Disappointing Beginnings

Imagine being with the Israelites who left Egypt for the Promised Land. We’ve said goodbyes to our Egyptian friends, sandals on our feet, staffs on our hands, tummies full, belongings packed, children excited, and we’ve crossed the Red/Reed Sea and started northward to the Promised Land. Then the spies saw the Canaanites, lost their nerves, our elders failed the test of faith, and God and Moses told us we’d spend forty years in the wilderness while we all die before our children entered the Promised Land.

That’s a disappointing beginning after exciting anticipation. But that was precisely what the first-generation Israelites, God’s beloved son, experienced.

Would the pattern change when Jesus, God’s beloved second and new son, had replaced them?

“Immediately, the spirit cast him out into the desert. He was in that desert for forty days, being tested by Satan. He was with the wild beasts.” (Mark 1:12–13a)

The new beloved son’s experience was short but intense. Short because it was forty days, not years. Intense because he was cast into the wilderness, tested by Satan, and lived with wild beasts.

The verb cast-out was used in the classical days to throw someone overboard from a ship or banish someone from a place. Mark used it twelve out of eighteen times for Jesus and his disciples casting out demons (1:34, 39, 43; 3:15, 22–23; 6:13; 7:26; 9:18, 28, 38; 11:5). Just as he cast out demons from people, the spirit cast him out into the wilderness – a forceful eviction from his land. That was a disappointing beginning!

In the wilderness, he was tested/tempted. The Greek word peirazo has a positive meaning of “test” and a negative meaning of “tempt.” The difference between these is razor’s edge, tiny. God often tested the people in the wilderness – with bitter water, no water, or no meat – to see if they would say, “God’s word is enough.” God never tempts with evil (James 1:13). But they didn’t pass the test; instead, they murmured and sinned against God. Their tests became their temptations to sin against God.

Similarly, the new beloved son would be tested to see if he would pass or fail. If he murmured and rebelled, he would be guilty of being tempted and failing. But he passed.

Just as peirazo has two meanings, satana has two meanings: the person of Satan or an adversary. A physical Satan could have appeared to Jesus to test/tempt him. At the same time, an unknown adversary could have tempted/tested Jesus. Perhaps that was why Mark mentioned, “He was with the wild beasts.” Just as the first Adam was with a serpent that tempted him, the second Adam would be with wild beasts. Regardless, this second son faced tests.

God’s presence, however, was with both sons. The angel of the Lord went before and after Israel to protect them when the Egyptians came after him (Exod 14:19). He marched with him and guarded him against Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Canaanites, Hivites, and Jebusites (Exod 23:20; 33:2). Similarly, God’s angels ministered to the second son in the wilderness (Mark 1:13b).

All these together confirm that even the son had a rough start to his ministry. The writer of Hebrews says, “Even though he was a son, he had to learn obedience” (5:8).

Often, we may have disappointing beginnings. It might test our faith, tempt us to deny God, and forsake our faith. We must persevere. God will always send his angels, unbeknown to us, to minister to us.