Matthew 4:1-11 Sermon

English Standard Version Chapter 4

4 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

So Jesus has just been baptized and there has been this incredible scene where the voice of God speaks from the heavens, naming Jesus as his Beloved Son, the Spirit descends on Jesus, and then that same Spirit leads Jesus into the wilderness, and for what purpose does Matthew say?

So most of your Bibles will probably say what mine does, that the Spirit has led Jesus into the wilderness in order to be tempted by the devil. Now the word for “to be tempted” in the original Greek is “peirazo.” But in all honesty, “to tempt” is too restrictive of a word in English to really get at the idea of what this experience in the wilderness is all about and here’s why: in English, to be tempted or to tempt someone, it’s never a good thing. It carries a negative connotation, doesn’t it? Would you ever say that you were tempted to eat vegetables? You were tempted to exercise more? You were tempted to be patient with your screaming kids? No! Because in English we are only ever tempted to do bad things.

Jesus is led into a test

So you may say, well the devil is trying to get Jesus to do bad things, so “to tempt” is a perfectly suitable word to describe what’s going on, and that very may well be. But you’re going to run into several other stories in this same book where Jesus will again be “peirazo’ed,” and it happens when the Pharisees ask him questions about his interpretation of the Jewish Law. They will “peirazo” him when they ask about divorce, paying taxes, what’s the greatest commandment, and so on. Are they trying to get Jesus to do evil by asking him these questions? No, what they are doing is more in line with another English word, and that is “to test.” They are testing him. In fact, in the vast majority of cases in the New Testament, “peirazo” is translated into English as the word, “to test.” And I think that this actually gets at the heart of what Jesus experience in the wilderness is all about.

So my sister is a teacher, and I know the amount of work that she puts in to walking her students through the various subjects, like fractions and decimals and the civil war and so one. And at the end of each of these teaching modules, she needs to find out the truth about how much of that information her students actually absorbed over the past few weeks, so she gives them a test. Now, unless you were that kid in your school, tests aren’t fun. They are challenging and stressful.

What is a test? A test is a difficult and challenging experience that reveals a truth about who you are. So in the case of my sister, she’s giving her students a challenging experience that will reveal a truth about them - how much do they know this information? Did they do their homework or did they play video games all weekend? It’s a difficult experience that reveals a truth about who you are.

This is what the Pharisees will try to do when they ask Jesus all these questions about the Jewish Law. They are trying to trap him in his words with difficult questions so that the truth of who he is (as they see it) will be revealed and everyone will see that he’s an imposter.

I think this is a more helpful way of looking what is going on in the wilderness. Jesus does not stumble into the devil, nor is he lured by the devil. We have the God’s beloved Son, who is the delight of the Father in heaven, and he is led by the Spirit that came from the Father, to be tested, to undergo a difficult and challenging experience so that the truth of this Jesus would be revealed. This is a story about an innocent Jesus being tempted to do evil. This is a story of the Savior of the World showing the truth about who he is by undergoing this test.

So what is the test? Well it involves an interaction with this creature that is called be “tester” and the “devil.” Now, if Scripture is our source, not pop culture, not medieval art, not Greek and Roman mythology, if Scripture is our source for information on this figure, the truth is we know very little about the story of the devil. But one thing we know for certain is this: time and time again in the human saga, this creature’s primary goal is to cause the people who have been made in God’s image, so everyone, to cause them to doubt God’s goodness and love for them. And sure enough, in this creature’s questions we see the focus of the test that Jesus undergoes?

English Standard Version Chapter 4

3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.”

English Standard Version Chapter 4

2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God,

The second question in verse 5 sounds very similar:

English Standard Version Chapter 4

5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple 6 and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down

In the final question, the creature has given up on this tactic because Jesus is obviously not playing along, but do you see what this creature is trying to do? “If you are the Son of God...” He’s trying to undermine Jesus’ identity. If we remember, or just look above or turn one page back, we just had this incredible scene where Jesus is baptized and the heavens are ripped open and the voice of the Father says what? “You are my Son. I am so pleased with you” And what is the first thing this tester goes after? What is the creature questioning? Jesus’ identity as the dearly loved Son of the Father. He’s trying to undermine Jesus’ trust in God’s goodness and love for him.

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And he first does it by drawing Jesus’ attention to his circumstances. Jesus has been fasting for forty days and forty nights, and he was hungry. Really hungry. This was not a pleasant experience. Some of you fasted for Ash Wednesday, and you’re irritable and weak and it’s not fun, and that was just one day. Jesus has done this for forty. So the tester points out the difficult and challenging and unpleasant circumstance that Jesus is in, and he uses that as a way of bringing into question God’s goodness and love. If you were really the beloved Son of God, why would your life look like this? If God really loved you, why would you be going through this experience? Do you see what he’s doing? He’s undermining Jesus’ trust in God by point out the difficult circumstances of his life.

