135 Tested with Jesus (3): "Worship Me" and the Attack on Love

In this final Lent episode on Jesus’ temptations, Geoff and Cyd Holsclaw explore the third temptation as an attack on Jesus’ agency—shifting from anxiety-driven hyperactivation to independence-driven deactivation of attachment. They discuss how modern pressures like hustle culture, comparison, and radical self-reliance can pull people toward building “lesser kingdoms” instead of using their agency to love God and others. Jesus refuses Satan’s offer of power and chooses worship and service to God alone, modeling a “self with others” rooted in love as action.

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Transcript

Third Temptation

Geoff Holsclaw: Welcome back to the Attach To God podcast. Today we are continuing, excuse me, I'm so sorry. Today we are continuing our journey through Lent and the temptations of Jesus. This is our last episode for The Temptations, but we are exploring the science and spirituality of attachment to help you move into a confident faith courage.

Connection. Be sure to subscribe to our podcast on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen to these podcasts, , and leave a review That helps get the word out, but also subscribe to our, embodied Faith substack to get all the episodes and other posts right in your inbox or on the app. That way you can just get rid of social media because you probably gave up social media for Lent anyways, which is a good thing.

Sid, onto you.

Cyd Holsclaw: Yeah. first, before I say anything else, I just wanna say to all of our listeners, if you've ever wondered how many times we record a podcast, now you know, we don't really rerecord otherwise, we would've taken Jeff's cough outta there. So we just keep it rolling, keeping it real.

Geoff Holsclaw: that cough just came outta nowhere. It snuck. It just, it was a sneak attack.

Cyd Holsclaw: Sneak attack, but there you go, the real unedited versions of us. So in this, we're, continuing this series in Lent about Jesus's temptations, and this is our third episode. So if you haven't listened to the first two, you might wanna go back to the first two. But we're remembering that the question that we're using to sort of frame our discussion of the Temptations is what if the devil's temptations of Jesus weren't just about trying to get him to te, tempt him to sin?

What if? What if Satan was trying to attack Jesus's attachment to his father? So what if Satan is trying to destroy Jesus's faith, hope and love, which is the foundation of secure attachment? So the past two weeks, we've watched Satan attack Jesus' Hope and faith. Trying to get him to doubt whether the distress is gonna be alleviated by turning stones into bread.

And then last time doubting whether Jesus, whether God is available to him, and should he test the relationship by jumping off the temple to find out if he was truly available. So in both of those temptations, Jesus, Jesus stood firm and he chose connection over protection and he trusted the relationship with God without needing to test it.

Or to fix it himself. So now today we're gonna talk about how Satan makes this one final attempt where if he can't get Jesus to hyper activate his attachment through anxiety, maybe he can get Jesus to deactivate his attachment through independence. And so today we're talking about the attack on love.

So it's this question of what do we do with our agency? Do we use it to love others and to love God? Or do we use our agency to build our little kingdoms of lesser loves? So that's what we're focused on today.

Geoff Holsclaw: And why does this matter how we use our agency? Or how do we think about purpose, or use our power? You know, these are different ways to kind of talk about it. in our culture, especially, in this capitalistic, industrious, efficiency driven, we have a lot of.

Pressure maybe to have a hustle or a side hustle, to kind of build your own brand and become your own boss, to be ultimate, , to be your kind of, your independent kind of, kind of person. We also have like all this life hacking and life optimization and kind of perspectives, for some people.

There has been a real drive to find like pressure and or purpose rather, purpose and meaning in their work to find FA fulfilling job. And I know that so many people feel like a lot of pressure about, you know, does their work have purpose and meaning? and there's several others. What, what are some others?

Syd, why does this

Cyd Holsclaw: I'm also thinking about just the way that we have this heavy comparison in our, world where, if you're on social media at all, you're always seeing the best of other people's lives and it's easy to compare. oh, they have more likes or followers, or they're getting more comments, or they're getting more interaction than I am,

Geoff Holsclaw: They went on a better vacation and their kids are more well behaved

Cyd Holsclaw: kids are better behaved. They've, they go nicer places for an anniversary, all those kinds of things. But then there's also the whole, comparison of careers like that person's job. Sounds amazing. And why can't I do something like that? Or relationship status, like why can't my relationship look like theirs?

Or why can't I have, you know, as many dates as that person? And these sort of success metrics that we measure ourselves by tend to isolate us from other people or make us look at other people as like others to be competed with rather than people to actually be in community with. You know? And then also we've got this temptation to shortcuts of like, You know, we have a lot of modeling by public figures that you do whatever it takes to succeed and compromising your values in order to get your task accomplished. It's okay, you can do that. And people can be used as stepping stones. And so all of that, erosion of the integrity that maybe.

yeah, just anyway, temptation to shortcuts. And then also this idea that being alone is stronger than being in community. it's, I'll figure it out myself. I'm better off alone. I don't need to ask other people for help. And this sort of like independence becomes an identity thing. Like I am an independent person.

