Turn the TV Off
Prepare for the Revolution in the Wilderness
March 5, 2025
Ash Wednesday, Year C
St. Stephen’s UMC, Burke, VA
Luke 4:1–13 (NRSVUE)
Revolution Will Not Be Televised
Ever since last month’s Super Bowl, this closing catchphrase from the halftime show has been echoing in my mind:
Turn the TV off. Turn the TV off.
This repeated line is especially striking because the performer opened his show by referencing a poem by Gil Scott-Heron, titled The Revolution Will Not Be Televised. Written in response to the sociopolitical turmoil of the 1960s, this poem proclaims that real change does not come through corporations or the media, but through our own engagements away from the couch.
And now, in 2025, Kendrick Lamar’s halftime show seems to echo the same message, pushing us to recognize that the change we seek will not simply be handed to us, whether that change is personal, social, or political. If we want change, we must step away from our screens and engage with reality; hence, turn the TV off.
A life without screens in today’s world is, perhaps, much like the wilderness of Jesus’ time. Our fear of being without screens is deeply connected to humanity’s fear of the wilderness itself — a place marked by danger, uncertainty, and temptation. We are afraid of a life where we might lose connection, where we might starve for entertainment. We are afraid of confronting the loud silence of nothingness. And we are afraid of meeting ourselves unmasked and insecure, without the trappings of society to define us. In short, we are terribly afraid of the truth that we are dust and to dust we will return.
So instead, today’s world has created for us a garden of illusions surrounded by screens, offering us a false sense of comfort, security, connection, and identity. As we spend an average of a quarter of our daily lives exposed to these screens, we begin to see this digital environment as our safe space and our salvation.
We consume information that makes our blood boil with anxiety and fear. We yell at our screens, pointing fingers and speaking evil. And, with a simple swipe, we quickly soothe ourselves, amusing ourselves to death.
The result? We feel most connected, yet we are more isolated and divided than ever. We feel most advanced, yet we are more fragile than ever. We feel most informed, yet we remain profoundly unaware of what’s happening right under our noses.
I have been wondering about this for quite some time: If we cannot even focus on the world beyond our screens, how can we possibly focus on God’s voice, which is beyond our understanding of the world?
Jesus and the Wilderness
On this Ash Wednesday, we remember that Jesus was not tricked into entering the wilderness. Rather, Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Before beginning his revolutionary ministry on earth, Jesus first had to enter the wilderness — a place marked not only by struggle but also by growth, transformation, and new beginnings.
In this place, Jesus faced three distinct temptations from the devil. And each one forced him to confront the human dilemma in the face of overwhelming need.
See, Jesus came to fulfill God’s mission as proclaimed in Mary’s Magnificat that has social, political, and religious implications: to fill the hungry and send the rich empty, to bring down the powerful and lift up the lowly, and to come to the aid of his child Israel (Luke 1:52–54). And as he was about to begin his mission, the devil tested him in each of these areas.
- You can satisfy the hunger of yours and the world right now — if only you turn these stones into bread.
- You can turn the world upside down by ruling all its kingdoms right now — if only you sell your soul to the devil.
- You can prove how much faith you have in God right now — if only you do what the devil says and throw yourself from the temple.
Each temptation was an offer of expediency, a shortcut to what Jesus came to do, but at the cost of his trust in God’s ways. Instead of taking the quick victory humanity expected from the Messiah, Jesus remained steadfast in his trust in God, grounding himself in the scriptures — even if that trust meant going through a journey marked by suffering, even death on a cross.
The wilderness is where this human dilemma emerges, standing at the crossroads between mortality and expediency. Confronting this tension feels like a temptation too harsh to bear. In our fear of losing relevance, control, and faith, we are tempted to cling to quick solutions, instant certainty, and immediate security. In our fear of facing mortality, we are tempted to seek an easy way out of the wilderness — longing for relationships without sacrifice, faith without humility, reconciliation without repentance, or discipleship without the cross.
No one wants to face our deepest fear that we are dust and to dust we will return; thus, we resist the wilderness for as long as possible, despite the Holy Spirit’s persistent nudges.
But on this Ash Wednesday, we find ourselves once again being nudged by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness. Lent is a season of testing and endurance, a journey of learning to trust in God’s ways while resisting the lure of instant gratification and grounding our faith in the scriptures.
Only when we can wrestle with these temptations can we fully understand why crosses are drawn on our foreheads in ashes. The good news of the cross only becomes intelligible when we humble ourselves enough to embrace our mortality.
From Wilderness to Revolution
On this Ash Wednesday, I want to suggest that our wilderness is the world outside our screens, the world outside our bubbles fabricated by corporations and the media. It is in that foreign place that the Holy Spirit leads us. It is in that uncomfortable space that we engage in the spiritual practices of fasting and repentance.
In Isaiah 58, the religious people of Israel questioned God, asking why their fasting and wearing sackcloth and ashes had not brought any significant change in their lives, asking (v. 3a),
“Why do we fast, but you do not see?
Why humble ourselves, but you do not notice?”
The prophet then responds (v. 3b-10),
Look, you serve your own interest on your fast day
and oppress all your workers.
You fast only to quarrel and to fight
and to strike with a wicked fist.
Such fasting as you do today
will not make your voice heard on high.
Is such the fast that I choose,
a day to humble oneself?
Is it to bow down the head like a bulrush
and to lie in sackcloth and ashes?
Will you call this a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?Is not this the fast that I choose:
to loose the bonds of injustice,
to undo the straps of the yoke,
to let the oppressed go free,
and to break every yoke?
Is it not to share your bread with the hungry
and bring the homeless poor into your house;
when you see the naked, to cover them
and not to hide yourself from your own kin?
Then your light shall break forth like the dawn,
and your healing shall spring up quickly;
your vindicator shall go before you;
the glory of the Lord shall be your rear guard.
Then you shall call, and the Lord will answer;
you shall cry for help, and he will say, “Here I am.”If you remove the yoke from among you,
the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil,
if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness
and your gloom be like the noonday.
In a world faced with overwhelming needs, Isaiah’s words offer us a glimmer of hope and a clear path forward. The call to fasting is not a self-serving spiritual practice; the call to repentance is not a one-dimensional personal discipline. Rather, our faithful engagement in Lent, in the wilderness, is the beginning of what becomes a revolution with social, political, and religious implications.
Today marks the beginning of a 40-day journey that calls us to prepare for Easter — a revolution where death has lost its sting, a revolution that proclaims hope lives, a revolution that sings love triumphant, a revolution that calls us from dust to glory, and a revolution that declares the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
May tonight’s imposition of ashes be a reminder of the coming revolution, and may we respond to the invitation to observance of Lenten discipline with courage, for the Holy Spirit invites us into the wilderness to make us Easter people of hope.
In the name of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Rev. Minoo Kim is an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church, currently serving in the Virginia Annual Conference. Follow his Medium publication to receive his latest sermons or check out his website minoowkim.com for his latest content. Peace!
