Perfect Obedience

Welcome

I hope everyone had a great Christmas!

I hope these messages about Jesus have brought you closer to Him.

We will have our final business meeting for 2021 today.

We are going to hopefully pass a budget

And we are going to pass a 3-year plan for our church

INTRODUCTION

What I want to talk to you about today is “Perfect Obedience.” And this is the last message that will focus on the person of Christ. Last week we saw Jesus is His magnificent deity and this week we will see Jesus in His perfect humanity. Jesus was not just the Son of God, with the same essence of God, having the same attributes of God, being equal to God, but He was also fully human.

This is what Christmas is all about. Had Jesus not been human He could never have saved us. We celebrate Christmas because it marks the incarnation of God in human flesh in the historical person of Jesus Christ. Had Jesus not become a man we would not have salvation. It had to take the seed of a woman to redeem mankind. It had to take someone truly human to live a sinless life.

The focus of the story, as of each part of Matthew’s introductory section, is on the Old Testament. There are implied parallels between Jesus’ experience and that of Moses (see on vv. 2, 8) and Elijah (see on vv. 2, 11); and Psalm 91, quoted by Satan in v. 6, is probably echoed again in v. 11, while its theme of humble expectation of God’s protection underlies much of the account. But the primary focus is on Deuteronomy 6–8, three times quoted by Jesus in answer to Satan’s suggestions (v. 4 = Deut. 8:3; v. 7 = Deut. 6:16; v. 10 = Deut. 6:13). It is a description of the lessons God put before the Israelites in the wilderness before their mission of conquest of the promised land, when he tested them (Deut. 8:2) as a man disciplines his son (Deut. 8:5). Israel failed to learn its lessons, but now the true Son of God, at the outset of his mission, faces the same tests in the wilderness and succeeds. The conception of Jesus as the true Israel, already affirmed by Matthew in 2:15, here comes to fuller expression

The Wilderness comes into our lives and it feels like we are walking through a desert. This may be loneliness, financial hardships, difficult relationships or marriage, unexpected tragedy, or could just be a really tough time in your life. This is place where none of us wants to be, because it is hard, it is a very trying time for our faith, but it is absolutely necessary for our faith.

The Wilderness is where God brought the Children of Israel when He freed them from slavery in Egypt. And they failed

MESSAGE

Matthew 4:1 NASB95

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

Don’t miss what this says, “Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness”.

This was God’s ordained plan for His Son to be taken out into a desert barren place for the sole purpose of being tempted by the devil.

Jesus could not have been fully human unless he experienced temptation just like we do.

This testifies of Jesus’ perfect obedience

Could Jesus have sinned? Absolutely!

Why would Satan even bother if Jesus was not able to sin?

And we should never think we could not fall into sin..

Don’t ever think temptation has lost its power in your life

Prone to wander, Lord I feel it..

The Bible tells us that God does not tempt anyone. (James 1:13)

But God does allow us to be tempted for a purpose

Jesus was brought here to be tempted because it was necessary for His ministry.

God allows us to be tempted in order to test us

The devil is present not because this is his domain, but because he has a vital role in the testing which is God’s purpose. The devil is a tension between his total hostility to God and his people and his operation apparently within and subject to the ultimate sovereignty of God, a tension which Matthew here reflects in that the devil’s intention to “tempt” Jesus to do wrong is subsumed under God’s good purpose to “test” his Son.

Now we must understand the illusion here is to Israel in the Wilderness

Israel spent 40 years in the Wilderness and Jesus 40 days

Israel failed miserably, Jesus never sinned

Notice why God said Israel went into the wilderness:

Deuteronomy 8:2 (NASB95)

“You shall remember all the way which the Lord your God has led you in the wilderness these forty years, that He might humble you, testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not.

What is the purpose of God allowing us to be tempted by the devil?

#1) “that He might humble you”

Adversity humbles us and brings us back down to pliable clay

God wants us pliable so He can transform us

And humans are prone to becoming prideful and self-absorbed

We like to think more of ourselves than we should

And God knows just what we need to be humbled

Humility is the ability to have an accurate view of ourselves

It does not mean we think we are worthless or pitiful (that’s false humility)

Humility makes no claim on God but submits to the reign of God; it makes no claim over against the brother but serves, forgives, and loves the brother. Humility places others above ourselves. Its sees everyone as someone with great value.

Matt 23:12 “Whoever exalts himself shall be humbled; and whoever humbles himself shall be exalted.”

