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. . . during forty days, being tempted of the devil. And he did eat nothing in those days: and when they were completed, he hungered. (Luke 4:2)While Jesus spent forty days in the unforgiving wilderness a devil[1] came and visited him with one goal in mind, distraction. In the situation that Jesus faced in this passage, we find the same key element of the devil’s plans that can be seen in the lives of the saints of old and of the living saints today who live out the Christian faith. This key element is none other than DISTRACTION. During Jesus’ temptations you will see the devil trying his hardest to make Jesus lose his focus on the end goal. He has tried the same strategy in other’s lives and is still trying to distract us today from the end goal, from being the men and women whom we have been created to be, distraction from the ultimate message of Divine Love.
There once lived a man named Anthony who lived in the desert and was physically attacked by demons. Anthony unabashedly loved Christ through both his thoughts and actions. Then one night the demons made Anthony’s dwelling to “be shaken by an earthquake, and the demons as if breaking the four walls of the dwelling seemed to enter through them, coming in the likeness of beasts and creeping things. And the place was on a sudden filled with the forms of lions, bears, leopards, bulls, serpents, asps, scorpions, and wolves, and each of them was moving according to his nature. The lion was roaring, wishing to attack, the bull seeming to toss with its horns, the serpent writhing but unable to approach, and the wolf as it rushed on was restrained; altogether the noises of the apparitions, with their angry ragings, were dreadful. But Antony, stricken and goaded by them, felt bodily pains severer still. He lay watching, however, with unshaken soul, groaning from bodily anguish; but his mind was clear, and as in mockery he said, 'If there had been any power in you, it would have sufficed had one of you come, but since the Lord hath made you weak you attempt to terrify me by numbers: and a proof of your weakness is that you take the shapes of brute beasts.' And again with boldness he said, 'If you are able, and have received power against me, delay not to attack; but if you are unable, why trouble me in vain? For faith in our Lord is a seal and a wall of safety to us.' So after many attempts they gnashed their teeth upon him, because they were mocking themselves rather than him.”[2]
Like St. Anthony, today we also have our own distractions in our own dwellings. These distractions which take us away from that Divine Love can be something as common as the sins that we know we commit. We all have those sins that we know we commit and know are wrong, and yet we always choose to overlook them and/or ignore then. Why do we not tell the demons and devils that bring these sins into our lives the same thing St. Anthony said to them, “If you are able, and have received power against me, delay not to attack; but if you are unable, why trouble me in vain?” However there is another form of distraction in many of our lives, especially mine, which keeps our minds off of the Love of Christ just a effectively as our more noticeable sins. Today our world is filled with the constant distraction of TV, radios, cell-phones, text messaging, e-mailing, facebooking, tweeting, and even I-phoning. Sure, many times these things seem harmless. Many times they have no ill effects, but there seems to be a growing void[3] in our lives that we keep trying to fill up with distractions.
Remember that the Spirit led Jesus into the desert to help focus him and rid him of the political scene, the crowds, the fame, and the distractions. The Spirit leads us into the desert to help focus us as well to rid us of our own temptation, the temptation that is simply our own agony of distractions. Stay focused in your spiritual walk. The spiritual hunger pains will come, the distractions of life will come, and the demons and devils will come in all forms of temptations and distractions, but stay focused. If and when you lose focus, take time to refocus for the journey in the desert is there for us to become rejuvenated psychologically and revitalized physically and resurrected spiritually.
In the Grace of Christ Almighty,
[1] Devil in Luke 4:2 is the Greek work διαβολου (Diabolou) which means the devil, Satan, a false accuser, slanderer, and/or liar.
[2] Life of St. Antony. Par. 9
[3] This void could simply be explained as a lack of the Love of Christ, a lack of the Divine Love. Some have described this void as a God shaped hole in our souls that can only be filled with God. But all too often, myself included, we throw all kinds of trash from sex, violence, drugs, alcohol, to bad movies and TV shows, excessive music, comfort food and everything else into this God shaped hole in our souls. It’s simply as if God created us imperfect so that through communion with him and one another we could reach a higher perfection then every dreamed otherwise.
