Approved of God - James 1 and Matthew 4

Good morning family, our reading today will be in James 1 and Matthew 4 as we talk about being approved by God. When I talk about being approved by God, what I mean is does God trust us to be faithful to word?

Before we begin let us invite Jesus into the conversation.

Turn with me to James 1.

Let me begin by explaining what I mean approved by God.

1 Samuel 13 and Acts 13 the Bible describes King David as a man after God’s own heart. The reason King David is described this way is the fact he determined in his heart he would be fully committed to obeying God regardless of what happened in life. King David was a man committed to God’s Word as well as committed to being a man of prayer. David demonstrated this committed through the decisions he made, he chose God’s way over the ways of man (even when these decisions went against the popular vote).

God knew, regardless of life situation or circumstance, how David would respond when faced with hardships and blessings. The reason God knows how David would respond is David proved himself time and time again.

Just as David proved Himself to God, you and I will experience the same type of trials and tribulations as he did. When we experience trials and tribulations in life, God wants to know how we respond because our response to life will demonstrate the motives of our hearts.

James 1: 12 Blessed is the man who endures temptation; for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love Him.

How are we proved? How are we tested? How can we demonstrate to God we will be faithful to Him regardless of what happens in life?

Turn with me to Matthew 4.

Matthew 4 teaches us about three temptations, and each of these three temptations relate to three different seasons in life. When we experience these three temptations in each of these three different seasons, we are tested in our sincerity of relationship with Jesus.

How serious is our devotion to God’s word? How serious are we in our prayer lives?

When reading through Matthew 4, as Jesus is in the desert 40 days and 40 nights being tempted, Jesus demonstrates His sincerity to God’s word by choosing obedience rather than taking control of the outcomes of life.

The challenge He faced in the desert was patience, self-control, the ability to wait for God to provide even though Jesus was in need. Jesus never took upon Himself to provide for Himself, He waits for God to provide for Him, so in the waiting or being patient Jesus demonstrates self-control by denying Himself.

Matthew 4: 1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. 3 Now when the tempter came to Him

There are 3 important lessons we need to learn from these 3 verses.

Jesus is following God, Jesus is in the will of God, and Jesus has no sin in His life.

Jesus is praying and fasting, Jesus is inviting God to be His provider in life.

While following God, earnest in prayer and fasting, God allows Satan to disrupt Jesus prayer time, while in a state of need, God allows Satan to bother Him with temptations.

The struggles that Jesus is about to endure is not because He doing something wrong, but because He is doing something right.

Again, God will always prove our relationship with His word, and we will be tested according to our ability to trust in God regardless of what is happening in life. When God challenges our sincerity of relationship, this is when God will reveal Himself more and more to us? If we want the anointing of God in our lives, we need to demonstrate we can be trusted with His power.

Matthew 4:3 Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

I shared before that Matthew 4 will teach us about three temptations, and each of these three temptations relate to three different seasons in life. When we experience these three temptations in each of their seasons, we are tested in our sincerity of relationship with Jesus.

The first temptation relates to provision, and the season of life is in the desert.

I share the opinion the desert is one of the most important parts in our relationship with Jesus. The reason I think this way is because the desert reveals our strengths and weakness. When in the desert, this is when Jesus feels like a thousand miles away, and we are forced to either apply the word of God to our lives or we try to do things on our own. The desert will reveal the substance or the sincerity of our relationship with Jesus. The desert is where God will prove our faithfulness.

When we face temptations, we are challenged in the health of our study life, the healthy of our prayer life, and the sincerity of our obedience.

(KJV) 2 Timothy 2:15 Study to shew thyself approved unto God, a workman that needeth not to be ashamed, rightly dividing the word of truth

The term approved means to be authentic. We are being tested to our authenticity.

If we notice something, Jesus is in the desert for 40 days and night, wondering without food and water. Jesus being in the desert is an image of the Children of Israel being in the desert 40 years wondering without food and water.

