It is written.

February 21, 2010

The Temptation of Jesus in the Desert

In my typical fashion of my posts, I'm going to take something tiny and talk about a lot of stuff around it in an attempt to frighten that small moment into making more sense. Sneak up on it from behind.

So, thank you Textual Culture class for this reflection.

It is written.

What a phrase to preface everything with in a Temptation scenario. But what does that mean in a culture where so few would ever see such words written? When it was passed along orally at meetings, and that was how most people studied scripture? Scrolls - we literally hadn't invented the book yet - were kept beautiful and apart. Would it have the same authority if you had never seen the words written down?

But what we have here is not a recitation of words written far away and long ago. This is the new written Word, emblazoning the truth on the rocks of the desert and the towers of man and kingdoms of the world. This is what is written, the Word that made the world. Now He not so much writes so that we can read it but points to where it is already written across creation and in revelations to those who have the blessing to listen.

Not a personal rebuttal - no, I won't. I reject you, Satan.

It is written.

The Truth, on scraps of sheepskin and papyrus, rolled together and stained with ink. What a thing - a thing that so many would never see but only hear told of. Something so precious in something so ordinary - out of materials that mean nothing comes the written word. Like in our own dirty flesh and sticky blood and dry bones came the Word of God, made of things that were never precious until they were put together and given the Grace to become more.

The Word that spoke into the Nothing and created the world shrunk itself down far enough to be scrawled in dark liquid across the belly of tamed fluffy beasts and woven reeds in order to tell us something important. The answers were always there.

Listen. It is written.

Not has been, not will be. The words were always there. So was the Word.