Sermon #22 Luke
Sermons
Title: THE TEMPTATION OF CHRIST
Text: Luke 4:1-13
Subject: Christ’s
Temptations in the Wilderness
Date: Sunday Evening - January 16, 2000[1]
Tape
# V-65b
Readings: Office:
Don Martin Auditorium: James Jordan
Introduction:
In order to save us from our sins the Lord Jesus Christ,
the Son of God, not only became a man so that he could die for us, as our
Substitute, but he humbled himself, as a man. I am certain that we cannot
fathom the depths of his humiliation. And I am equally certain that we should
not try. In fact, everything I have heard or read by men attempting to explain
the various aspects of our Lord’s humiliation, though done with the desire to
honor him, has appeared to me to be a desecration of that which is most sacred.
Instead of trying to fathom the unfathomable, let us rather
simply bow before the revelation of God in Holy Scripture and worship that One
who, though he was rich, yet for our sake, became poor, that we through his
poverty might be made rich. With that in mind, tonight, I want us to reverently
meditate upon The Temptation of Christ in the wilderness, as it is
recorded upon the pages of Inspiration in Luke 4:1-13, and worship him who was
in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin.
(Luke 4:1-13)
"And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and
was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
2 Being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat
nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered. 3 And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command
this stone that it be made bread. 4 And
Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man
shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. 5 And the devil, taking him up into an
high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of
time. 6 And the devil said unto him,
All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered
unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it.
7 If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine. 8 And Jesus answered and said unto him,
Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou
shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. 9 And he brought him to Jerusalem, and
set him on a pinnacle of the temple, and said unto him, If thou be the Son of
God, cast thyself down from hence: 10 For
it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: 11 And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy
foot against a stone. 12 And Jesus
answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not
tempt the Lord thy God. 13 And
when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a
season."
May God the Holy Spirit be our Teacher, as we consider and
seek to learn the things here revealed.
Proposition: In order to redeem and save
his people, the Lord Jesus Christ had to live in perfect obedience to God,
while enduring all the consequences of sin, triumph over Satan, and suffer the
wrath of God to the full satisfaction of justice, and thereby bring in everlasting
righteousness as a man.
One great part of our Master’s obedience was his temptation
in all points as a man and his overcoming of temptation, his triumphing over
Satan in temptation, that he might be for us a merciful and faithful High
Priest in things pertaining to God. This is what we have before us in Luke
4:1-13.
Immediately after his baptism Christ was
harassed with the temptations of Satan. As it is written, "he suffered being tempted,” and he "was tempted in all points like as we are, yet without sin,”
(Heb. 2:18 4:15). He was tried and tested with all sorts of temptations, just
like we are. Yet, he had no sin and did no sin.
Satan tempted him, but not by stirring up
some corruption, or provoking some lust in him, as he does when he tempts us to
evil.
David is an example of the way we are tempted. He was tempted, like we are,
when Satan stirred up the lust of pride and vanity that was in him to number
the people. But there was no sin, no corruption in Christ to be stirred. The
old serpent found nothing in him with which to work.
Our Lord was not tempted by Satan putting any
evil into him, as he put it into the heart
of Judas Iscariot to betray his Lord, and put it into the hearts of Ananias and
Sapphira to lie unto the Holy Ghost.
And Satan got no advantage over Christ by any
of his temptations, as he so often does us. Oh, no! The Lord Jesus triumphed over his
adversary and ours in all things. The devil was forced leave our Lord after
these temptations in the wilderness, just as he was in the garden of
Gethsemane. And, at last, our Savior crushed the serpent’s head in complete
victory at Calvary, and bound the dragon of hell in the chain of his
omnipotence, that he should deceive the nations no more.
Thank God, he who is our tempter, our
adversary, our accuser, he who is far too cunning and powerful a foe for us,
has been bound by our Savior. Our adversary the devil still goes about, walking
up and down in the earth as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. But he
is a bound lion. His fangs hand claws have been removed. In so far as God’s
elect are concerned, all he can do is roar!
(John 12:31-33) "Now is the
judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out. 32 And I, if I
be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men
unto me. 33 This he said,
signifying what death he should die."
(Revelation 12:10) "And I heard a loud voice saying in
heaven, Now is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and
the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused
them before our God day and night."
(Revelation 20:1-3) "And I saw an angel come down from
heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. 2 And he laid hold on the dragon, that
old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, 3 And cast him into the bottomless pit,
and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no
more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be
loosed a little season."
Having said all that, we must never fail to
remember that these temptations of Christ were real.