When the Children of Israel are wondering the desert for 40 years, they were constantly complaining to Moses that God led them out of Egyptian to kill them in the desert. If we study Exodus, they left Egypt with enough food and water to last about 2 months. God allowed them enough resources to get them out of Egypt, but not enough to carry them all the way through their journey. The reason God allowed their resources to be depleted is they needed to understand they needed God in their lives.

The moment they began to cry out to God for food, God gave them manna.

When we are experiencing a desert season of life, God might deplete our resources to see if we will trust in Him to be our provider? The Bible teaches us that He will always see to our needs, but that Bible never teaches us when. God is an on time God, but His on time is not the same our our on time. We will be challenged to rely on God to be our provider.

When Jesus is in the desert, the temptation is to turn stones into bread , is the same temptation of the Children of Israel had in the wilderness, they eat Manna (angels food), bread from Heaven.

The Manna we have today is literally the Bible. If the Bible teaches us that God will provide, we need to trust that somehow or another that God is going to see to our needs.

We need to learn how to rely on God’s word to be our source of provision.

Matthew 4:4 But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’ ”

Let us continue with verse 5.

Matthew 4:5 Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’and, ‘In their hands they shall bear you up Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’ 

Let me put what we are reading in the right context. When reading this verse, it reads like Satan is challenging Jesus to take His life, jump off a building and trust the angels to some how rescue you.

If we put this in context, the temptation is has nothing to do with Jesus killing Himself, but proving His divinity to Satan. Let me explain this a little bit.

If we read Matthew 14, Jesus is walking on water as the disciples are sailing, and Peter ask Jesus if he could walk on water to.

Jesus, in His divine power, is not limited to this physical earth the same way we are. Jesus walks on water, turns water into wine, raises the dead, told Peter to get a coin from the mouth of a fish; Jesus is God made flesh.

The temptation is to demonstrate His divinity, His ability to command angels, instead of allowing God to to guide His decision making. The temptation is about submission or attitude.

The temptation of Jesus relates to tempting God, or challenging His authority in our lives. We are tempted to challenge God’s authority in life when we experience hardships, and we call this hardship a valley experience.

Valley experiences reveals our attitudes. A very good lesson to learn attitude is found in the book of Job. If we read Job, in chapter 1, in one day Satan takes the life of all of Jobs kids, his business, and most of his money. The bible says in all of this Job never challenges Gods authority in his life. If we read chapter 2, Satan strikes Job with sickness, and in all this Job never raises his voice to God.

Even though Job never raises his voice to God, or challenges God’s authority in his life; when reading the book, Job never praises God either, and that is why Job sins against God. Job is completely focused on His hardships in life, which affects his attitude toward God, and because Job never praises God this is why he sins against God. He never focuses on the goodness of God.

The temptations of Jesus is relates to challenging God in the hardships of life. When we experience hardships, this is when we can be demanding, and being speaking to God as though He answers to us instead of us answering to him.

Valley experiences will reveal the integrity of our relationship with Jesus.

7 Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the LORD your God.’ ”

Jesus is telling Satan, He is submitted to God. God will move when He is ready, and I am not going to make any decisions that God does not approve of. I will be patient and wait.

8 Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9 And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.”

If we study our Bibles at any length, the Bible is clear that one day Jesus is going to return as King of Kings and Lord of Lords. When Jesus comes back, He is going to reign for a thousand years, and the end of that thousand years Satan is going to be locked up in Hell for all eternity.

Satan is telling Jesus, if you will worship me, I will go ahead and give you this earthly reign here and now.

The last temptation relates to credit, who gets credit when life is good?

When life is good we call this a mountain top experience.

In the Christian community we call mountain top experiences a personal encounter with Jesus when we have a heavenly experience.

Everyones mountain top experiences will be different, but the idea comes from Matthew 17. Jesus takes Peter, James, and John on top of a mountain, and then Jesus transitions from a earthly body into his glorified body and begins a conversation with Moses and Elijah. When Peter witnesses this, he ask Jesus if they can build houses on top of this mountain to live there.

A mountain top experience is when life is good and we have the presence of Jesus is showing up in wonderful ways.

10 Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.’ ” 11 Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.