There are many times in our lives when God intervenes and humbles us for our own good.

#2) testing you, to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not”

Testing forces us to prove the depth of our commitment

The easiest time to follow the Lord is when everything is going right in our lives

But you let some adversity creep into your life, and you’ll be faced with two options:

Continue following the Lord and continue to be afflicted

Or fall away from the Lord and be afflicted no more

And we all come to these crossroads that define our faith whether it is genuine or it is only lip service

Adversity does not reveal our true nature for God, for God already knows our hearts.

It reveals our true nature to us

It’s truly an act of grace upon our lives. That we do not go through lives only fooling ourselves into thinking we belong to the Lord. God is too good to allow that. He reveals it in the wilderness.

Testing is an inevitable part of your faith. Do not think you can walk with the Lord and not be tested in your faith. IT IS NECESSARY!

Satan tempts Jesus in three broad areas. But he is not just tempting him to sin, his goal is to pull Jesus away from His faithfulness to God.

And that is His goal for our lives

It is not the mere sin that Satan is after, but that we would leave God all together

Look with me in verses 2-3

Matt 4:2-3

Matthew 4:2–3 NASB95

And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry. And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

The first temptation seems so subtle

Is it a sin to eat food?

Of coarse not!

But it’s not the eating of food that mattered, this was a for, of disobedience

The first temptation is to meet one’s own needs instead of relying upon God.

God’s plan for Jesus was to be hungry.

Jesus fasted 40 days and 40 nights.

It was that hunger that would bring him to a place where he would be truly tempted to break His commitment to God.

There are times in your life when God will cause you to be hungry as part of His plan.

Sometimes God purposely allows us to be without to deeper our reliance upon Him.

The temptation in these times is to make a way on our own part from God’s will!

We serve a God who wants us to be completely dependent upon Him even if we think we are not going to make it.

He will close worldly ways that meet our needs so that He can supernaturally meet our needs.

Resists the temptation to run ahead of God.

Saul ran ahead of God y making an unlawful sacrifice.

Nothing wrong with a sacrifice unless it is done outside of God’s will.

God’s meets our needs in His timing, not ours.

How does Jesus resist this temptation?

Matthew 4:4

Matthew 4:4 NAS

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

Jesus places His obedience to God over His own physical needs.

In words He chooses to obey even if it seems unwise to.

The most important lesson here is that obedience to God gives life even over life’s necessities.

What gives life to us is not meeting our needs, but trusting in God to meet our needs.

Obedience to God’s will takes priority over self-gratification

Obedience to God’s will takes priority over self-gratification, even over apparently essential provision of food. Jesus’ use of this OT text shows that he understood his experience of hunger as God’s will for him at the time. The first temptation has its point of departure in Jesus’ hunger.

God’s son Israel does not trust God to provide and thus betrays the covenant relationship that requires confident trust in God’s readiness and ability to fulfill his self-imposed covenant obligations (see Gen. 15:6). Human beings possess life not by consuming bread but simply and solely because it is God’s will that they live. (“Every word from the mouth of God” includes not only Scripture but God’s will as it pertains to each human life.) Jesus faithfully remembers that he is totally dependent upon God. Matthew 4:11 (EBC Mt–Lk): Jesus had refused to relieve his hunger by miraculously turning stones to bread; now he is fed supernaturally

The Second temptation is to force God’s hand to act

matt 4:5-7 “Then the devil *took Him into the holy city and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and *said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down; for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You’; and ‘On their hands they will bear You up, So that You will not strike Your foot against a stone.’ ” Jesus said to him, “On the other hand, it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’ 

When we do this we are elevating ourselves as Lord over God.

By taking situations into our own hands and trying to force God to act upon our decisions is to place Him beneath us rather than over us.

Bu trying to obligate God to act by putting ourselves in this kind of situation is to test God.

Here Satan tempts Jesus to test God’s promise by placing himself in danger.

Since God promises to protect us, Satan says why don’t you put God to the test?

Our relationship with God must be one which needs no tests.

