2002-01-01
Good Morning Dear Ones,
We continue our analysis of MT 4: 1-11, the story of Christ’s temptation in the wilderness. You’ll remember that the devil tempted Him with hunger, trying to test Him, and dominion over earthly territory. In each case, Christ’s reaction was to remain in line with God’s will and to reject the temptation. The Holy Spirit leads me to delve into some questions in the next few messages that will give us greater insight into the value to us of this very important story. Let’s begin with this question: If Christ had yielded to any of these temptations, would there have been any temporal value to Him?
Christ knew that He had come to earth to experience what it is to be mortal, to serve a three-year ministry, and most important of all to give His life as the perfect sin-sacrifice for us on the cross [COL 1: 19-20; 1 PET 1: 20-21; JN 3: 16; HE 10: 10]. We may ask, why God would make such a sacrifice for people who were His enemies and didn’t deserve it. The only logical explanation for this is His most remarkable love for His creation. Another aspect often overlooked for Christ’s incarnation is revealed in HE 4: 15. “Our High Priest is not One Who cannot feel sympathy for our weaknesses. On the contrary, we have a High Priest Who was tempted in every way that we are, but did not sin.” When we go back to HE 8: 1-2, we learn why that is so crucial. It is Christ’s calling to be our Advocate and Intercessor in heaven. How could He have ever done this without understanding our suffering and pain?
Now when we look at the original question above, we must see that from the human, natural point of view, Christ could have chosen to give in to Satan’s temptations, and thus, avoid the pain and suffering of the cross. Had he done this, He would no longer have been qualified to be our Kinsman-Redeemer. We have been told that Christ was both Man and God. He had all the ability to be tempted by the flesh than any of us are. What set Him apart, was His willingness not to be. Even up to the last few hours of His life, we get a picture of his human outer self at war with His inner spiritual self. LK 22: 42, “Father, if it is Your will, take this cup of suffering away from Me. Not My will, but Your will be done.” Those were His prayerful communications with the Father while He suffered in the Garden of Gethsemane.
The temptations that Satan put in front of Christ in the wilderness were not realistic. Christ was faithful enough and had the discernment given Him by the Father to see them for what they were. He knew the Father had no plan to allow Him to starve to death. He also knew that it was not God’s will that anyone should demand a miracle. As for dominion over the earth, Christ was fully aware that God’s plan for that would be carried out by Him in God’s own time, not the devil’s. Christ always does exactly what the Father tells Him to do. Christ’s will is exactly in line with the Father’s. How could that be so? We need only look at Christ’s prayer life and His actions to know that. We know from 1 COR 5: 6-7, that Christ is our Passover Lamb Who has been sacrificed for us. His trip to the cross is the quintessential act of obedience to God.
We must meditate on the significance of this to us. HE 10: 14 helps us to better understand. “With one sacrifice, then, He has made perfect forever those who are purified from sin.” Remember that RO 5: 10-11 revealed that we had been made God’s friends after having been enemies through the death of His Son? Our task, of course, is to work on expunging sin from our lives using the discernment that we get from daily time with God’s word, an active prayer life, interaction with other believers, and service to God. We can learn much from the circumstances of our lives when they are held up to God’s teaching in the Scriptures and the messages He sends to us in prayer. Whether we are dealing with challenges to our health, family problems, difficulties arising in the workplace, self-doubt, grief, or whatever, we must know that our Lord loves each of us dearly and is eager to guide and help us through these challenges. I know this from personal experience. We must place our trust in the Lord. PS 37: 5, “Commit everything you do to the Lord. Trust Him to help you do it, and He will.”
PRAYER: O Lord, today we stand before Your altar in humility and great gratitude. While we never deserved it, You enfolded us with Your grace by sending Christ to the cross for our salvation. Satan and his angels are evil; they take delight in establishing strongholds in our lives leading us to sin and death. RO 6: 11 tells us that we are dead to sin and living in fellowship with You through Christ. There is nothing equal we can do for You in return, but we can confess and repent of our sin. We can have faith in Christ. We must be exposed to Satan’s misdeeds and the suffering he and his followers cause us, but we don’t have to feel we are alone. Like Moses leading the Jews over the Red Sea and young David facing Goliath, the giant, we can be victorious when we remain faithful to You. We know that, because Your power is used repeatedly to protect the faithful. We need only look at how Israel has survived unbelievably unfavorable odds to survive 3000 years of persecution to see the truth of this. Our heartfelt gratitude today comes from a deeper understanding which You give us in the Scriptures of the magnitude of Christ’s sacrifice made for us and its significance to us. We offer You praise for Who You are and thanks for what You do for us. PS 103: 1-5 expresses the contents of our hearts today. “Praise the Lord, my soul! All my being; praise His holy name! Praise the Lord, my soul, and do not forget how kind He is. He forgives all my sins and heals all my diseases. He keeps me from the grave and blessed me with love and mercy. He fills my life with good things, so that I stay young and strong like an eagle.” We are Your adoring, worshipping, loyal, diligent, trusting, and obeying servants. We are also Your friends who love You. All that is good in our lives, even our road to eternal life itself, we acknowledge comes from You. You are an honorable and righteous God Who deserves all the glory. In Christ’s name, we pray. Amen.
Tomorrow, I am led to take up other interesting questions that arise out of our close look at MT 4: 1-11. One passage helps to illuminate the darkness with which Satan tries to surround us. Enjoy these words, PS 103: 15-18, “As for us, our life is like grass. We grow and flourish like a wild flower; then the wind blows on it, and then it is gone-no one sees it again. But for those who honor the Lord, His love lasts forever, and His goodness endures for all generations of those who are true to His covenant and who faithfully obey His commands.” His love is so palpable when we get to know Him through the Scriptures and prayer. It’s worth sharing with others through friendships, the example of how we live our lives, and the choices we make. We are truly blessed when we endure in our faith and recognize His righteousness and His love for each of us. Peter and I send you our love too.
Grace Be With You Always,
Lynn