And how

trust God even in difficult life circumstances

In the second question, the devil takes Jesus to the top of the temple in Jerusalem, the epicenter of God’s presence on earth according to Jewish thought. And he quotes from , a beautiful song about trusting God. The Pslamist says that God is a refuge and a fortress. He is with the one’s in trouble, they abide in the shadow of the Almighty. The poem is meant to bring us into a deeper trust of God, a deeper dependence on his goodness. And the devil twists it into way to question that goodness and trustworthiness. Again, attempting to undermine Jesus’ trust in his identity as one dearly loved by God, and undermine his trust that God is truly good.

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Now, here’s an important question. How did we get this story? In all the other stories of Jesus that are recorded for us, there are witnesses to the events. There’s a crowd of people at his baptism, a crowd following his teachings, disciples were at his transfiguration, but in this story there is only Jesus, alone in the wilderness. So how did Matthew learn about this experience that Jesus underwent? Well, Jesus must have told him about it. He must have shared this experience with his disciples. Why would he do that? Evidently, Jesus wanted his disciples to know about this moment in his life when he struggled with his identity, when his trust in God’s love and goodness was called into question in a significant way. And I think the reason that Jesus shares this experience with us is because he knew that his followers would experience this same kind of testing. He knew that his followers would also go through difficult and challenging experiences that would reveal a truth about themselves, and in particular they’d undergo tests that would seek to undermine their identity and their trust in God’s love and goodness for them.

And friends, he was right, wasn’t he? How many of us have gone through difficult and challenging and unpleasant seasons of life that has caused us to question whether God really loved us, whether he was really good, whether he could be trusted? How many of us have heard the voice of shame speak to us in dark moments, calling into question our identity as a loved son or daughter of God? Jesus was right. We have, we do, and we will face the test just as he did. And what will it reveal to us? What truth will it reveal about us?

Why do we practice fasting in Lent? Why do people give things up during Lent? Why do we willingly go through this difficult season together? Because the fasting is a difficult experience that reveals a truth about who we are. And what is that truth?

The truth that is revealed in us is that we fail the test. We don’t trust in God’s love and goodness. We don’t trust in our identity as sons and daughters of God. We don’t trust that the ways of God lead to life and flourishing. The truth that our life and that Lent reveals is that we fail this test. We fail this test just as the people of Israel in the Old Testament failed their test in the wilderness. The Lord had rescued them from Egypt with incredible displays of power, bringing them through the waters, but even with that in their recent past, the people of Israel doubted and questioned and lost trust that God would lead them to life and flourishing. And it’s the same with us. We fail the test.

And Jesus shared this story with his disciples because he knew we’d fail the test. Remember, this isn’t a story about an innocent Jesus being tempted to do evil. This is a story that reveals a truth about who is this Jesus? And what’s revealed is that though everyone else would fail the test, Jesus does not. Just like the people of Israel, Jesus is brought through the waters at his baptism, and he’s led into the wilderness to be tested, but where the people of God fail, Jesus succeeds. The tester’s words fall flat, emptied of their power. Evil is emptied of it’s power in the presence of Jesus. “Be gone!” Jesus says, and with the whimper of a crushing defeat, the devil leaves. Not a word more. Because he knows that it’s over. And from this moment on in Jesus life, every time he encounters a being aligned with evil, they speak to Jesus as one already defeated. Why? Because Jesus as passed the test and evil is emptied of its power in his presence.

So where do you go when those voices come? Where do you go when those voices come that say, “Look at your life. Look at what’s going on. Look at the type of person you are. Look at the terrible decisions that you’ve made. Are you really telling yourself that God loves you? That he delights in you? That you could really be his beloved?” Where do you go when those voices creep up? You go here. You go to the cross. You go to the one who empties the power of the evil one with his mere presence. You go to the one who has passed the test for you, and in his strength and with his Spirit you mirror his response, “Be gone!”

The entire purpose of the wilderness of Lent, the fasting, the prayers, the giving, the Scripture reading, all of it is meant to bring us to the point where we can look at the death and resurrection of Jesus and say, this and this alone defines who I am. I am the beloved son and daughter of God because Jesus has made it so. This is good news. Jesus has passed the test.

A test is a difficult/challenging experience that reveals a truth about you.

ILLUSTRATION: Tests in school are challenging and reveal the truth about whether you know the material or not.

In the vast majority of cases in the New Testament, “peirazo” is translated into English as the word, “to test.”