The Temptation of Jesus

 Matthew 4: 1-11

The First Sunday in Lent, March 4, 2001

The Bible teaches us that Jesus crushed the devil’s head when he died on the cross and thus destroyed his power over us.  It says that Satan is bound for the Day of Judgment.  At the same time, the Bible says that the devil is like a roaring lion, walking around, looking for someone to devour.  We are told to be on our guard against the devil’s lies and schemes.  And yet we read in the Epistle to the Hebrews, “Inasmuch then as the children have partaken of flesh and blood, He Himself likewise shared in the same, that through death He might destroy him who had the power of death, that is, the devil.” (Hebrews 2:14)

So we keep on fighting against the one whom Jesus has defeated.  We fight as those who have already won, yet must still do battle.  There is an “already” and a “not yet” element to this.  In Christ the victory has already been won.  We are in Christ.  Yet we are also in this world, and we see the fight raging all around us.  The devil is called the prince of this world.  But he is not in charge.  He never has been and he never will be.  He may be more powerful than we are, but he is no match for the One whose name we bear in Holy Baptism.

Note the timing of this most famous confrontation between God and the devil.  It is no accident that Jesus went into the desert to face temptation from the devil right after he was baptized. He did this to teach us that we may do battle against the devil only from the strength of our baptism.  It is in Holy Baptism that we put on Christ as the Apostle teaches in Galatians 3:27.  It is in Holy Baptism that we are crucified, die, and rise from the dead in union with Christ’s crucifixion, death, and resurrection, as the Apostle teaches in Romans 6.  We cannot do battle against the devil on our own.  Unless we are joined to the almighty name and power of the Holy Trinity – the name put upon us in Holy Baptism – we will surely fail.

The Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness.  We pray, “lead us not into temptation,” because Jesus was led into temptation to face it as our champion.  We cannot face the devil without Jesus.  This is why Jesus faced him.  Jesus faced him to defeat him.  For forty years Israel grumbled in a faithless rebellion against God as they wandered in the wilderness.  They gave in to the devil’s temptations.  For forty days Jesus, the new Israel, submitted in reverence to God as he fasted in the wilderness.  He did not give in to the devil’s temptations.  He came to succeed where we had failed.  And so he did.  And he did it for us.

The devil tempted Eve our first mother in the same three-fold manner he continues to use to this day.  They are suggestion, delight, and consent.  First, he suggests, “Has God indeed said?”  The suggestion leads to a delight in the one being tempted.  Eve saw that the fruit was desirable.  She delighted in it.  And it was when she delighted in the devil’s suggestion that she acted on that suggestion and sinned against God. 

But when God the Son was incarnate in the Virgin’s womb, he came into the world without sin.  The devil could and did make his suggestion, but Jesus could not possibly delight in sin.  So the temptation of Jesus stayed on the outside.  It never penetrated into Jesus’ heart as it did with Eve, and as it does every day with you and me.  Jesus could be and was tempted just as we are, but Jesus couldn’t and didn’t fall prey to the temper’s power.  The one who led us into sin met the One who could not sin and in that meeting he was defeated.

I do not know how much the devil understands about God but he is a smart person I know that.  The Bible says he is cunning.  He is clever.  Did he understand during this temptation that he was talking to God in the flesh?  When he said, “If you are the Son of God,” did he know for a fact that Jesus most certainly was?  I don’t know. 

But look at how Jesus chooses to do battle against this liar and murderer of souls.  He does battle as we may do battle.  He who is the Almighty God before whom every knee will one day kneel, chose to oppose the devil, not with his inner divine power, but with the power of the Holy Scriptures, the Bible, the same power you and I have.  Jesus drove the devil away with the naked Scriptures.  You can read the Bible that drives the devil right back to hell where he belongs.  You can confess the truth that is not so high above you that you need to leap up to heaven to get it.  The truth that drove the devil away from Jesus is written in the Bible.

When we talk about how Jesus is our Redeemer, we confess in the Little Catechism, “Who has redeemed me, a lost and condemned creature, purchased and won me from all sins, from death, and from the power of the devil.”  Jesus is God and only God is by nature incapable of evil.  Eve and Adam were free to do good or evil.  But when they used their freedom to do evil they became enslaved by that very evil.  When the delight to sin leads to the doing of sin, that deed becomes the prison for the one who did it.

