Today is the First Sunday in Lent, the first Sunday in our season of penitence and fasting, prayer and self-denial, acts of devotion and works of mercy, that will prepare us, as individuals and as a church, for the celebration of the feast of Easter. Today is also Episcopal Relief and Development Sunday. Our Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori has designated this day ERD Sunday, and is calling on all Episcopal congregations throughout the church to pray and to give in support of ERD's work on the Millennium Development Goals.

Now at first it may seem like these are a very odd combination--First Sunday in Lent and ERD Sunday--but I think there is a connection here, a very deep connection, and that connection becomes clear when we take a really deep look at our Gospel story today.

On the First Sunday in Lent we always read about Jesus' temptation in the wilderness, when Jesus fasted and prayed for forty days and forty nights, and at the end of that time, when he was famished, when his defenses were down, the Devil came to him and tried to sabotage his ministry before it had even begun. The Devil said to Jesus "If you are the Son of God…"

I think in some ways that one clause, that one word "If," is the core of the temptations, the most insidious temptation of all. Each of the three specific things the Devil tries to get Jesus to do is designed to make Jesus question who he is, to forget who God is calling him to be, to settle for something less than the fullness of life God wants to give to the Beloved Son.

"You're hungry," the Devil says. "Change these stones to bread." The temptation for Jesus is to feed his stomach, but to ignore his spirit, to settle for something less than the true sustenance that comes not from bread alone but from the word of God.

"Jump from the Temple," the Devil says. "Surely God will protect you and hold you up--Scripture says so! You trust the Scriptures, don't you? You trust God, don't you?" The temptation for Jesus is to fear that his trust in God is misplaced, to settle for a cheap test of God's love, rather than the deeper trust that Passion and Crucifixion and Resurrection will demand.

"You're destined to be King of kings and Lord of Lords," the Devil says. "I can make that happen for you, quicker and easier than the way God has in mind." The temptation for Jesus is to feed his ego, to grab for false glory in a quick-fix, self-gratifying way; the temptation is to settle for something less that the true glory of Ascension and sharing the Reign of God that God wants to give him.

In each case, the Devil tempts Jesus to forget who he is, to forget who God is calling him to be, to settle for a cheap substitute instead of the real love God wants to fulfill in the Beloved Son. And in each case Jesus refuses to take the bait. Jesus resists the temptation, not by exerting his will power, not by gritting his teeth and bearing it, not by showing how strong he is in his spirit and in his soul--Jesus resists each temptation by staying focused on his mission, by grounding his sense of identity and his sense of purpose in what he discerns God is calling him to do, by centering himself on dwelling in God's word, and worshiping God alone, and trusting that his relationship with God goes deeper than any cheap stunt could show. Jesus deflects the Devil's temptations by remembering who he is and whose he is--and he remembers that by staying focused on his call to share in the mission of God.

And I think the message of this Gospel for is that that's how temptation works in our lives, too. For us as individuals and for us as a church, temptation tries to make us forget who we are, it tries to make us forget who God is calling us to be, it tries to make us settle for something less than the fullness God wants to give to us: a lesser love, a littler life, a smaller self, a less genuine discipleship. As a church we can be be tempted to be something less: we can be tempted to be a social club, a gathering of like-minded people who enjoy each other's company well enough but who don't make any real difference in the world or in the Spirit. We can be tempted to be a social service agency, a philanthropic organization that does good works in the world and strives to meet people's material needs, but pays little or no attention to the spiritual transformation our world needs. We can be tempted to be a historical society, an antiquarians' club dedicated to preserving customs and traditions that don't really mean anything anymore, but we hang on to just because we've always done it that way. We can be tempted to be an enclave for saints, a purity group, a collection of holiness wanabees who see to their own spiritual well-being but who end up being so heavenly minded they're no earthly good. The church can be and has been tempted to be many things other than what Christ calls it to be; the church can be and has been tempted to forget who it is, to forget whose it is, to settle for something less than the full life, the full love, God wants to give it.

And when we the church are tempted like that, then for us, as for Jesus in the story, the way to resist temptation is to stay focused on our mission. Resisting our corporate temptation is not just a matter of being strong and exerting our collective will power and coming up with a new strategic plan and promising to do better. The way to resist temptation is to stay focused on our mission, to keep our attention on doing the things Jesus taught us and God calls us and the Spirit empowers us to do.

And that brings us back to Episcopal Relief and Development Sunday and our call to work on the Millennium Development Goals. Because working on the MDGs is one of the things that helps us keep focused on our mission. At the General Convention in 2006 we voted to make the MDGs a mission priority, reflected in the national church budget and in various programs and agencies maintained by our church. And now, on this First Sunday in Lent 2008, we are being invited and called to support the MDG Inspiration Fund, which is a new joint venture between ERD, Jubilee Ministries, and the Executive Council of the Episcopal Church. This fund will be a dedicated resource for work which focuses on fighting deadly diseases such as malaria and HIV/AIDS and providing basic health care in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean. There is more information about the fund, including instructions for how to make a donation, in your bulletin insert today; and I have this yellow folder with even more information which I will put in the parish hall after the service. Giving to this fund, giving to ERD, is a practical and concrete way to help us stay focused on our mission as a church. Because giving of ourselves for healing and health care is a direct imitation of Christ, whose ministry was so much centered on healing those who came to him. Some people say that the MDGs are basically secular goals, and that any philanthropic organization could do them, and that they aren't really the business of the church. And it is true that working for health care and education and gender equality and maternal health and reducing child mortality, and all the rest of the goals, don't necessarily have "Christian"written all over them in big letters. But they are still Christian things to do. I heard a comment on the radio the other day by John Dilulio, who was the head of the White House office of faith based initiatives, and he said that these are things we do for people not because they're Christians, but because we are Christians. Jesus did not say "Love your neighbors as you love yourselves, because that way you might convert them"; Jesus said "Love your neighbors, the strangers, your enemies as you love yourselves, because that way you will be children of God, who loves the righteous and the wicked, and who sends his rain on the just and the unjust." Doing the MDGs helps the world, but perhaps even more importantly it helps us, it helps us keep in touch with the ministry of Jesus, it helps us keep focused on how we participate in the mission of God.

And that's the connection between ERD Sunday and the First Sunday in Lent: both of them call us to resist the temptation to be something less than the disciples God calls us to be. Both of them show us a way to be faithful to the work of ministry that is ours in Christ. Both of them offer us the hope that when we stay faithful to the mission, when we remember who we are and whose we are and what we are called to do, then God works through us, angels come and wait on us, and we can do more for the world and for the Spirit than we had ever dreamed possible. That is our Good News today; let us live that Good News all Lent long. Amen.