The Temptation of Christ

Mark 1:12–13 (ESV)

12 The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him.

Review

So, with the Spirit descending from heaven and with the words that he speaks, God the Father publicly sets the seal on the mission of his Son. He smiles down at the Son he has sent into the world out of his love to save it. Jesus himself knows his unique qualification for his mission. Looking back, we too can understand and know. This is the Lord Jesus, who is both God and man so that he is able to stand in the gap that separates us from God: the man who can identify with us in our weaknesses, who feels the cold as he stands on the riverbank and the wind dries him off; but who is also God the Son, with the authority and power of God, the authority that will be seen throughout his ministry as he heals diseases and drives out demons with a word—the one who is qualified and able to save us.

Introduction

Perhaps it's humbling to admit, embarrassing at points, but all of us still carry around with us a susceptibility to temptation. You were susceptible this week. You are susceptible to different things than I may be susceptible to. But we’re all susceptible to temptation in some location, some situation, some relationship. And because of that, this passage that we’re going to look at, however brief, is a particular comfort.

Mark is very careful to record that Christ faced and defeated Satan in three ways throughout His life. First, in this moment where Christ is driven by the Spirit of God into the wilderness and is tempted by Satan He defeats Satan in that moment. Christ faced him again in His public ministry and demonstrates His power over evil there. And Christ faced him again at the cross, making a public spectacle of him, triumphing over him by the cross.

Mark reminds us that everything Christ did in his life was done for us. From day one, it all was the substitution; it all was Christ in our place, Christ facing what we would not be able to face, Christ winning a victory that we could not win. Paul Tripp

Illustration

The Unavoidable Encounter

Charles Colson, in his brilliant book of essays Who Speaks For God?, tells of watching a segment of television’s “60 Minutes” in which host Mike Wallace interviewed Auschwitz survivor Yehiel Dinur, a principal witness at the Nuremberg war-crime trials. During the interview, a film clip from Adolf Eichmann’s 1961 trial was viewed which showed Dinur enter the courtroom and come face to face with Eichmann for the first time since being sent to Auschwitz almost twenty years earlier. Stopped cold, Dinur began to sob uncontrollably and then fainted while the presiding judge pounded his gavel for order. “Was Dinur overcome by hatred? Fear? Horrid memories?” asked Colson, who answers:

No; it was none of these. Rather, as Dinur explained to Wallace, all at once he realized Eichmann was not the godlike army officer who had sent so many to their deaths. This Eichmann was an ordinary man. “I was afraid about myself,” said Dinur. “I saw that I am capable to do this. I am … exactly like he.” Wallace’s subsequent summation of Dinur’s terrible discovery—“Eichmann is in all of us”—is a horrifying statement; but it indeed captures the central truth about man’s nature. For as a result of the fall, sin is in each of us—not just the susceptibility to sin, but sin itself.1

It was not the horror of the man Eichmann that smote Dinur, but the horrible revelation of self and the predicament of mankind that made him faint. Eichmann is in all of us, because all of us are in Adam. This is proven by our susceptibility to temptation. We are tempted by theft because we are thieves, even though we may not in fact steal. We are tempted to kill because we are murderers, even if we do not literally slay our brother. We are tempted to adultery because we are adulterers, even though we may not commit adultery. James says,

James 1:13–14 (ESV)

13 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. 14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire.

The fact that we are tempted proves that we are prone to evil—and it is terrible. Eichmann is in all of us. Objecting to this shows that we have not yet fully grasped the Scriptures’ teaching about our sin, nor have we come to grips with the realities about our own personalities. Chuck Colson

“The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.”

The intimate connection between the two events is established by the introductory word “immediately.” Jesus’ expulsion into the desert is the necessary consequence of his baptism; it is the same Spirit who descended upon Jesus at his baptism who now forces him to penetrate more deeply into the wilderness. it is the same Spirit who descended upon Jesus at his baptism who now forces him to penetrate more deeply into the wilderness.

