Jesus is a Mola-Mola
Sermon by Pr. Sharai Jacob on the First Sunday in Lent + Saturday, February 21, 2026
I came across a short youtube video this week in which Hank Green talked about his favorite fish. Hank Green is famous for being an “internet science guy;” he often makes videos answering people's silly or interesting questions about science. Hank Green’s favorite fish is the Mola-Mola fish, which is known for being possibly the world dumbest fish! It is often covered in parasites, its mouth is fused open- so it cannot bite, or defend itself. They are the world’s largest bony fish, typically growing 6ft long and 8-10ft tall, but are very thin. So they look a bit like a flat disc. They are often found stuck floating on their side at the ocean’s surface, presumably because they don’t have swim bladders or strong enough fins to flip themselves the right way up. Most of their large bodies are made of slimy tasteless material. Essentially they are inedible. You also could cut away almost all of their flesh, and they’d just keep going, so there seems to be no reason for them to be as big as they are.
Hank’s video however, proves that this seemingly useless mistake of a fish, has always been a genius creature that we simply didn’t understand.
Scientists have discovered that the reason this fish doesn’t have a swim bladder is because it needs to sink quickly to the icy ocean depths to eat jellyfish. It hunts in the daytime because there are less predators to compete with in the deep sea during the day. Then it floats to the surface and sun bathes to regulate it’s body temperature, and while sunbathing, birds peck parasites off of it’s body. It’s large body is mostly made of tasteless jelly so that predators who might take a bite of them, would be deterred. Their bodies are so big, that a bite or two from a predator wouldn’t reach any of their major organs. These fish have successfully survived for thousands of years, they are winning!
We may not have understood them, or seen the value in their existence, but they don’t live to impress us, they don’t live to prove themselves to anyone. They do what they do, and they know their own worth.
In our reading today, Jesus is channeling the Mola-Mola fish! Satan asks him repeatedly, “Prove that you are the son of God!” Prove yourself to me! If you were really God’s son you’d have the power to control and demand and take.
But Jesus doesn’t fall into the trap of proving his worth. Just one verse before our reading today, in Matthew 3:17, a voice from Heaven said, “This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased.” Jesus knows his own worth, who cares what the devil thinks of him?
When Satan sees that Jesus is not going to waste his energy trying to prove his worth, the devil offers Jesus power. Satan’s kind of power creates and is created by control, fear, and violence. God’s power on the other hand is rooted in love, care, grace and hope.
Satan is offering Kingdoms, offering the power of a King to control and command. God offers us a home in his Kin-dom. God offers us a place in his family, where we can become Kin. In God’s kin-dom, it’s not about fear and control, it’s about trusting in God’s love.
What Satan offers to Jesus is really the illusion of more power, more self-assurance, more control, but the only true power belongs to God. Self-assurance is already ours in God’s kindom where we are offered unconditional love and grace. God’s love offers us true freedom, and in a relationship built on trust there is no need for control.
In our world today, there are people, institutions, “powers,” calling us to prove ourselves. We hear scripture misquoted, and misused to justify hate. Powerful people are working so hard to trick us into spending our energy in arguments rather than using our energy to do good work, to organize, or to care for each other.
We are poked and prodded by cultural norms when we dare to lean on one another in community rather than struggling alone. Because people in power prefer for us to be isolated. It makes us weaker and easier to control.
So, who are you proving yourself to? Whose opinion of you matters? Where do you spend your energy?
As we begin our Lenten journeys, and as the brokenness of the world grows ever more concerning, I offer you the wisdom of the Mola Mola fish! The strategy of Jesus in the wilderness, remember that God does not require that you prove your worth. You are known and loved unconditionally. There is no power in all of creation that could separate you from the Love of God.
So go, and do the work that your hands find to do. No matter how insignificant it may seem to others. Even if people around you don’t understand your role. Even if you think your work looks so small beside the looming problems you face. Go and be God’s Kindom in the world. You have nothing to prove, but there is work to do. And we are all working towards the goal together.