It would be like the attitude of the Israelites “at Massah,” as Deut 6:16 goes on to specify, using a Hebrew word-play which the Greek cannot capture. The allusion is to Exod 17:1–7, where the Israelites’ thirst in the wilderness drove them to demand a miraculous provision of water, provoking Moses to respond, “Why do you test the Lord?”; and Moses “called the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites quarrelled and tested the Lord, saying ‘Is the Lord among us or not?” The point of the second temptation is to be similarly inferred from Jesus’ response, which quotes Deut. 6:16: “You must not put the Lord your God to the test as you did at Massah” (reb). The sorry affair is related in Exod. 17:1–7, which concludes with an etymology of the place-names: “He named the place Massah and Meribah, because the Israelites had disputed with him and put the Lord to the test with their question, ‘Is the Lord in our midst or not?’ ” (reb; cf. Deut. 9:22; 33:8; Ps. 95:8; Heb. 3:8). The rebellious people challenges its covenant partner, the Lord God, to fulfill his covenant obligations and, in so doing, proves itself unworthy of the covenant. but because honoring God excludes every kind of manipulation, including putting God to the test..

The third temptation is to offer the second best for you .

Instant gratification is a strategy of the devil. He knows that our flesh appeals to getting what we want right now.

The end result of Jesus was to rule the heavens and the earth.

His Victory over sin and death leas all who trust in Him into victory and Satan knows this.

His offer? To have the glory without the cross.

It is to skip the suffering, the waiting, the persevering and take the offer of second best right now.

What the devil offers is the glory of this world, but what Jesus will receives is the glory of all heaven and earth. (All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth Matt 28:18)

All Satan could ever offer you is second best.

The temptation is for instant gratification.

You cannot have the crown without the cross.

You cannot receive all that God has for you without the suffering that is involved.

You cannot Becuase it is the process that prepares us for the reward.

When my marriage failed, it took four years to mend it back together.

God could have done it sooner, but I would have not been ready to receive it.

Without the process you can’t handle what God has for you!

It doesn’t matter how much you think you are ready, you must trust God to say when you are ready!

You must understand that without the process, the glory is unattainable.

Matthew 4:8–9 (NICNT Mt): The mention of the “glory” of the kingdoms of the world confirms that what the devil is offering is not just a sphere for service, but paramount status, as “king of kings.” A universal dominion over all peoples is a theme of some OT hopes for the people of God or their royal Messiah (Pss 2:8; 72:8–11; Dan 7:13–14; Zech 9:10). When eventually Jesus is able to claim on another mountain (but see n. 30) that “all authority has been given to me,” it will be as a result not of kowtowing to Satan but of suffering in obedience to God’s purpose, and then it will be all authority not only on earth but also in heaven, an authority which the devil was not able to offer (28:18). The concern of the third temptation is idolatry, as seen in the sequel to Jesus’ deuteronomic response. Immediately following the command, “You shall fear the Lord your God; you shall serve him, and swear by his name,” we read, “You shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the peoples who are round about you” (Deut. 6:13–14). Despite this and many other warnings, Israel repeatedly “played the harlot” with other gods (Exod. 32:1–6; Judg. 2:17; etc.). Their love for the Lord their God (Deut. 6:4) was “like a morning cloud, like the dew that goes early away” (Hos. 6:4). The third scene in the triptych assures us of Jesus’ undivided loyalty. He will not ride two horses. He will worship and serve God only. Here is the purity of heart so prized by Kierkegaard: to will one thing.

Should the devil’s offer be read as sheer bluff, or was he understood to have some real authority over “the kingdoms of the world”? Several times in the NT he will be described in such language as “the ruler of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30; 16:11; 2 Cor 4:4; Eph 6:11–12; 1 John 5:19; Rev 12:9–17); in 12:26 he has his own “kingship.” As such he is understood to have real power in the present age, though always under the perspective of the ultimate victory of God. And as such he can offer power and glory, but not ultimate fulfillment, still less an authority in accordance with the will of God.

GOD REPLENISHES ALL THAT WAS DENIED

Matthew 4:11 (NICNT Mt): Meanwhile Jesus, though victorious, is weak and hungry, and angels provide him with the sustenance he refused in v. 4 to commandeer for himself; compare the experience of Elijah in the wilderness (1 Kgs 19:4–8), though in that case the food was provided at the beginning of the forty days, not at the end. The angels thus fulfill their protective role as it was promised in the devil’s quotation from Ps 91:11. Jesus will later claim to have legions of angels at his call in case of need (26:53), though again he will decline to call on them. For the “caring” role of angels cf. Heb 1:14: they are “ministering spirits sent to care for (diakonia, the same term as here) those who are to inherit salvation,” though it is unlikely that Hebrews was thinking there of the provision of literal food.