Our Lord Jesus was tempted in all points, just like we are. The lust of the
eye, the lust of the flesh, and the pride of life (1 John 2:16) by which he got
advantage over Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, and by which he still
deceives and overthrows many, are the very weapons Satan used against our
Master.
1. The Lord Jesus was tempted “when he was full of the
Holy Ghost” (v. 1).
Luke tells us that our Lord was filled with the Holy Spirit
when he was tempted. Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell us that he was led of the
Spirit into the wilderness of temptation. These things are not written to fill
up space. They are written for our learning. They tell us plainly that nothing
shields a believer from Satan’s temptations.
·
Nothing will prevent us from
temptation but the will of God. No amount of holiness, no measure of spirituality,
will keep the tempter away. No matter how fervent we are in prayer, no matter
how completely we may walk in the Spirit, no matter how sensitive and
submissive we are to the Spirit’s leading, we will still be tempted of the
devil to do evil.
·
In fact, Matthew specifically informs us that “Jesus was led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of
the devil.” In other words, the
temptations to which we are subjected are, like all other aspects of the
believer’s life, according to the will of God and designed by him for our good.
Like our Master, God’s people learn obedience by the things we suffer, even
from the hands of our adversary the devil.
2.
Our Lord’s temptations came in the wilderness.
Matthew, Mark, and Luke tell us that
the temptations took place in the wilderness, where there was no one and
nothing to support him. Mark tells us that he was there exposed to the wild
beasts. Matthew and Luke tell us that his temptations came after he had been
miraculously sustained by God through a period of forty days and nights of
fasting. This, too, is important. Our
Master’s temptations came at a time when he was physically weak and hungry.
Satan is a cunning, crafty adversary. He suits his temptations to the
constitutions, circumstances, and situation we are in.
3.
Our Savior was tempted just after his baptism.
·
He had just come from a time of solemn worship and deliberate,
consecrated obedience. He had just been baptized, in order to fulfill all
righteousness (symbolically), as a pledge of his determination to obey his
Father’s will unto death as our Substitute.
·
Our Lord had just been highly, publicly honored as the Son of God, in
whom the Father is well pleased.
·
He had just experienced the miraculous power of God in sustaining him
in life without any natural means. He was sustained not by bread, but by the
word (the decree) of God.
There is often
only a step from great privileges and blessings to great trials and troubles.
We must never forget this. Even in our most solemn frames and at the times of
our greatest usefulness, we must “watch
and pray.”
“So it often is with his
members; that as he was tempted, after his baptism, after the Spirit of God had
descended upon him, and filled him with his gifts and graces without measure;
and after he had had such a testimony from heaven of his divine Sonship: so his
people, after they have had communion with God in ordinances, and have had some
sealing testimonies of his love, fall into temptations, and fall by them; as
the disciples of Christ after the supper, who, when tempted, all forsook him
and fled, and one denied him.” -- John
Gill
All that is in the world, all our troubles, all our trials,
all our temptations, all our rebellions, all the misery we bring to others, and
all the woe we bring upon ourselves, is the result of three great evils, as
John describes them: “the lust of the
flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life.” These were, as I have
already said, the ruin of Adam and Eve, and of our race in the Garden of Eden.
And these are the areas wherein our Master was tempted of Satan. They have to
do with unbelief, worldliness, and presumption.
Three times we see our Savior tempted of the devil,
assaulted by the fiend of hell, as he cunningly attempted, with feigned
politeness, to draw the holy One of God into sin. Each assault was the work of
one who is a master in deceit. We will be wise to carefully observe both the
subtlety of the serpent and the wisdom of our Savior in each of these
temptations.
I.
First, Satan tempted the Lord Jesus
to unbelief, to the lust of the eye (vv. 3-4).
(Luke 4:3-4)
"And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command
this stone that it be made bread. 4 And
Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man
shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God."
Here Satan tried to get the Lord Jesus to distrust his
Father’s care, the care of him who had sustained him for forty days and nights
without food. Our Savior was hungry and weak. But he had just received a public
declaration by which his Father owned him as the Son of God. So the hissing
serpent offers him a very “kind, sensible” suggestion. The sense of it is this
– The devil picked up, or pointed to
a rock and said, Since you’re the Son of God, and you are hungry, why don’t you
just turn this rock into a loaf of bread and have a bite to eat?
Why should he wait? Why should the Creator of all things
sit still and starve? Why not command the stone to become bread? What possible
evil could there be in that? The answer is found in our Lord’s rely. Being
familiar with the Old Testament Scriptures, the Master resisted Satan and
escaped his snare by quoting from Deuteronomy 8:3.