Christ wasn’t in the wilderness because of some kind of preemptive attack by Satan. He wasn't there because He was lured there by the evil one. It was the Spirit of God that led Christ into the wilderness to be tempted.

Now here's what that means. This was part of the redemptive script. This was part of God's plan. The wilderness was a necessary step in what Christ came to do. This isn’t a diversion. This isn’t an interruption. This is not a dangerous moment and you wonder what's going to happen. This is God doing exactly what He meant to do, to lead Christ to face the enemy on our behalf.

You should notice the obvious reference, the obvious allusion that Mark makes to Israel and Israel's time in the wilderness. Think about the people of God in the wilderness. It really is pretty shocking because they've experienced marvelous redemption. Think of the glory display that happened in Egypt as God is delivering His people. You would think that in the heart of every Israelite, there would be this thought, “This is God and God alone, and we will serve him without question forever!” You would think

But it doesn't take very long. Look if you would, with me, you have to get out a church Bible to do this, to Exodus 32, because it's shocking what happens here. God, as an act of grace, having redeemed his people from Egypt, is now going to give them His law. That giving of the law is itself a grace. Notice the account here:

When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron and said to him, “Up, make us gods who shall go before us. As for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.” (Exodus 32: 1- 2, ESV)

What's the issue?

What's the issue that leads to this outrageous idolatry?

Schedule!

Moses is gone longer than they think he should be gone; they say, “We don't know what's happened to him.” And so what's the obvious next step? “Let's make gods for us.” I mean, that's how powerful our temptation to idolatry is! It doesn't take much for our hearts to run after a God-replacement. That's why we're so susceptible to temptation. Own the fact that that heart is in you. Do you know what the New Testament says?

1 Corinthians 10:11–12 (ESV) 11 Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come. 12 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall.

These are people just like us.

Now think of Aaron. Aaron is one of God's leaders.You would think Aaron would say, “Never! There is one true God, Jehovah, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the God who led us out of Egypt! I will not do this thing?” What does Aaron say? ‘

Take off the rings of gold that are in the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.’ So all the people took off the rings of gold that were in the ears and brought them to Aaron. And he received the gold from their hand and fashioned it with a graving tool and made a golden calf. And they said, (Listen to this!) ‘These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt!’ (Exodus 32:2-4) How outrageous! We do the same.

We attribute to our idols what only could've been done by God. When Moses comes down, the conversation is amazing. You think, at that point as he approaches Aaron, that Aaron would be honest. Aaron says, “This is not my fault. This amazing thing happened. I threw that gold in the fire and out came this calf.” How quickly we excuse our rebellion. How quickly we recast our idolatry! This is why we so desperately need Jesus to stand in our place, Jesus to win the victory for us because this heart is our heart. And so Jesus does stand for us as the second Adam, standing in our place. It's remarkable that the very place of Israel's rebellion is also the place of Christ’s defeat of Satan.

The wilderness that was a place of complaining and idolatry and rebellion, challenge of God again and again, becomes a place where the Son of God goes, representing us, and stands before the enemy, and wins our victory.

Here's the Story

The first Adam was our representative. The first Adam stood where we would stand, and the first Adam faced the evil lies of the tempter; and he believed those lies. and he stepped outside of God's boundaries, disobeyed God's rules. He opted for autonomy and self-sufficiency; he opted for the possibility that maybe I could live independent of God; maybe I could find life outside of God.

And Romans says, “As Adam died, all died.”

Romans 5:12 (ESV)

12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned—

With that horrible choice of Adam, sin entered the world, and all of us are born in sin, and all of us have that susceptibility to temptation; all of us desire autonomy; all of us desire self-sufficiency; all of us want the position of God.

We’re all like Adam. And so what’s necessary is that God would send Jesus as the second Adam. Jesus now faces the same tempter, and He's doing that for us.

