There Are No Shortcuts

Scripture

This evening I want to look briefly at 3 scriptures.

Psalm 2:7–8 KJV 1900

I will declare the decree: The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son; This day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, And I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, And the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession.

Matthew 4:8–10 KJV 1900

Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.

Revelation 11:15 KJV 1900

And the seventh angel sounded; and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he shall reign for ever and ever.

I have taken some of the thoughts for this evening from Joe Smith however I am looking at a different direction.

Dad’s Shortcut

I don’t know if your fathers are like mine, however my father loves to take a different route every time he goes somewhere. He loves to figure out what he considers to be the best route. Often this exploration may begin with these words, “let’s take a shortcut.”

For around 20 years my dad pastored a church about 120 miles from our house. these days it is a pretty easy drive with pretty good roads. By following the speed limit approximately it only takes 2 hours so the average speed for the trip is 60 mph. Now early on in his pastorate there we would try slightly different routes often to try and figure out the best route. Now this is before smartphones were common place and long before we had one, this was the early days of gps systems and it was in the last days of the good old Rand McNally Road Atlas. One day we set out on our trip and we began with those infamous words let’s take a shortcut. When we crossed the bridge over Penn’s Creek we turned left and followed the creek. It began as a rough 2 lane road. Not too far down the road it turned to a paved 1 lane road. After 15 or so minutes we ran out of pavement all together and we headed on gravel roads deep into Bald Eagle State Forest, I think. This a near 20 year old memory and at the time I had no idea where we were. My memory may have embellished the truth, however I think this a fairly accurate representation of the facts. We began to follow gravel roads until we reached the end of them and turn this way and that onto the next grave road. Each one seemed less traveled than the last as we travelled deeper and deeper into the forest. I have recently gone exploring through some of these roads and found myself traveling in circles with no idea really where I was. Thankfully I have found my way out each time so there is not a lonely Harley Davidson doing circles in the forest right now. Eventually as we travelled my dad came to the realization that we didn’t quite know where we were. He tried the gps but there was no signal, he tried the map but there was no record of these roads in the atlas. Many times we were forced to stop as one or another of us faced the sickening effects of an old minivan on rough, winding, gravel, forest roads. Eventually we turned right at every crossroads and finally after 3 hours of miserable driving we found ourselves in Woodward, 20 miles down the road. Finally on the right road we continued on and by the time we got to our destination our 2 hour drive had turned into a miserable 5 hour marathon full of car sickness, bumps, twists, turns, misery and a bit of fear. Now of course my dad would claim he was never lost, but you tell me if you would call turning a 2 hour drive into 5 hours should be called a shortcut. You tell me if you know where you are the whole time would you be pulling off the road and studying maps? Would you be checking to see if we had gotten gps signal every time we crested a hill? We finally did make it where we were going, but only after we got back on the road we never should have left in the first place. In memory of this journey we purchased for my dad a coffee mug that has the accurate statement “A journey of a thousand miles begins with dad saying ‘I know a shortcut’.”

Satan’s Temptation of Jesus

Jesus too was offered a shortcut. We read in our scriptures in the Psalms of the promise that God the Father gave to His begotten Son Jesus that Jesus inheritance would be the heathen and the uttermost parts of the earth. In one sense this was the purpose for which Jesus came to earth. He came to break the power of Satan and make a way of redemption possible for the heathen, for the uttermost parts of the earth. When we are redeemed we are to take our freedom that has been purchased for us and with that freedom turn ourselves over to be Jesus possession is obedience and love to Him. In Revelation we read that the kingdoms of this world will become the kingdoms of our Lord and of His Christ and He shall reign forever and ever.

When Jesus was tempted Satan offered Him the kingdoms of the world. He offered Jesus the inheritance that Jesus was destined already to receive, yet the path that God had laid out involved taking on sin and dying on the cross. The path that Satan offered seems easier. Simply bow down and worship Satan. The cross could be avoided and yet the inheritance would still be recieved.

Jesus rejected this shortcut, for many reasons. One of those is that by taking this shortcut Jesus never would have reached the destination. Satan’s temptations are intermingled with truth at times. Satan is called the prince of this world. He rules over this world in the sense that most people have chosen to listen to his sweet deceitful lies and live under his control. He was in a sense offering that control over people to Jesus without the way of the cross. The only issue is that Jesus would be coming under Satan’s control, and instead of breaking sin and Satan’s power everyone would have remained under Satan’s control through Satan’s control over Jesus. Now how much truth was in Satan’s temptation? How would this work in the Spiritual real? Was it at all possible? I do not want to get off into those issues as there are different and very strongly held opinions about all of that. What I want to focus on is that Satan offered Jesus a shortcut, but that shortcut would not have ended up with Jesus Christ the righteous ruling in righteousness of His righteous inheritance. If it was a path that could have been taken it would have ended up in an entirely different destination.

Application

Satan offers us shortcuts as well. Heaven is promises as a place of true joy, true peace, true happiness, a place filled with wonder and pleasure. A place where we want to be and will be overjoyed to stay for all eternity. Yet there is a road that must be travelled. Yet even on this road remember that God does remember us, He knows the thoughts He thinks toward us, thoughts of good and He plans to bring us to our expected eternal destination in Heaven with Him. Sometimes though that road doesnt look like we think it should. Sometimes it seems to be too long, too rough, or too steep. So when we have those thoughts Satan offers us a shortcut. A bypass to get past the hardtimes, a shorter way to get to true peace a different path to happiness. A way to avoid the battles and the difficulties. Now again there is some truth to his temptations. He is responsible for the battles that come our way. He says, I would not fight you if you would serve me, and truth be told he wouldn’t. Doesn’t that sound like peace? No more fighting against temptation? But the destination is entirely different. Instead of eternal joy in heaven there is temporary pleasure and eternal torment. Instead of fighting against the temptations of our enemy we become the his puppet and plaything. Don’t forget that Satan hates God. Since God loves us Satan uses us to try to get back at God. When we stop fighting him we don’t find peace, instead he stops tempting us and begins to torment us. Fleeting pleasures are substituted for eternal happiness. There are no shortcuts in our spiritual journeys! Now perhaps you find yourself entangled in the web of Satan’s deceptions, lost on his gravel pathways. Do not despair. Just do exactly as my dad did to get us our of the forest. Turn to the right. Turn back toward God. If you turn back to God you will end up back on the road that you belong on! And if you stay on that road and don’t fall for any of the shortcuts that satan throws at you, you will end up at the proper destination. Remember there are no shortcuts!