The Christ Embracing Our Temptations

Introduction

Why did God put the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in midst of the garden of Eden? Many have pointed to this as proof of an immoral God, one who is guilty of leading people into sin by dangling it infront of them when he had every ability to remove it. Such mockers of God’s holy character are not new. In fact, the Apostle James addressed those who blamed God for their falls into sin,

James 1:13 ESV

Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one.

For those who would continue to accuse God of being unfair in actively testing his people, we have this important part of Jesus’ ministry, his time of temptation in the wilderness. In this account, we see Jesus, the God become man, exposing himself to the same temptations annd tests that all other human being are exposed to in the worst times, and in this way becoming the example of how these tests are passed and his unique ability to lead God’s people into holiness and faith is displayed.

Jesus in the Wilderness

In his baptism, Jesus’ person was revealed and his public ministry began. The first thing Jesus does is go into the middle of nowhere. For a ministry that is centred on the saving of humanity, before he goes out and preaches the Gospel he wanders into the wilderness.

Now in our text today, as Matthew opens the longer scene, which we examine next time, we have three things we can examine. First, that Jesus wandering into the wilderness is provoked by the Holy Spirit that has just descended on him. Second, what is this wilderness meant to represent? And thrid, the fact that the purpose of this hiking trip is temptation by the devil.

Led up by the Spirit

We are told that right after the baptism, Jesus is led by the Spirit.

We may seem to find a contradiction between our text and what we read in James 1:13. Not only is God the Son tempted by evil in our text, he is led by the Spirit to experience this temptation. How do we explain this?

It is important for us to continue reading what James has to say, “14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.”

In other words, while God does put his people in situations to test them, even Adam and Eve in the Garden with the forbidden tree, or false prophets in the midst of the people of Israel (Deuteronomy 13:3 “The LORD your God is testing you, to know whether you love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.”)

While both the Greek and Hebrew word for “test” is the same and for “tempted”, James’ point is that God is never behind someone being enticed to evil. While God does indeed put to the test, it is our desires that actually provoke and pull us to the temptation. God tests his people to see whether they truly love him enough to deny their own selfish desires, and it is the desires themselves, coming from fallen flesh, that lure us away from love into sin.

Satan, although a rebel against God, is often God’s instrument of testing. This was the case with Eve, Job, and now with Jesus. Yet it was the Spirit who led Jesus to Satan for this purpose, that he may be tested and his righteousness be confirmed.

Into the Wilderness

Wilderness is a picture we’ve already talked about a bit. It represents the state between exile and recieving the promises. It is a time where faith must overcome doubt, fear, discomfort, grumbling, thanklessness, and idolotry. It is a place where God’s people are unable to provide for themselves and must lean on his provision.

This is the road that Jesus must walk if he is to be the leader of God’s people, a better Moses.

To be templed by the devil

This is explicitly the purpose, Jesus had an appointment with Satan. While Satan’s plan is to tempt Jesus in order to get him to fall into the same idolotry and passionate selfishness that every one of the leaders of God’s people had fallen into before, the Spirit’s purpose is to test Jesus with the intention of displaying his true ability to lead God’s people righteously.

Christ’s ministry of Sinlessly Embracnig the Temptation of the Flesh (Heb 2:14-18)

Of course, Jesus did not need to prove anything. It’s not as if he were “showing off” in a mean-spirited fasion. Instead, his temptations did several important things for us, those he came to save, that we needed in order to be led out of the wilderness of sin. To understand this, it would be helpful for us to turn to Hebrews 2:14-18

Hebrews 2:14–18 ESV

Since therefore the children share in flesh and blood, he himself likewise partook of the same things, that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil, and deliver all those who through fear of death were subject to lifelong slavery. For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

As Part of Embracing humanity (vs 14a)

Temptation is part of embracing humanity. Human beings are made in the image of God, and that image is tested to see whether it truly reflects its creator. Like a fine gold crown must be tested before it is presented to royalty, God’s image-bearers have their loyalty tested. Will they use their heart, mind, soul, and strength to display the righteous sovereignty of our creator, or will they become so enamoured by the image and insodoing reject the one whose image it bears?

Temptation is part of the human experience. Every time we feel something, think something, partake in some activity, our passions are there and we are constantly tested as to whether we will follow them or glorify God in faith. I may even approach a sandwich and eat it idolotrously, serving myself and thinking only of satisfying my passion for food, or I can eat it with thanksgiving, praising God for his provision for me and pointing others to the great kindness with which he provides. If Christ did not embrace the human experience of being tempted, he wouldn’t have truly embraced the human experience.

To overpower death (vs 14b)

Jesu came to destroy the works of the devil, the work of using people’s desires to enslave them to death. He did this both by embracing the experience of temptation and overcoming it, then embracing the experience of death and also overcoming it. For the second to be effective, the first had to be true as well.

To be a merciful and faithful High Priest (17)

Merciful, having a heart for the plight of sinners in order to save them in good will, not grudgingly or half-heatedly.

Faithful, to the plans of God, the covenant with Abraham, and the promises to save those who come to him in true faith.

High Priest, one not touched by sins power but able, as a human being, to atone for sin’s guilt.

To help us in our temptations (vs 18)

Christ came to save us from sin in every way, and to do this he exposed himself to temptation with the same force that we experience it so that he can help us in our temptations.

He “suffered” when tempted. To go against temptation is an offense to our self-worshipping passions and does violence to our flesh. Resisting temptations means pain and suffering, it is inherent in the experience. Anyone who expects a life of rejecting sin and walking in holiness to be easy will not be able to walk that road. Sinful desires can at times be so strong they might as well be the hunger paigns after 40 days of fasting. But they, nonetheless, must be resisted.

But we have this happy promise, that because Jesus suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.

Conclusion

Although in the wilderness alone with only Satan’s tempting voice for company, Jesus accomplished great things for us in this first act of his minitry.

Christ has at once given grace to the one who desperately and painfully strives against sin, and condemns the one who accepts it or gives up the fight.

Christ’s complete victory of sin, including his victory of the tests of temptation, gives us hope on every front. It gives us confidence to combat shame, peace to counter feelings of condemnation, hope to counter feeling stuck and lost in a sinful habit, urgency to counter a slothful flight with sin, grace to counter the failings of our fellow Christ, warning to counter any excuse for sin, and the Spirit’s Work in us to counter the power of sin.

Christ has given us everything we need to deal with sin in himself. To be near him is the only way to effectively resist the devil (James 4:7-8) and pass the test of the righteous. Because all those who are in Christ are righteous in God’s sight, the same Spirit that led Jesus through the wilderness of temptation will lead you through and its temptations.

But to do so means to die to self, die to desire, die to passions of the flesh and embrace the sufferings of temptation in this life looking forward to the promised glory of the next. How have you responded to that call?