Geoff Holsclaw: So this gets at what does success look like? What do I do with, , the freedom and independence that I've been given? and really what is the purpose and what is my deep identity and how do I, how do I express that in the world? And so, two weeks ago we looked at, The first temptation, which is turning the stones into bread.

, and we were asking that attachment kind of question of, will this distress be alleviated? , last week we looked at the temptation for Jesus to throw himself off the temple and to test God. , and that's an attachment default. That question that we talk about of are others available to me when I'm in distress.

So today we are gonna be looking at this question of success or. Self-love or worship, around the question of how do I use my agency? And so let us just look at the passage from, we're looking at the gospel of Matthew. This is also told in the Gospel of Luke, but Matthew four verses eight ends nine, the devil took him to the peak of a very high mountain and showed him all the kings kingdoms of the world and their glory.

I will give it all to you. He said, if you will kneel down and worship me.

Cyd Holsclaw: So looking at this understanding, how do we look at this attack and look at it as an attack on attachment rather than just a temptation to sin. And so it's, The, temptation before this, Satan was trying to hyper activate Jesus's attachment system toward intimacy to test the relationship. And so now it seems almost like the devil's flipping the strategy.

Like maybe he can push Jesus into focusing on his independence. And he wants Jesus to use his agency, his sort of power to act in the world for his own glory, his own purposes, and his own goals. So in a, in essence, he's saying, why be so focused on the father's will and the father's plan? Be your own man with your own plan.

And , Satan knows that Jesus is focused like he's here on a mission. He's come to repair a ruptured world. He's come to gather the lost sheep no matter what it costs him personally. And Satan is basically trying to give Jesus an easy button. Like I can give you all the kingdoms of the world. I can give you all the glory.

You just. just take a shortcut. And so he's tempting Jesus into practicing independence apart from intimacy. It's this sort of classic temptation that the ends justify the means. Like it doesn't matter how you get the pa, the fame, and the power, and the glory, all it really matters is that you, you get it.

And so Jesus is being tempted in this temptation to move into a desert landscape. To tempted to live as a self without needing others, like so tempted to live in this distorted sense of what it means to love loving himself paying attention to, the love of the world and God's love.

Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah, so Jesus' response, like, um, it's getting at that question of, well, what is worship? I think a lot of times, in my, upbringing worship was kind of like, you know, who you sing songs to or, , and it is kind of paired with idolatry and you're not supposed to worship a false God, but only the true God, but.

This worship, I really, it, it really has to do with, also serving. And so it's, it's not just kind of who do I give glory to, but how am I extending that glory in the world? And so Jesus is basically being challenged to worship the devil and work on behalf of the Devil's Kingdom, or to, in a sense, , worship God and work on behalf of God's world.

And so I actually didn't write down the answer. I'm gonna have to go and look it up. Where is it? Do you, I'm gonna have to look it up. I didn't write down, exactly. I could do it for memory. Do you have it memorized, honey?

Cyd Holsclaw: I don't have the whole thing memorized, but I do have a Bible right next to me, so I will

Geoff Holsclaw: you look it up. 'cause I want to get Jesus', , answer exactly right. But. , so often when it comes to, to, worship Jesus is modeling for us, how he uses his agency, not for himself, which is in a sense to worship the devil, but for, for the sake of others, for the sake of God's kingdom.

Or to say something like, it's not just Jesus versus the world, but it's Jesus for the world. were you looking in the wrong Bible there?

Cyd Holsclaw: I am just looking into different translation. So the new Living translation says, get out of here Satan. Jesus told him for the scripture, say, you must worship the Lord your God and serve him only. And then I was just gonna look up the NRSV too just in case.

Geoff Holsclaw: All right, perfect. Jesus, in a sense, this is, the worshiping and serving God alone is Jesus integrating his intimacy and his independence. And so a lot of times, this kind of desert spirituality, or worshiping the devil or this selfishness. Is to prioritize my independence, at the sake or, in contrast to the intimacy with others.

But Jesus is really saying like, I'm not gonna choose myself over others, but I'm gonna integrate and become a person in the midst of others, or as we say, a self with others. So instead of a self. Against others, , which would be like the desert spirituality, but even also, , different than the the, um, jungle, which is a self needing others.

So I need people to be here for me, otherwise I'm not myself. And the desert says I want to be a myself alone, but Jesus is saying I am a self. I am myself with others and on behalf of others. And. For others, and that's what God's kingdom is for. So he's using his agency to connect with others, not to protect on behalf of himself.

He's using his agency to connect others to the father's love rather than protect his own possessions or energy or resources.

Cyd Holsclaw: So just an update. The NRSV, the only thing that's different between the NLT and the NRSV is that. The New Living Translation says, get out of here, Satan. And the new revised standard version says Away with you Satan. Other than that, they're exactly the same. So it's the

Geoff Holsclaw: Wow. Thank you for that update.

Cyd Holsclaw: and serve.

Serve only him.

Geoff Holsclaw: All right. Sorry everybody. I did not prepare by putting that scripture in the

Cyd Holsclaw: And like we said, we don't re-record, so here we are.

Geoff Holsclaw: All right. Sid, why don't you do, Why don't you do the definition of love there since we're that we're into that part where we want to reframe and define.

Cyd Holsclaw: Yeah, so you know, we talk about love. I think sometimes, especially As we're recording this, it's moving up to Valentine's Day and this sort of romantic infatuation, vague sentiment or like strong feeling is a lot of times what we think of as love. And so love certainly includes feelings and emotions, and usually a lot of them in a lot of layers.

But in the Bible, love

Geoff Holsclaw: of love you. Our cat loves you right now. Now,

Cyd Holsclaw: she does.

Geoff Holsclaw: you, if anybody's watching this episode on YouTube, which you can do, , you'll have noticed that, our cat Harper. Has jumped up onto the side, counter and is, working her way to be right in front of the camera. She's done this like three times.

She will not get the, and Sid keeps grabbing her and throwing her off to the side. So this is an example of, the what? Like an embodied engaged love. A persistent love or something. I got, I totally got you off track, but that's because I got distracted by the cat

Cyd Holsclaw: No, that's okay. Yeah, she, wants to be close. She wants to be near, she wants to be part of things. but yeah, I guess it's, we could draw metaphors. Is this, I love in the Bible is focused on action, right? Like love is in action. So I don't know, I guess her action is to. That does that, metaphor falls short.

It doesn't work. So if we look at one Corinthians 13 though, the classic love text, you know that verses four through eight, there's verbs and adjectives together. So love is patient, love is kind, but then there's action. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It does not dishonor others. It is not self-seeking.

It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with. The truth. It always protects, it always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. And so those are all action words for love. This isn't just some vague feeling. There's this, it protects other people. It trusts, it, hopes it perseveres.

It rejoices with the truth. Love never fails. And so if we apply all of that in context to using our own agency to love and to join God in love, we're actually designed. To overflow in love toward God and for others. And so the only way we can do that is when we're filled with the love of God. So we, as we are filled with the love of God, we can freely give that away to others through connecting.

And that's what our agency is for. Our agency is for loving God and loving others. It's not for pursuing our own interests, it's for pursuing what's best for a whole community. So it's not about Self-protective survival strategies. It's also about making sure that the weak are protected and that, so basically our agency is designed for love in action.

Geoff Holsclaw: Yeah. Love in action and that love in action can flow. Through us because we are already receiving that overflowing love between the father, son and the spirit for God. So love the world that he sent his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but out everlasting life, right?

And so it's not that we through our own strenuous energy, love the world. Um, but it's rather we're just aligning ourselves with God's love for the world and letting it flow through us. And that's where again, we talk about how Jesus is both kind of the way, the truth and the or and the life that he shows us the way in his humanity and how to love others.

But he really is the truth of love because he has already come before us and laid down his life like the Good Shepherd lays down his life for the sheep, as John says. And, , the gospel of John. Jesus shows us how to do this. And so when he says, deny yourself and take up your cross, we can learn how to do that as an overflowing of love because Jesus has already done that.

And denying ourselves and taking up our cross is not the end of the story of love. It's not something like self martyrdom. but rather we know that there's the resurrection, there's the new life that comes. this is where Lent is leading to right to Passion Week and then to Easter. And so can we jump in and learn, , not just jump in, but rather can we be modeled, formed and conformed to the way of Christ, and use our love and say no to the kingdoms of this world and say yes to the kingdom of love that God is bringing you.

Were about to jump in there, but I, I walked all over you with my, , my

Cyd Holsclaw: I don't even know what I was gonna say. I think I was, whatever it was gonna be profound, but it's lost on me

Geoff Holsclaw: Okay. Rah. What is the victory or what's the good news that you're feeling? Because you always wanna proclaim the good news to people. So what's, what is the spirit drawing out of you right now?

Cyd Holsclaw: the spirit is drawing out of me right now that, the good news is that, Jesus went before us and has faced all of these temptations, and in his humanity, he emerges from the wilderness. A stronger attachment with the father after these temptations, which is something that we can follow him into because we have access to all the same resources that Jesus has access to.

I was just reading this morning in Ephesians. Chapter one, you know, verse 15 and onward of just this whole, this like Paul's prayers for the people, and then his reminder to the church and Ephesus that the same power that raised Christ from the dead is the power that is in you. And so the same power. By that same attachment, the same relationship, the same companionship of the Holy Spirit that Jesus relied upon to be able to withstand these temptations and to rest in the attachment relationship with the Father.

That same power is what we all have access to. And so, you know, Jesus has, won that for us. Now I remember what I was gonna say before. I was gonna say that the only reason that. That when Jesus was enduring the cross on his way to the cross, he knew what he was going for. You know, in Hebrews 12, that for the joy set before him, he endured the cross knowing that what his love was going to produce his act, his love in action, was going to bring new life, the restoration of family, the restoration of attachment for all God's people.

And so that good news is that, even as we. Endure the temptations and notice the things that we need to let go of or lay down or sacrifice or die to that. In that, there can also be joy because we are moving toward being brought home into the family, being one with Christ, and being attached in trust and in love.

Geoff Holsclaw: I wanna circle back, to what you're saying about Jesus in the wilderness. 'cause living in the wilderness is not God's soul and enduring purpose for us. This, we enter into Lent, to remember the wilderness experiences, but. Part of what you just said. we've been, reading from the Gospel of Matthew, but in the gospel of Luke, the temptations start this way right after Jesus' baptism, and then the Spirit has come upon him.

It says Jesus full of the spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, and so does the spirit that is leading Jesus into the wilderness. So part of that can be comfort for us is that even in the midst of the temptations or experiences of wilderness, it is the spirit who is leading and is at work.

And then after. All of these temptations. , verse 13 of chapter four in Luke, , when the devil had finished all these tempting, he left Jesus. And then the next verse is, Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit. And so even Jesus, and again, this is why. Jesus and his humanity as well as divinity, can be a model.

And, for us is that Jesus goes out already filled, already blessed, already baptized by the spirit. However, your tradition, or church kind of talks about that, initial kind of experience or transformation. But then through the wilderness, now all of a sudden Jesus is engaging in his public ministry full of the power of the Spirit, not just full of the spirit.

And I know that we all, you know, we want. not like in a, a selfish way, the power of the spirit, but we, you know, we want that overcoming life, that fullness of life, that enduring life of God. , that is, part of the, power of the spirit. And so that usually does not come except for outside of the wilderness experiences and learning how to endure temptation the way Jesus did.

Cyd Holsclaw: Yeah. 'cause we all, we're all gonna be tempted and Jesus is with us in all of our temptations. Yeah.

Geoff Holsclaw: Alright, what's the invitation or the practice that, can help us kind of get into this a little bit more?

Cyd Holsclaw: Yeah, a couple different things. Again, first of all, just noticing, noticing your life and just reflecting on where am I using my agency to protect myself? And maybe that's needed in some places. So that's not always a bad thing. But where am I using my agency to protect myself or for my own sort of glory or reputation or success?

And where am I using my agency to love other people? And how is that flourishing the lives of other, how is, how does my love flourish other people? And sort of looking at those two and then just noticing what, what comes out of that examination. And then also maybe looking at a similar question of where do you notice yourself competing against other people in your life?

And where do you see yourself sort of collaborating with or joining with? And what would it look like to use your gifts and the agency that God has given? To you for others to flourish others rather than to compete against others. Um, so those are two things that could be more of examination and reflection, but then actual practice.

if, independence is your emphasis, it's sort of your go-to, what would it be like for you this week to ask somebody else for help, like to practice being a self with others instead of a self without. Others, how could you practice independent interdependence this week? So that's sort of a, putting on a new practice and then putting something off or dying to something.

In those lists that you noticed of the agency and how you're using agency and how you're using compare how you're comparing or collaborating. Is there anything that you feel God's invitation to say, just let that die. Like just. Try letting that go and see what would happen if you let that go. Would there be more room for love in your life?

Geoff Holsclaw: Don't feel overwhelmed by all those practices or options. Just if one thing jumped out at you, just grab onto that and try to put it, into your life and try to live into that, a little bit more. I. Thank you, Sid, for all your passion and insight. Thank you, all of you for listening. Be sure to, again, subscribe on it and, like, and review the podcast on Apple, Spotify or wherever you listen.

, and then subscribe also to the Embodied Faith on Substack. , all that is linked into the show notes. 'cause then you'll get the episodes. All of our announcements are their posts, all the different things we're doing right there in your inbox or on the app. Next week we're gonna kind of circle back to.

That first temptation of, , man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And we're gonna kind of expand that of this like this, need, this fundamental need to be in relationship with God, to be in joyful connection as that thing that sustains us in each and every season of our life, but especially all the seasons that feel like Lent.

So until then, thanks for being with us.