Luke 4:1-12
Today, as this season of Lent starts, we read about the temptations of Jesus.
Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted
Interestingly, we pray a bit later in this service, ‘Lead us not into temptation’.
We will look at that in our Lent course on the Lord’s Prayer, but I wonder whether one way to think about this is to consider that there are two kinds of temptations. There are those temptations which are too strong for us and will destroy spiritually and physically, and those temptations that are there to test us and grow us. As James writes, “Blessed is anyone who endures temptation. Such a one has stood the test and will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him”. (James 1:12)
So when we pray ‘Lead us not into temptation’, we are praying that God will not let us go to those places or be in such situations where we will face temptations that we cannot bear.
Of course we will experience temptation. It is part of being human.
It is not sinful to experience temptation.
In the story of Adam and Eve, they were guilty of no sin when the serpent spoke to Eve. They were guilty of sin when they disbelieved God and put their trust in what the servant said and ate the fruit.
We do not sin when we are tempted. We sin when we give in to temptation.
In other words, Satan is tempting Jesus to do the work of God by doing dramatic things, by signs, and not by the long, costly way of love – a way that will take Jesus to be crucified
The first temptation is to forget God
The second temptation is to become God
The third temptation is about turning God into your servant, into your genii in the bottle. Make God work to your agenda. It is the temptation to pray, but to pray for what I want or what we want. It is about renouncing the way of love.
These were the temptations that Jesus faced all through his ministry, and particularly this third temptation as he came closer and closer to the cross.
It is why, when Jesus tells his disciples that he must go to the cross, and Peter says to him, ‘Lord that is not the way for you’, Jesus is so fierce with Peter. ‘Get behind me Satan. You are not speaking the things of God, but of human things’.
And the final temptation of Christ? It was when they jeered at him as he hung on the cross and said come down and prove to us that you are the Son of God. Echoes of the wilderness.
And Jesus stands firm against temptation because
1. He has thrown himself on his Father
At the right time, having encountered his Father powerfully in the baptism, he has gone, ‘been led’, into the wilderness to be tempted, to be tested. He faced up to the demons that were out there, and made himself weak, vulnerable and completely dependent on his Father
2. He is so full of the Word of God:
He knows the scripture, he quotes scripture. He knows that God’s Word can quite literally fill us. It can guide us, teach us, comfort us, strengthen us, satisfy us – because it leads us to God. And on each occasion when he is tempted, he is able to quote the scripture.
3. He is utterly committed to putting God his Father first, to putting him at the centre.
We pray in the prayer that he prayed, that he gave us to pray, ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name’.
Our very first request, having established who God is and what our relationship is with him, is to pray that his name will be made holy, honoured.
And Jesus is prepared to commit himself completely into the hands of the God who has said that He loves him.
4. He has submitted himself to doing things God’s way, the way of love, and not the seemingly easy way.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, when he prays that God will take away the cross – he ends up praying, ‘but not my will but yours be done’. And again in the Lord’s prayer, we pray, ‘Your will be done on earth as in heaven’.
My friends, as we go through this season of Lent it can be a time when we open ourselves and make ourselves vulnerable, possibly by fasting, possibly by going somewhere (literal or metaphorical) that we have avoided for some time. It might very well mean saying sorry – sorry to God and sorry to someone else. Or it may be a time to let go of a hurt or resentment – by handing it to God and letting him deal with it. Often it helps to do that with someone else.
It required a great deal of courage for Jesus to go into the wilderness, just as it required huge courage for him to face the cross. Perhaps we need courage in our Christian faith.
It is also a time to get to know the Word of God, the bible.
It is really helpful – and I’ve only got this in the last 10 years or so – to learn passages so that you can pray them over: when you are out walking, or in the night hours when you are awake.
Learn the song of Mary, Zechariah, Simeon. Learn some of the Psalms. It is why we are starting to use the Psalms in our mid-morning service. We begin to let them soak into us, to become part of us. So that we start to think, to feel in a Psalm way: with lament, anger, longing and praise. They challenge and they reassure. And when the temptations come, we have something that we can turn to
And use this season to make that commitment to God, to rededicate ourselves to him and his service. And we recommit ourselves to walk his way – not the way of status or power or spectacular works, but the way of love, a way that takes us to the cross.
Of course we cannot do that on our own. We should not even begin to try.
But I mentioned that Jesus, in the wilderness, as he goes to the cross, and as he stays on the cross, resisted temptation to level 100 – all the way!
The writer to the Hebrews says, “Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:14-16)
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| The temptations of Christ. The Basilica of San Marco, Venice c1100-1150 |
The story is told of the boy whose parents found out that he was swimming in the river on his way home from school. They told him that he was not to do that. The following morning, mum thought it was wise to check his bag. She found in it a pair of swimming trunks. She said to him, ‘I thought I had told you not to go swimming on your way back from school’. And he replied, ‘It is OK mum. I wasn’t going to go swimming. I packed them just in case I was tempted’.
Today, as this season of Lent starts, we read about the temptations of Jesus.
Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted
Interestingly, we pray a bit later in this service, ‘Lead us not into temptation’.
We will look at that in our Lent course on the Lord’s Prayer, but I wonder whether one way to think about this is to consider that there are two kinds of temptations. There are those temptations which are too strong for us and will destroy spiritually and physically, and those temptations that are there to test us and grow us. As James writes, “Blessed is anyone who endures temptation. Such a one has stood the test and will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised to those who love him”. (James 1:12)
So when we pray ‘Lead us not into temptation’, we are praying that God will not let us go to those places or be in such situations where we will face temptations that we cannot bear.
Of course we will experience temptation. It is part of being human.
It is not sinful to experience temptation.
In the story of Adam and Eve, they were guilty of no sin when the serpent spoke to Eve. They were guilty of sin when they disbelieved God and put their trust in what the servant said and ate the fruit.
We do not sin when we are tempted. We sin when we give in to temptation.
Jesus was, in the words of Hebrews’ ‘tempted just as we are’. Indeed, he experienced temptation at a level none of us can imagine.
If there is a scale of temptation, levels 1 to 100, then I never reach level 4 – because I’ve given in by level 3. But Jesus got to level 100 – particularly as he was so tempted in the garden of Gethsemane to avoid the cross. He resisted temptation all the way.
And we’ll come back to that at the end.
And we read here that Jesus was tempted when he had fasted and ‘was famished’.
That is also very much the case. When we fast (and I note that Jesus assumes three things of those who follow him: we will give, we will pray and we will fast.)
But when we fast often some of the yuckier darker stuff that is in us, which we are quite good at pretending that it is not there, will often come to the service.
When I fast, it is usually the time for Alison to take cover – because then I am tempted to be angry, grumpy and resentful (or at least more angry, grumpy and resentful than usual).
And it is when I fast that I most need to cry out to the Holy Spirit to come and change me.
And so, Jesus has fasted. He is in the wilderness. Not a good place. He is famished. And Satan comes to him.
He tempts him to forget God, to live only for the desires of this world. To use his power, with no reference to God, to satisfy his physical needs. ‘Turn these stones into bread’.
And secondly, Satan tempts Jesus to revolt against God his Father – who only a few verses before has told Jesus, ‘You are my beloved Son – and I am proud of you’. But now Satan is saying to Jesus, reject the Father. He says he loves you, but he doesn’t really love you. Rule for yourself. Take the glory and the authority for yourself. Become God alone.
It is the same temptation that he put to Adam and Eve – in the old story – when he urged them to rebel against God. Now he is inciting rebellion within the Trinity.
And thirdly, and this is the most subtle, insidious of the temptations, Satan tempts Jesus not to walk the way of love.
If there is a scale of temptation, levels 1 to 100, then I never reach level 4 – because I’ve given in by level 3. But Jesus got to level 100 – particularly as he was so tempted in the garden of Gethsemane to avoid the cross. He resisted temptation all the way.
And we’ll come back to that at the end.
And we read here that Jesus was tempted when he had fasted and ‘was famished’.
That is also very much the case. When we fast (and I note that Jesus assumes three things of those who follow him: we will give, we will pray and we will fast.)
But when we fast often some of the yuckier darker stuff that is in us, which we are quite good at pretending that it is not there, will often come to the service.
When I fast, it is usually the time for Alison to take cover – because then I am tempted to be angry, grumpy and resentful (or at least more angry, grumpy and resentful than usual).
And it is when I fast that I most need to cry out to the Holy Spirit to come and change me.
And so, Jesus has fasted. He is in the wilderness. Not a good place. He is famished. And Satan comes to him.
He tempts him to forget God, to live only for the desires of this world. To use his power, with no reference to God, to satisfy his physical needs. ‘Turn these stones into bread’.
And secondly, Satan tempts Jesus to revolt against God his Father – who only a few verses before has told Jesus, ‘You are my beloved Son – and I am proud of you’. But now Satan is saying to Jesus, reject the Father. He says he loves you, but he doesn’t really love you. Rule for yourself. Take the glory and the authority for yourself. Become God alone.
