Sermon Tone Analysis

Announcements

Are there any announcements?

Next Sunday March 27 after church we are having our first potluck.

So please bring your favorite dish!!!

Revelation Bible Study Thursday March 24 6:30pm with Kevin

Women’s Tea and Light Lunch Saturday April 2 at noon.

Introduction

Good morning and welcome to FCC, where we worship God in Spirit and in Truth, one verse at a a time, one book at a time.

We have come as far as Matthew 4, so let us open our Bibles there

Read Matthew 4:1-17

Prayer

Review

In looking back we discovered that in verse 1 of chapter 4 the word then points back to the ending of chapter 3.

Jesus was baptized by John and Mark writes that he was immediately led (driven) by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

This is where heaven and hell collide church.

John the Baptist, the greatest man that ever lived just Baptized Jesus so that all of righteousness would be fulfilled and then the Father says, “This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased!”

Then right after, Jesus had this amazing experience with John, The Father and the Holy Spirit empowering him for ministry the devil showed up

It is important church for us to get this!

Jesus just had a spiritual experience with the Lord church, He was just empowered for ministry and John the Baptist basically handed him the baton to carry on and he was tempted.

Much of the time after we hit a spiritual high or have a tremendous blessing come our way, the devil shows up and throws temptation our way.

He seeks to derail us and get our eyes of Jesus the Author and Finisher of our faith.

Do you see that walketh there in this text?

Depending on the context of words ending in eth in the KJV they can mean continual.

Here we have a verb that is in the present continual tense.

Therefore, church, the devil is always walking about seeking prey...

He is seeking to devour church and if we are not armored up and focused upon Jesus guess what?

He will pounce!

It is said that a person traveling in tiger country will not be attacked if he sees the tiger before the tiger sees him.

Tigers attack from behind in order to surprise their victims, and therefore one of the best defenses against that vicious animal is to face it.

The story is told of four high school boys who couldn’t resist the temptation to skip morning classes.

Each had been smitten with a bad case of spring fever.

After lunch they showed up at school and reported to the teacher that their car had a flat tire.

Much to their relief, she smiled and said, “Well, you missed a quiz this morning, so take your seats and get out a pencil and paper.”

Still smiling, she waited as they settled down and got ready for her questions.

Then she said, “First question—which tire was flat?”

How were you tempted this week?

5. Jesus had fasted 40 days and 40 nights and we learned that he was on the verge of death.

Physiologists tell us that when one fasts for that length of time, he loses his appetite completely.

His hunger returns only when he is on the verge of death.

Last week we ended right here, Jesus was on the verge of death and the tempter came.

Church, let us not be fooled into thinking that that the tempter only comes we we are fasting.

He comes in all shapes and sizes, on all occasions so be vigilant, be sober!

When Peter said Be sober and Be vigilant, he was giving his readers two imperatives to follow>>>

What is an imperative in the Greek church?

It is not something you can think about doing, it is something that we must do or we will fall victim to the wicked one.

Sober-nēphō (nay'-fo)-to be sober, to be calm and collected in spirit, to be temperate, dispassionate, circumspect...

It can also mean to be free from intoxicants, but here it is talking about self- control in the KJV it is the word temperance...

to get self-control ⇔ sober up v. — to curb the controlling influence of inordinate emotions or desires (and therefore become reasonable); conceived of as sobering up from the influence of alcohol.

It means to restrain, to restrict, to deny, to guard oneself, to bridle, to curb ones passions, desires and appetites

I share this church, because last week I shared that Satan tempted Jesus with three things.

Do you remember what they are?

Satan tempts us to doubt God’s provision!

and We see this here isn verses 3 and 4:

It is important to note and connect 1 Peter 5:8 here because Satan not only tempted Jesus to doubt God’s provision, but he attacked him in his appetites and desires church.

It is also important to note that God does not tempt, but he does test us!

The devil tempted Jesus to doubt God’s provision, but he also was tempting his in the arena of his appetites and desires church.

This is a very important teaching here.

What does tempt mean would be our first question here?

Tempt- (pi-rad'-zo)-to try to trap, to entice to sin.

Our second question is what it mean to be drawn away or enticed?

Church, no temptation appears as temptation; it always seems more alluring than it really is.

James used two illustrations or word pictures from the world that he lived in.

Drawn away carries with it the idea of the baiting of a trap; and enticed in the original Greek means “to bait a hook.”

The hunter and the fisherman have to use bait to attract and catch their prey.

No animal is deliberately going to step into a trap and no fish will knowingly bite at a naked hook.

The idea is to hide the trap and the hook.

Temptation always carries with it some bait that appeals to our natural desires.

The bait not only attracts us, but it also hides the fact that yielding to the desire will eventually bring sorrow and punishment.

It is the bait that is the exciting thing.

Lot would never have moved toward Sodom had he not seen the “well-watered plains of Jordan” (Gen.

13:10ff).

When David looked on his neighbor’s wife, he would never have committed adultery had he seen the tragic consequences: the death of a baby (Bathsheba’s son), the murder of a brave soldier (Uriah), the violation of a daughter (Tamar).

Church, The bait keeps us from seeing the consequences of sin.

When Jesus was tempted by Satan, He always dealt with the temptation on the basis of the Word of God.

Three times in the text that we are in He said, “It is written.”

From the human point of view, turning stones into bread to satisfy hunger is a sensible thing to do; but not from God’s point of view.

When you know the Bible, you can detect the bait and deal with it decisively that is what Jesus did!

This is what it means to walk by faith and not by sight.

Desire

Discipline

Delight

Every Word, if we do not know our Bibles then how are we going to know how to fight!

We will be defenseless against the whiles of the devil.

It is important to note here, that the devil only speaks in the word of God three times.

In the Garden of Eden to Eve

To Job

And here to Jesus

Jesus was quoting from one of his favorite books church:

Did you see that the Lord tested?

The devil tempts us to do what is not lawful, to sin, while the Lord tests us.

The issue is here in Matthew 4:3-4 is not that is wrong to hunger and eat, but rather who you go to to have your needs met.

Jesus said, “is not the material realm.

More important than physical food is the spiritual food I find in God’s Word.”

Again Jesus quotes form one of his favorite books Duet 6:16, his other favorite book I believe is Isaiah.

The holy city is Jerusalem here church and he set him on the Pinnacle of the Temple.

The pinnacle of the temple was about 450’ from the top the pinnacle down to the Kidron Valley church on the east side

The ancient Jewish historian Josephus wrote about this lofty point of the temple.

He said that it was so high, and that the Kedron Valley it overlooked was - from that vantage point - so deep, that if anyone stood at that point and looked down, "he would be giddy, while his sight could not reach to such an immense depth."

Obviously Jesus did not jump, but some scholars say that Jesus half brother James who wrote the book of James was thrown off here and lived and then stoned to death...

Satan is quoting scripture church here, but is missing a valuable part of Psalm 91: