17 February 2026
Trials and temptations
James gives us a blunt and beautiful truth today:
“Blessed is the one who perseveres in temptation,
for when he has been proved he will receive the crown of
life.”
Notice what James does not say.
He does not say,
“Blessed is the one who avoids all difficulty.”
He does not say,
“Blessed is the one whose faith is never tested.”
He says
blessed is the one who perseveres.
James is writing to Christians scattered and under pressure.
They are not living in comfortable times.
Their faith costs something.
And James wants them to understand something fundamental about the spiritual life:
trials do not come from God to destroy us,
but they can become the place where God strengthens us.
He makes a careful distinction.
Temptation itself does not originate in God.
God does not lure us into sin.
Rather, James says temptation often begins in disordered desire
—when we allow something lesser
to take first place in our hearts.
Desire conceives,
gives birth to sin,
and sin,
when it matures,
leads to death.
It is a stark image,
and a timely message one day before Lent starts.
But James does not leave us there.
He pivots immediately:
“Every good and perfect gift is from above,
coming down from the Father of lights.”
There are two movements in the human heart:
one that curves inward toward selfish desire,
and one that opens upward toward God’s gift.
One leads to life;
one leads to distortion.
And that is where the Gospel meets us.
In Mark’s Gospel,
Jesus is frustrated
—not because the disciples are malicious,
but because they are slow to understand.
They are worried about bread.
They forgot to bring enough.
And Jesus warns them about the
“leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod.”
Leaven is small, but it spreads.
It works quietly.
It changes everything from within.
The Pharisees’ leaven is hypocrisy
—a religion focused outwardly
but hardened inwardly.
Herod’s leaven is worldly power and self-protection.
Both are forms of disordered desire.
Both begin subtly.
Both shape the heart.
And the disciples miss the point.
They think He is talking about lunch.
Sometimes you wonder how we came to be here with a bunch of guys like this.
Then I remember how slow I am to listen to the Lord.
So Jesus walks them back through memory:
“Do you not remember?
When I broke the five loaves for the five thousand…
how many baskets did you pick up?”
He is not testing their math.
He is testing their memory.
Have you forgotten who I am?
Have you forgotten what I have already done?
Why are you anxious about bread
when you are standing next to the One who multiplies it?
James and Mark are teaching the same lesson in different keys.
Temptation grows when we forget who God is.
Faith strengthens when we remember.
James says perseverance leads to the “crown of life.”
Jesus is forming that perseverance in His disciples
—not by removing confusion,
but by deepening trust.
And this is where the timing of today matters.
Tomorrow, we will mark our foreheads with ashes.
We will hear the call to return to the Lord.
But the Church does something wise:
she does not drop us into Lent abruptly.
She prepares the soil.
Today is about the interior battle.
James names it clearly:
desire can either lead us toward God’s gift
or away from Him.
Jesus names it clearly:
a little leaven can shape your whole heart.
Lent is not about dramatic gestures.
It is about identifying the leaven.
What small attitudes are shaping us?
What quiet desires are pulling us?
What anxieties show we have forgotten who Christ is?
James calls God the “Father of lights.”
There is no shifting shadow in Him.
He does not change.
He does not withhold what is good.
He does not play games with our lives.
The disciples are worried about bread.
James is worried about hearts.
Jesus is forming both.
Perseverance is not about white-knuckling our way through temptation.
It is about remembering who gives every good gift.
It is about trusting that God’s grace is not stingy.
It is about allowing Him to reshape what we desire.
Before ashes mark our foreheads,
the Word marks our hearts.
Blessed is the one who perseveres.
Blessed is the one who remembers.
Blessed is the one who trusts the Father of lights
more than the shifting desires within.
That is how faith grows
—not in comfort,
but in clarity.