Jesus Our Substitute

This is Jesus as our substitute. And it was very, very important that before Christ faced His public ministry, that He would first face the enemy of that ministry.Matthew says, “If you’re going to enter the house of a strong man and take his stuff, you have to first bind him up.” And so

Christ faced the enemy, and He demonstrates His power; He does that for us so that we would, in His sacrifice, have that same power to say, “No!” to temptation. Not because we have that power in ourselves, but because we find that power in Him. He comes not only to forgive us, but to empower us by His grace; so that by that grace, we can say, “No!” Paul Tripp

And so that grace is operating on our behalf in this moment. This is not an interruption of the plan; this is part of the plan. The Spirit sends Christ out into the wilderness.

Our Hope

As believers, it is the fact that we are in the second Adam, the last Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ who conquered temptation. Admittedly this is a wondrous mystery (cf. 1 Corinthians 12:13), as is the mystery of his being sinless and yet fully tempted (Hebrews 4:15). Because of our solidarity with him, we can have victory over the sin within us. In recognition of this, we are going to examine the great temptation of Christ in the wilderness—seeing the nature of his temptations and what he did to overcome them, and then seeing how this can be of help in our own struggles with temptation.

“And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him.”

Mark has a very interesting way of characterizing these events. Mark is a very efficient Gospel. We have the whole temptation of Christ covered in very few words, two short verses, but it's interesting Mark's take on this. Notice what he says, “And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan.” Now, most of us, I think, when we think of Christ being tempted, we don't think of the whole forty days being a temptation. We think the temptation of Christ was just these three moments, and surely those three moments took place. But Mark tends to go in this direction; rather than emphasizing the attack of the enemy on the Messiahship of Christ, Mark tends to emphasize the attack of the enemy on the humanity of Christ.

Christ is driven out into the wilderness alone. He faces the direct attack of Satan there. He faces the danger of wild animals there. Here's the picture; Christ, for those forty days, is standing in our place, and He's receiving the full force of what it means to live in this fallen world.

That's what it means when it says in Hebrews 4

Hebrews 4:15 (ESV)

15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.

That in this moment in the wilderness, that full range of what it means to face the harsh realities of life in a fallen world, all the aloneness and all the alienation and all the direct temptations of the enemy and all the dangers of a world that is broken, Christ is shouldering for us. It's not just a couple moments of temptation; it's forty days where Christ is in our place defeating the enemy on our behalf. And then it says, “And the angels were ministering to Him.” God honors the obedience of the Son, and He sends His messengers to bring aid and comfort to the Lamb.

He continues there for forty days. This signifies that the aspect of humiliation in Jesus’ mission is not yet terminated in spite of the declaration that he is the beloved Son. Jesus must remain submissive: the Spirit does not allow him to abandon the wilderness after his baptism.

Jesus stays in the wilderness for forty days, a fixed time of symbolic significance. The reference to the forty days recalls Moses’ stay on Mount Sinai and Elijah’s wandering through the wilderness to Mount Horeb. In their case the time of the forty days concentrates into one crucial period the innermost quality of their mission. Moses and Elijah are men of the wilderness, both prior to this period as well as after it. There is evidence that the same perspective is true of Jesus in Mark. The forty days do not describe a period whose significance is exhausted once Jesus begins his public ministry but sound the dominant note of his entire ministry.

It is significant that Mark does not report the victory of Jesus over Satan, nor the end of the temptation. It is the evangelist’s distinctive understanding that Jesus did not win the decisive victory during the forty days nor did he cease to be tempted. Jesus is thrust into the wilderness in order to be confronted with Satan and temptation. It is this confrontation which is itself important, since it is sustained throughout Jesus’ ministry. This explains why Mark does not say anything about the content of the temptation: his whole Gospel constitutes the explanation of the manner in which Jesus was tempted.

Jesus in the midst of the wild beasts signifies the victory of the New Adam over Satan and temptation so that paradise is restored in which man is at peace with the animals.

