Three Lies to Ruin Easter

(and everything else, really)

Terracotta pots sit under grow lights in my living room, looking more like a science experiment than something to adorn a dinner table. But the People of Pinterest assure me that the unimpressive wheat berries in these pots will, in fact, grow into lush green grass suitable for centerpieces in time for Easter. I’m doubtful. But I’m going to try.

The spontaneity of this project reminds me of how terrible I am at planning, and speaking of planning reminds me that I have failed to participate in Lent as I intended. Forty-some days ago I had really good intentions to start some really important things (or at least I thought they were important at the time). I may have implemented half of them, half well. Now Holy Week has arrived and Lent is coming to an end.

Lent is a lot of things, but one of them is an opportunity to reflect on Jesus’s time of temptation while he was fasting in the wilderness for forty days. This year my intentions for Lent were mostly centered around slowing down and welcoming silence. Now I’m preparing to host my extended family for Easter dinner, and preparing to host is the opposite of these things. I have a house to clean, a menu to plan, ingredients to shop for, and a lot to prepare. 

This is nothing like what Jesus experienced in the wilderness.

Except…maybe the struggles in these experiences do share a common thread.

Henri Nouwen summarizes Christ’s temptations in the wilderness as the Accuser trying to get Christ to believe something about His identity that isn’t true. Nouwen says the Accuser crafted “Three big lies: I am what I have. I am what I do. I am what other people say about me.” 

And I battle those lies too. 

I think of all the people coming to my home and what they are going to think of the dust bunnies and the home improvement projects I haven’t finished (or started). I think of the size of our house and the number of people we’re going to stuff into it. Am I going to be prepared? What are they going to think of me? I’m being really vulnerable here. I don’t like admitting these things, but that’s where I’m at. Are you with me? 

Maybe your particulars are different -  maybe it’s about who is there or who is not. What you’ve accomplished, or the missed opportunity. What will everyone think? Or maybe it’s something else entirely, but the root of the lie is the same: 

I am what I have. 

I am what I do. 

I am what people say about me.

Anxiety begins to rise and peace goes hiding.

We need to be reminded of who we really are.

Immediately before the story of Jesus’ time in the wilderness, the story of His baptism is recorded. At His baptism, God declares Christ's true identity, His Beloved. This is before He started His ministry, before He did anything, really. God calls Christ His Beloved, which is a stark contrast to what Satan tempts Him to believe about His identity in the wilderness. 

Before this year, I have never considered the common thread of identity in these two stories. I’ve missed their placement side-by-side in scriptures, but now it seems significant.

This Holy Week is immediately following a season in which I’ve spent a considerable amount of time wrestling with my own true identity, struggling to believe that He calls me His beloved.

I am God’s beloved.

That’s it. That’s the whole story of my identity. It seems so simple like somehow I should have already moved beyond this elemental truth of my faith by now. But the Great Designer of wheat berries and oak trees reminds me that growth can happen in a matter of days or centuries, but it always starts with a seed spilling its guts. That’s exactly what it felt like a few months ago when this truth was reawakened in me. And it made me weep. It undid me, like a seed.

But that’s another story for another day.

I don’t know what’s going to happen - with the plants, the centerpieces, in my soul or my schedule this week. But I’m going to try my best to cultivate growth. I’m going to keep watering the seeds and make sure they have plenty of light.  I’m going to keep reminding myself of God’s love and that what I have, do, and what others think of me is not who I really am. That’s all I can do.

And what I do know is that at the end of the day, the end of the dinner, at the end of the hosting, at the end of the Holy Week, no matter how anything turns out, God loves me. And I just want you to know that no matter what, God loves you, too.