The Gospel in the Wilderness - First Sunday in Lent

The Gospel in the Wilderness — On this first Sunday of Lent, we follow Jesus into the wilderness, where hunger, silence, and temptation reveal the deeper battle beneath our lives. In a world that offers thin hope built on feelings, self-reliance, or quick glory, Christ stands as the true and better Adam — resisting the devil not by strength, but by clinging to the promises of God. This sermon explores how the wilderness clarifies reality: our mortality, our need, and our inability to save ourselves. Yet the good news is not that we must fight and win our own battles, but that Jesus has already won the victory for us. His triumph over temptation leads to the greater victory of the cross, giving us a hope sturdy enough to live on and certain enough to die in — the promise that even in ashes, even in the grave, the dead shall be raised.