(Deuteronomy 8:3) "And he humbled thee, and suffered thee
to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy
fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread
only, but by every word that
proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live."
Our Lord refused to turn the stone to bread because he
refused to live by carnal reason. He refused to walk by sight. He was
determined to live by faith, trusting the word[2]
of God.
1.
He would not turn the stone into bread because it
was not his Father’s will that the stone be turned into bread.
Though our Lord performed countless miracles for the
benefit of others, he never performed even one for his own benefit. He
preferred to remain hungry than to violate his Father’s will. With the hunger
pangs and physical weakness of going forty days and nights without food, the
Lord Jesus, in effect said to Satan, like Job of old, “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him.”
If we would honor God, we must follow Christ’s example. Let
us ever choose trusting him, believing him, walking by faith, rather than
leaning on the arm of the flesh. Our Father’s will is always best; and he will
provide everything we need as we walk in his will, in his way, trusting him.
2.
There is another, obvious
reason, why he refused to turn the stone into bread. He was living on this earth as a man, as my Representative and
Substitute, and I cannot turn a rock into a loaf of bread.
·
If he would live and die for me, as my Redeemer, he had to live and die
as I must, as a man.
·
If he would be touched with the feeling of my infirmity, he had to feel
what feel in the same circumstances.
3.
I cannot help thinking that
he may have had a third reason for refusing the devil, though he was terribly
hungry. – He refused to make sport
for and entertain the fiend of hell.
He had nothing to prove to himself or to the devil. He was
the and is the Son of God. He knew it. His Father had just declared it. And,
though pride would jump at the chance to prove it by displaying it before the
prince of darkness, our Master refused to gratify him. But the heart of the
matter is this. – Satan tried to get
Christ not to trust his Father’s wise and good providence. When
Apollyon persuades us to walk by sight, by the lust of the eye, rather than
trust God’s providence, we have fallen victim to his devices.
II.
Second, Satan tried to entice the Holy One into sin by the lust of the flesh,
by worldliness.[3]
He tried to get the Lord Jesus to grasp worldly power by
compromise (vv. 5-8).
(Luke 4:5-8)
"And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, showed unto
him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6 And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee,
and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will
I give it. 7 If thou therefore wilt
worship me, all shall be thine. 8 And
Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me,
Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only
shalt thou serve."
The devil took the Lord Jesus by his permission up on top
of one of those high mountains surrounding Jerusalem, and offered him all the
kingdoms of the world, if he would just fall down and worship him.
Try to get a sense of the brazenness of the wicked one. He
sort of waved his hands, with a confident smile and, by a diabolical and false
representation of things to the sight, he showed the Lord Jesus "all the kingdoms of the world, and the
glory of them,” alluring him with a promise of the whole world to "fall down and worship him.” Imagine
that!
For
Satan to promise these to Christ was hellishly impertinent. The whole world was
his already! The earth is his, and the fullness thereof, the world, and they
that dwell therein. He made it all. He owns it all. Besides that, all power in
heaven and earth is given our Lord as the God-man Mediator, to rule them, use
them, and dispose of them as he will. For Satan to pretend that these were his
to give, that they were in his power to dispose of to whomsoever he pleased,
was intolerable arrogance.
Understand
this. There is nothing in this world,
nothing in the universe, which belongs to Satan, nothing over which he has
power, except as Christ our God gives it to him. This is the same devil
who, we are told in the Book of Job, cowers before God’s throne to give account
of his doings, who could not wiggle his finger against Job without God’s
permission. Why he could not even go into a herd of hogs, without the Lord Jesus
giving him permission to do so. For him to propose to Christ, that he should
fall down and worship him, was the height of insolence and impudence! But that
is his nature. We must never expect less from him or from those who dance by
his lead.
“This shows what the
original sin of the devil was, affectation of Deity, and to be worshipped as
God; hence he has usurped the title of the God of this world; and has prevailed
upon the ignorant part of it, in some places, to give him worship: and, indeed,
to sacrifice to idols, is to sacrifice to devils: but, not content with this,
he sought to be worshipped by the Son of God himself; than which nothing could
be more audacious and impious; wherefore Christ rejected his temptation with
indignation and abhorrence; saying, ‘Get
thee behind me, Satan; for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God,
and him only shalt thou serve.’”
-- John Gill
The devil here appeals to the Master to by-pass the misery
and agony of the cross. He was promised the world as the reward for his
obedience unto death, the throne of universal monarchy upon his finishing the
Father’s will as our sin-atoning Sacrifice. Satan was just offering him an easier
way to get it all. All he required was, what appears to be a small concession.