And so it happened and happens.  Jesus said, “Whoever sins is a slave to sin.”  The idea that we are free spiritual agents is a lie that the devil himself invented.  You are either a child of God or a slave of the devil.  There is no middle ground.  This is why when we are baptized, prior to our baptism we promise to renounce the devil and all his works and all his ways.  When God baptizes us, he sets us free and he makes us warriors against the one who kept us in bondage.

Just as our baptism calls us into battle against the devil and equips us to do battle against the devil, the three temptations of the devil are all directed against what God gave us in Holy Baptism, namely, his holy name.  “If you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”  This is a temptation to deny God the Father who richly and daily provides us with all that we need to support our body and life.  “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down.”  This is a temptation to deny God the Son who showed his true power, not by feats of glorious daring, but by being nailed to the cross in public shame.  The third temptation is to deny God the Holy Spirit as the devil shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and says, “All these things I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.”  Every form of false worship is a denial of the Holy Spirit who comes into us so that we may worship the true God in spirit and in truth.  The devil attacks the Holy Trinity.  For these temptations were not directed only against Jesus, but are continually directed against us.

Stones into bread.  What does this mean?  It means that the devil attacks through our fleshly appetites.  Remember that song by Debby Boone from the seventies, “It can’t be wrong if it feels so right”?  Well it can be wrong if it feels so right.  The hunger we feel inside may be a perfectly natural desire, and often in itself a perfectly good one.  But when that hunger for the needs of the body becomes greater than our hunger for the needs of our soul we are caught in sin.  Life is more than the body, Jesus says.  The devil goes after our physical appetites to get us to place them first.

This is why Christians don’t go to church on Sundays, but instead choose to make more money or get more sleep or do something else to please the body.  They succumb to this basic temptation.  God won’t take care of me.  I need to do it myself.  I will not live on the word of God because that won’t pay the bills.   

But who ever went hungry or in need who put God’s word before his bodily needs?  It has never happened.  The devil is a liar.

Even if you have to do without, God will provide for you.  You think you need to miss church and to neglect God’s word so you can put food on the table?  What kind of food is more important?  What are you and what is your life?  Is your life the physical cravings and needs?  Or is your life communion with God your Creator?  Is faith in him a foolish gesture when you don’t see how he can take care of your physical needs?  Why should you be able to see?  Isn’t it enough for you that God can see?

Throw yourself down.  What does this mean?  The devil tells us that we are in charge of our relationship with God.  We may rest assured that if God really means what he promises us, why we ought to be able to test him to make sure of his sincerity.  Make God prove himself.  How else can we trust in him?  And, after all, isn’t it true that he has promised to take care of us?  The previous temptation tells us not to rely on God but ourselves.  This temptation tells us to put God to the test, requiring of him what he hasn’t promised to us.  But that is the opposite of faith.  God has already proven himself.  Did Jesus not already bear our sin and rise from the dead and ascend into heaven to be seated at the right hand of glory?  So what does he have to prove?  He opened heaven to us, isn’t that enough?

Bow down and worship me.  What does this mean?  It means elevating the wisdom of men over the true worship and praise of God.  But what has God said?  What has God said?  The devil says, “Did God really say?”  We say, yes he most certainly did.  So the true worship of God is the true faith and that is engendered by the true gospel.  This is why we are intolerant of false doctrine.  The devil is the author of every false teaching to plague the church and the souls of Christians.  The word orthodox is used to describe the true doctrine.  It actually means right worship, or rightly glorifying God.  To worship God is to ascribe to him the glory that is his due.

That’s what Jesus did.  And that is what we do through faith in him.  We confess that this man is our God.  This man is our brother.  This man has destroyed the power of the devil.  He has replaced the sin of Adam with his own righteous obedience.  He has conquered death.  He has opened heaven to us all.  He has given us his power by joining us to himself in Holy Baptism.

So we fight the devil and his lies.  We never give up.  When we’re knocked down, we get right back up again.  Whenever we think we may lose, we remind the devil of Jesus’ own words, “Away with you, Satan!” and then the angels come and serve us at Christ’s command.  And when we die, they will take our souls to heaven where we will see God.   Amen.

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