It is the same temptation that he put to Adam and Eve – in the old story – when he urged them to rebel against God. Now he is inciting rebellion within the Trinity.
And thirdly, and this is the most subtle, insidious of the temptations, Satan tempts Jesus not to walk the way of love.
He says to Jesus, ‘Given that, since you are the Son of God’ (that is more the meaning of the ‘if’ here), do God’s work in your way and not his way. You believe in God. You have a relationship with God. Great. Now get God to do what you want. Do something spectacular, dramatic so that everyone will believe in God. Prove to them that God is trustworthy. You don’t need to go to the cross. Throw yourself off the pinnacle of the temple (the tallest building of the time). God has said that he will catch you.
In other words, Satan is tempting Jesus to do the work of God by doing dramatic things, by signs, and not by the long, costly way of love – a way that will take Jesus to be crucified
The first temptation is to forget God
The second temptation is to become God
The third temptation is about turning God into your servant, into your genii in the bottle. Make God work to your agenda. It is the temptation to pray, but to pray for what I want or what we want. It is about renouncing the way of love.
These were the temptations that Jesus faced all through his ministry, and particularly this third temptation as he came closer and closer to the cross.
It is why, when Jesus tells his disciples that he must go to the cross, and Peter says to him, ‘Lord that is not the way for you’, Jesus is so fierce with Peter. ‘Get behind me Satan. You are not speaking the things of God, but of human things’.
And the final temptation of Christ? It was when they jeered at him as he hung on the cross and said come down and prove to us that you are the Son of God. Echoes of the wilderness.
And Jesus stands firm against temptation because
1. He has thrown himself on his Father
At the right time, having encountered his Father powerfully in the baptism, he has gone, ‘been led’, into the wilderness to be tempted, to be tested. He faced up to the demons that were out there, and made himself weak, vulnerable and completely dependent on his Father
2. He is so full of the Word of God:
He knows the scripture, he quotes scripture. He knows that God’s Word can quite literally fill us. It can guide us, teach us, comfort us, strengthen us, satisfy us – because it leads us to God. And on each occasion when he is tempted, he is able to quote the scripture.
3. He is utterly committed to putting God his Father first, to putting him at the centre.
We pray in the prayer that he prayed, that he gave us to pray, ‘Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name’.
Our very first request, having established who God is and what our relationship is with him, is to pray that his name will be made holy, honoured.
And Jesus is prepared to commit himself completely into the hands of the God who has said that He loves him.
4. He has submitted himself to doing things God’s way, the way of love, and not the seemingly easy way.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, when he prays that God will take away the cross – he ends up praying, ‘but not my will but yours be done’. And again in the Lord’s prayer, we pray, ‘Your will be done on earth as in heaven’.
My friends, as we go through this season of Lent it can be a time when we open ourselves and make ourselves vulnerable, possibly by fasting, possibly by going somewhere (literal or metaphorical) that we have avoided for some time. It might very well mean saying sorry – sorry to God and sorry to someone else. Or it may be a time to let go of a hurt or resentment – by handing it to God and letting him deal with it. Often it helps to do that with someone else.
It required a great deal of courage for Jesus to go into the wilderness, just as it required huge courage for him to face the cross. Perhaps we need courage in our Christian faith.
It is also a time to get to know the Word of God, the bible.
It is really helpful – and I’ve only got this in the last 10 years or so – to learn passages so that you can pray them over: when you are out walking, or in the night hours when you are awake.
Learn the song of Mary, Zechariah, Simeon. Learn some of the Psalms. It is why we are starting to use the Psalms in our mid-morning service. We begin to let them soak into us, to become part of us. So that we start to think, to feel in a Psalm way: with lament, anger, longing and praise. They challenge and they reassure. And when the temptations come, we have something that we can turn to
And use this season to make that commitment to God, to rededicate ourselves to him and his service. And we recommit ourselves to walk his way – not the way of status or power or spectacular works, but the way of love, a way that takes us to the cross.
Of course we cannot do that on our own. We should not even begin to try.
But I mentioned that Jesus, in the wilderness, as he goes to the cross, and as he stays on the cross, resisted temptation to level 100 – all the way!
The writer to the Hebrews says, “Since, then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast to our confession. For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who in every respect has been tested as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore approach the throne of grace with boldness, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” (Hebrews 4:14-16)
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