He does not require that the Master cease to worship God, or to worship him
above God, or even that he worship him permanently. He only demanded the he
fall down and worship him, adore him, acknowledge him once, and that in
private.
The concession seemed to be small. The promise was great.
The way was easy. Why shouldn’t he take the easy way out? Why shouldn’t he grab
such an enormous prize? Why shouldn’t we? The answer is found in our Master’s
quotation of Deuteronomy 6:13. We are to worship God alone and serve him alone.
The glory of God must be our dominant
concern. For that, for the glory of God, we ought to gladly sacrifice
anything.
·
Beware of worldliness – the love of the world.
(1 John 2:15-17) "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love
the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16 For all that is in
the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of
life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. 17 And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that
doeth the will of God abideth for ever."
(Matthew 6:31-33) "Therefore take
no thought, saying, What shall we eat? or, What shall we drink? or, Wherewithal
shall we be clothed? 32 (For after all these things do the Gentiles seek:) for your
heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need of all these things. 33 But seek ye
first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be
added unto you."
·
Beware of covetousness,
which is idolatry.
(Luke 12:15)
"And he said unto them, Take heed, and
beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the
things which he possesseth."
(Colossians 3:1-5) "If ye then be risen with Christ, seek
those things which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. 2 Set your affection on things above,
not on things on the earth. 3 For ye
are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is our
life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. 5 Mortify therefore your members which
are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil
concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry:"
III.
Third, Satan tempted
the son of god with the pride of life, urging him to act in daring presumption (vv. 9-13).
(Luke 4:9-13)
"And he brought him to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the
temple, and said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from
hence: 10 For it is written, He shall
give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: 11 And in their hands
they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. 12 And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. 13 And when the devil had ended all the
temptation, he departed from him for a season."
This time the devil quotes Scripture (Ps. 91:11). In fact,
one of Satan’s favorite weapons is the Bible. He takes the Holy Book of
Inspiration and twists it, perverts it, misuses it, and abuses it for his own
devices.
Again, the Lord Jesus referred the devil to Deuteronomy 6.
This time he quoted verse 16.
(Deuteronomy 6:16) "Ye shall not tempt the LORD your God,
as ye tempted him in Massah."
What a wonderful, public, undeniable proof it would be that
he is indeed the Son of God and the Messiah, and a clear fulfillment of Psalm
91, if the Lord Jesus would dive off that high, high wall of the temple, with
all the scribes, and Pharisees, and people watching, as the angels of God swept
down from heaven and gave him a gentle landing. After all, this was the promise
of the Psalms. Surely, since God had not predestined his death at this time, he
could not die by diving off the wall. Could he? For him to have heeded Satan’s
allurement would have been an act of self exaltation and pride, as well as an
act of complete irresponsibility, tempting God by presuming upon his goodness.
Our Savior did not yield. The glory of his Father was more important to him than
the fickle approval and applause of men. May the same ever be true of us!
Application: Let me send you home with
four lessons to remember. Oh, may God the Holy Spirit teach them to us every
day. May he inscribe them upon our hearts and minds with the pen of his grace.
1.
Let us live by faith, not by
sight, trusting the will of God and the providence of God in all things.
(Jeremiah 29:11) "For I know the thoughts that I think
toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an
expected end."
(1 Corinthians 10:13) "There hath no temptation taken you but
such as is common to man: but God is faithful,
who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the
temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it."
2.
Let us love our God, not the
world. Seek godliness and shun worldliness.
3.
Let us walk humbly before
God, and ever beware of that horrid pride which would tempt him, presuming upon
his goodness.
4.
The Lord Jesus Christ is
just the Savior and Great High Priest we need.
(Hebrews 2:18) "For in that he himself hath suffered
being tempted, he is able to succour them that are tempted."
(Hebrews 4:14-16) "Seeing then that we have a great high
priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast
our profession. 15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the
feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin. 16 Let us therefore come boldly unto
the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time
of need."
As he foiled Satan in the wilderness and crushed his head
at Calvary, so he knows how to deliver you and me out of our temptations; and
blessed be his name, he will!
(Romans 16:20) "And the God of peace shall bruise Satan
under your feet shortly. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you. Amen."
AMEN.
[1] San Jose, CA – Monday, January 24, 2000
[2] The “word” of God, here and in the context of Deuteronomy, refers not to the Scriptures, but to the oracle, purpose, and decree of God.
[3] This was actually the third temptation in the successive order given in Matthew 4; but for some reason not revealed to us the Holy Spirit inspired Luke to place this temptation second. Perhaps it was done just to give the goats a can to chew. Obviously, there is no significance to the fact.