The wilderness is the place of the curse. In the wilderness there is neither seed nor fruit, water nor growth. Man cannot live there. Only frightening and unwanted kinds of animals dwell there. Significantly, when the wilderness is transformed into a paradise no ravenous beast will be in it (Isa. 35:9; Ezek. 34:23–28). Mark’s reference to the wild beasts in Ch. 1:13 serves to stress the character of the wilderness. Jesus confronts the horror, the loneliness and the danger with which the wilderness is fraught when he meets the wild beasts. Their affinity in this context is not with paradise, but with the realm of Satan.

Mark also refers to the ministering angels.

Mark’s reference to a plurality of angels indicates that Jesus is sustained by the servants of God. There is no indication in Mark that the service of the angels is withdrawn nor that it serves to mark the termination of the temptation. As Mauser remarks, “Mark thinks of the temptation, the being with the animals and the service of the angels as continuous events in the course of which all the forces of God and Satan are simultaneously present.” This is an appropriate description, for the Marcan account of the ministry of Jesus is dominated by his confrontation with demonic forces and the sustaining of temptation. Jesus’ obedience to God is affirmed and sustained in the wilderness, the precise place where Israel’s rebellion had brought death and alienation, in order that the new Israel of God may be constituted.[1]

This encounter was supremely dramatic. The backdrop was a desolate, monotonous wasteland like that in the forlorn surrealism of a Dali painting—an anti-Eden. In the foreground sat the weary and desperately hungry Christ. Before him glided the resplendent figure of Satan, radiating power and promise—elegantly beautiful.

The first Adam fell to the gorgeous Satan in the glories of Eden; now the second Adam faced Satan’s deceptively beautiful presence in trackless desolation. The encounter of Christ and Satan was the greatest combat which has ever taken place on the face of the earth, and by far the most important.

If Christ had failed at any point, we would have no hope of resisting temptation (the Eichmann in us) or of receiving salvation. Our Lord was, of course, victorious. As we look at his victory, we look at ours.

Now I don't know as I walked through that passage if you got the full import of what is going on here, but let me say it this way: at this moment as Christ is in the wilderness, all the hopes of humanity are resting on Christ’s shoulders; because if Christ gives in, if He succumbs to temptation even for a moment, if He succumbs in thought or desire or word or action for just one second in those forty days, our hope of redemption is over because then He cannot go to the cross as the perfect Lamb of God! And so there is no acceptable sacrifice, and so there is no such thing as redemption and forgiveness; there is no defeat of sin; there is no power over sin; there is no hope of eternity; the whole thing crashes to the ground!

Briefly in this moment Mark comments on the majesty and significance and importance of this event. It must be the pure, unspotted Lamb of God without sin who goes to the cross. There's nothing that Satan is going to be able to throw at Him that’s going to cause Him to turn from the Father’s will; there's hope for us; we will be redeemed!

So how are you doing with temptation? Do you act like you have no power? Do you give in to things that you should see coming? Do you give yourself to arguments that make wrong look right, trying to recast what you have done to make it more acceptable to your conscience? Do you live naïvely? Do you live proudly falling into believing that you're not susceptible in ways that you actually are?

This passage is for you because the Redeemer has come. He has faced temptation for you. In Him, there is forgiveness; but in Him, there's even more; there's power to say, “No!” Are you availing yourself of that power? Are you living in that power? Are you living in the grace of the second Adam? Paul Tripp

In those moments when you're being mistreated, and in those moments when the lure of evil is so strong in you, in those moments when your eyes see things and your heart begins to move toward those things, in moments when your thoughts begin to run away, in moments of jealousy or anger or doubt--do you rise and say, “My Messiah has defeated the enemy on my behalf, and I will stand and say, ‘No!’” and go in another direction? Jesus bore the full force of the sin and temptation of a fallen world so that we would have forgiveness, and we would have power. May we live in that forgiveness, and may we exercise that power!

1 1. Charles Colson, Who Speaks for God?(Westchester, IL: Crossway Books, 1985), pp. 27, 28. [1]Lane, W. L. (1974). The Gospel of Mark (pp. 59–62). Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.