero and afterward that Christians were arrested, tried, and then thrown to the wild beasts in the arena. Was Jesus showing solidarity with them? The problem is that Mark seems to have been written before these persecutions.
Another approach to the wild beasts is to go back to creation itself. The original creation placed Adam and Eve in the garden. There were no wild beasts there as all animals were obedient to Adam. Beasts did not attack humans until after the Fall. Part of the curse is that the overlordship given by God to Adam and Eve lost its absolute quality. Weeds and thorns would reduce and threaten the crops. Animals would rebel against the humans and even kill them. Humankind had lost control of creation. This is why there are deserts and wild places. This is why there are wild beasts. But the new Adam now lives with the wild beasts who do him no harm. There is a promise for us here that one day we shall be free from the curse which leads us all on the sorrowful road of death.
Wild beasts, such as hyenas and lions would be a considerable threat to a man weakened by hunger and thirst in the Judaean desert. Vultures would probably circle. So, the threats to Jesus would have been grave. It is interesting that Satan quoted Psalm 91:11-12 and tempted Jesus to cast himself down from the pinnacle of the Temple saying that the LORD’s angels would bear Him up lest He dash his foot against a stone. In it, Jesus told Satan that Scripture says that one should not tempt the LORD thy God. But here, God does bear up Jesus to survive the un-survivable. But Jesus had gone out into the wilderness by the will of the Father. He was not tempting God. This is the correct way to understand Psalm 91. The idea is that if we find ourself in-extremis because of our service to the LORD that He will ultimately take care of us. We do not look for trouble, but trouble finds us anyway. We will be opposed by Satan. We will be tempted to misuse our status just as Jesus was.
We should note that it says that the angels ministered to Him. Luke mentions this after the temptations as well. This is the right understanding of Psalm 91 as well. He did give His angels charge over Jesus. And after the temptation they lifted him up. No harm would come to Jesus by man, beast, or Satan himself at this time. Note the words “at this time.” Luke tells us there would be a more convenient time for Satan. There, real harm would come to the person of Jesus. He would suffer horribly and die on a cross. He was the victim of wild beasts disguised as priests and Roman soldiers. Yet, even though death, God bore him up and raised Him. By this Jesus redeems us and will raise us up also.
The other connection to the wilderness was His preaching to the people of Israel to repent and believe the Good News. The Kingdom was at hand. Jesus now was led by the same Spirit to proclaim the Gospel, the same gospel which got John thrown into prison and executed, the same gospel which would lead to Jesus’ own execution, the same gospel which led to the execution of most if not all of the Apostles, the same gospel which has led to the deaths of millions who have proclaimed it. The Temptation of Jesus showed that God is able to bear us up in the wilderness of this world, where much of humanity is little better than wild beasts. He sustains us in our ministry. What it also tells us that even if the Spirit drives us to the cross which we must carry after Jesus according to His word, we shall be raised up. We think of Paul in prison writing to the Philippians and also to Timothy. He did not know whether he would be released from prison or not. But as he told the Philippians that whether he lived or died did not ultimately matter as He belonged to the Lord.
We learn in the Temptation that Jesus’ standing up to hardship and resisting the temptations of Satan demonstrated the approval that the Father had bestowed upon Jesus at His baptism. The Lord has bestowed His approval upon us when we believed in Him. In our trials and temptations, we must endeavor to demonstrate this approval, We learned that Jesus demonstrated his faithfulness to the point of death here, and later on by death itself. We, too are called to be faithful in this way. We realize that Jesus in His humanity could not have survived the Temptation except for the providential care of the Father. No one can survive 40 days without water otherwise. Just like God delivered Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego from the un-survivable fiery furnace, he can deliver us as well. But like these three men of faith, we must faithfully serve God even if we find no deliverance in this life. Also, we can only withstand the temptation to sin by the same Spirit. If we are to make it through, we are entirely dependent upon the grace of God. The impossible shall be completed in us one day. We will no longer sin or die or suffer under the curse. For this, we can thank the Lord alone.
Knowing that it is the Lord who both begins and finished the work in us, let us rest on His grace. But the Spirit will also drive us to places we would not. Believers have not only been baptized in water but by the fire of the Spirit. We continue to proclaim the Good News of the Kingdom to the world in spite of dungeon, fire, or sword. We realize that God is at work in us, and that all these things we suffer shall be worked out for the good because we have been called by Him to fulfill his purposes, because we love God. We might not understand all the trials we might face, but we know it shall ultimately end well.
