The Wilderness and the Cross Part 2
The Wilderness and the Cross • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness
for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry.
The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.”
And the whole congregation of the people of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness,
and the people of Israel said to them, “Would that we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the meat pots and ate bread to the full, for you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger.”
Then Moses said to Aaron, “Say to the whole congregation of the people of Israel, ‘Come near before the Lord, for he has heard your grumbling.’ ”
And when the dew had gone up, there was on the face of the wilderness a fine, flake-like thing, fine as frost on the ground.
When the people of Israel saw it, they said to one another, “What is it?” For they did not know what it was. And Moses said to them, “It is the bread that the Lord has given you to eat.
Therefore the people quarreled with Moses and said, “Give us water to drink.” And Moses said to them, “Why do you quarrel with me? Why do you test the Lord?”
But the people thirsted there for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said, “Why did you bring us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”
And the Lord said to Moses, “Pass on before the people, taking with you some of the elders of Israel, and take in your hand the staff with which you struck the Nile, and go.
Behold, I will stand before you there on the rock at Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, and the people will drink.” And Moses did so, in the sight of the elders of Israel.
And he called the name of the place Massah and Meribah, because of the quarreling of the people of Israel, and because they tested the Lord by saying, “Is the Lord among us or not?”
The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.”
Are you God or not? If you are, why don’t you do something?
And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’ ”
Two Lessons from the Wilderness
And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.
Hunger is supposed to teach us trust, not complaint.
So you shall keep the commandments of the Lord your God by walking in his ways and by fearing him.
For the Lord your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing out in the valleys and hills,
a land of wheat and barley, of vines and fig trees and pomegranates, a land of olive trees and honey,
a land in which you will eat bread without scarcity, in which you will lack nothing, a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills you can dig copper.
And you shall eat and be full, and you shall bless the Lord your God for the good land he has given you.
Learning trust when we are hungry teaches us gratitude when we are full.
What if Jesus had made bread instead of learning trust?
In the days of his flesh, Jesus offered up prayers and supplications, with loud cries and tears, to him who was able to save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverence.
Although he was a son, he learned obedience through what he suffered.
You can’t obey a God you can’t trust. You can only complain about Him.
If you are hungry, learn trust.
If you are full, give thanks.
If you are complaining, repent.
