Gospel Mark 1:12-15
The Spirit drove Jesus out into the desert,
and he remained in the desert for forty days,
tempted by Satan.
He was among wild beasts,
and the angels ministered to him.
After John had been arrested,
Jesus came to Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God:
“This is the time of fulfillment.
The kingdom of God is at hand.
Repent, and believe in the gospel.”
Reflection by Alfred Pang – Contact
Alfred is currently writing his dissertation to earn his Ph.D in Theology and Education at Boston College.
In his poem “Desert Places,” Robert Frost depicts a hauntingly beautiful snowscape. He sees snow and night “falling fast” in tandem with each other. Lost in the rhythm of this snowfall, Frost soon finds himself enveloped in loneliness. What appears before him is the leering stillness of a vast snowfield:
A blanket whiteness of benighted snow
With no expression, nothing to express.
The landscape has become a metaphor for the poet’s inner desolation.
Yet, Frost disturbingly surprises us with a further detachment. Even the emptiness of the snow-covered ground is no match for the arid meaninglessness felt within him. “I have it in me so much nearer home/To scare myself with my own desert places,” he writes.
The interior journey to confront one’s own desert places is difficult. What I hear beneath Frost’s detachment is fear that paralyzes him from starting the journey, to go out into the “field [he] looked into going past.” Ironically, he knows that this fear is self-afflicting. Don’t I scare myself? Where are my desert places?
Today’s Gospel reading challenges us to be led out into our desert places. In an immediately dramatic style, Mark tells us that the Spirit did not just lead but “drove Jesus out into the desert.” Unlike the other Synoptic Gospel writers, Mark does not linger on the wiles and tactics of the Devil in tempting Jesus. Instead, he presses ahead, almost urgently, to have Jesus come to Galilee “proclaiming the gospel of God.” This Markan sense of urgency does not imply that we hurry out of our desert places or bypass them at will. Rather, it orients us to see them in light of God’s mission with hope. Desert places prepare us for discipleship.
Contrary to Frost, Mark pushes us to embrace the desert places of our lives as challenge and gift. This is possible because God’s Spirit is with us. The Spirit is grace that interrupts and calls us out into the desert, not as a terrain to be feared, but as holy ground upon which God is encountered.
We are told that Jesus “remained in the desert for forty days.” To remain is not to stay paralyzed. Rather, it is a posture of surrender rooted in trust that God never deserts us. Even in those moments when the “wild beasts” in our inner deserts should harass and threaten to devour us, we are promised the ministry of angels when we remain open to God in faith. In remaining, we give ourselves permission to be vulnerable before God, who reveals our deepest desire to be loved and to love.
God also discloses our shadow sides to us in desert places. Instead of turning away, we are reminded to turn to God’s mercy. Such is a mercy that is trustworthy; it unceasingly perfects the divine in the fragility of human love tainted by shadows. Far from closing us in, attending to our inner deserts calls us deeper and farther out of ourselves. It calls us to conversion, to live Jesus’ proclamation in the present: “This is the time of fulfillment. The kingdom of God is at hand. Repent, and believe in the gospel.”
During this season of Lent, how are we provoked to see the possibilities of God’s kingdom hidden in the desert places of our lives as individuals and as community? Might we scare ourselves by seeing these possibilities as somewhat too frightening to undertake? Or could we allow ourselves to be carried by the Spirit who haunts us with hope?
In our Lenten journey into desert places as Lasallians, let us find inspiration in De La Salle’s trust in God. This is a trust that moves us to walk through our deserts one day at a time, to be fully present to what each moment demands from us. Deserts are less daunting places when we remain amazed at the daily Providence of God in the small corners that we find ourselves. And so we pray these words of De La Salle:
“Stir up your trust in the Lord’s infinite goodness and honor God by leaving in the divine hands the care of your persons. Be not troubled about the present or disquieted about the future, but be concerned only about the moment you must now live. Do not let anticipation of tomorrow be a burden on the day that is passing. What you lack in the evening, the morrow will bring you, if you know how to hope in God. God will work miracles rather than let you suffer want. … Providence performs miracles daily, and they cease only for those who have no trust.”
Live Jesus in our Hearts. Forever.
Thank you for this opportunity to share in this spiritual on line retreat.
Beautiful reflection contrasting Frost’s view of “Desert Places” with that of the Gospel’s, and thus illuminating the holiness of “Desert Places” as opportunities to encounter, remain in, and hope in the Lord. May we too find mercy, wholeness, and relationship with the Lord as we journey into the sands of our lives these forty days. Thank you, Alfred!