February 22 – 1st Sunday of Lent
Ash Wednesday marked the beginning of Lent, the liturgical season that prepares us to celebrate the Paschal mystery. These forty days evoke the years of pilgrimage of the Israelite people through the desert, towards the Promised Land, as well as the days of fasting and penance of Our Lord Jesus Christ before beginning His public life.
We thus remember how the Church lives through each period of its history as a true spiritual battle, being invited to always choose the path of goodness. Jesus Himself fought such a battle in the desert when He was tempted by satan, as St. Matthew recounts in this Sunday’s Gospel.
These are three solicitations from the devil inviting Him to sin, each more serious than the last, summarizing the kinds of temptation that can assail us, for Our Lord wanted to be “tempted as we are, yet without sin” (Heb 4:15).
By unmasking the devil’s deceitful perfidy with exemplary wisdom and firmness, the Divine Master became the model of perfect shrewdness against infernal snares.
And He calls us to be attentive, vigilant and bold, to discern the plots of the enemy and his minions to induce us to sin.
Moreover, the Saviour has won for us the graces necessary for our perseverance, including – if, unfortunately, we should succumb – the strength to rise again and continue on the path of holiness. Indeed, the Apostle affirms: “God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your strength, but with the temptation will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it” (1 Cor 10:13).
The Most High permits temptations because they are part of our state of trial. They should not, therefore, sadden us, for they are an opportunity to show Him our love. It is a time for heroism! The mistake is not in suffering them, but in succumb to them. In the Lord’s Prayer, we do not ask not to be tempted, but not to fall into temptation.
On the other hand, although we feel how much the trial makes us suffer, we end up having a kind of desire to go through it, because we realize how it gives meaning to our lives and makes us deserve Heaven. Those who have never been tempted have not lived. The Apostle St. James rightly writes: “Blessed is the man who endures trial, for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life which God has promised to those who love Him” (Jas 1:12).
Prayer is the most effective remedy for resisting the temptations and attacks of the devil, for he can do no harm without God’s permission. Let us ask today for the grace to firmly reject any invitation to sin, as Jesus Himself showed us, and let us always beseech help from Heaven.
Let us pray confidently to the Divine Redeemer: “Never allow me to be separated from Thee; from the malignant enemy defend me.” ◊
