The Temptation of Jesus — Part Two

I invite you to take your Bibles and turn with me again to the portion of Luke chapter 4 which we left behind this morning.

And Father, we pray with earnest longing that you will bless our meditation now, that the words of our mouths and the meditation of our hearts may be found acceptable in your sight, you who are our strength and our redeemer.[1] Amen.

Well, I’d like to pick things up again at verse 9 and essentially finish what we left unfinished this morning. I hope to do so in much less time than I took this morning, and I say that as much as a warning to myself as an encouragement to you, at least potentially so.

We looked at these first two temptations, the first of which is recorded for us in verse 3: “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” And we recognized that Jesus resisted the temptation to provide bread for himself, for had he done so, it would have been an expression of insubordination and distrust of his Father. The second temptation concerned the possibility of becoming the recipient of all of the authority and splendor of the kingdoms of the world in a way that would deny the pathway of trials and tears or the loss of his own life. And we recognized that he resisted this as clearly and as strongly as the first temptation by counteracting the devil’s approach by the quoting of the Word of God: “Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.”

Now, in verse 9, he’s confronted by a further temptation as the devil leads him to Jerusalem and has him stand on the highest point of the temple. He’s confronted here with the temptation to obtain a more definite proof of his Father’s care for him by creating, arbitrarily, a situation in which the Father would be forced to come to the aid of his Son. And we’re told that the context for this is the temple—appropriately so: it is the place that represents God’s protection and God’s presence. And indeed, the devil’s own quoting of the Bible is very appropriate as well, because he’s quoting here from the Ninety-First Psalm, which many of you will recall begins, “He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High…”[2] And the Evil One comes to him with this great temptation.

Now, interestingly, Jesus, as we have seen, has been rebutting the devil’s temptations by the use of Scripture. And so the devil comes, and in a sense, he decides to tackle Christ in the same manner—at his own game, if we may say so reverently—by employing the Bible himself. And it is a reminder to us, although I have no interest in camping here this evening, that the devil is very, very good at quoting the Bible. And we must always remember that.

Naive Christians are often beguiled as a result of people quoting the Bible. And they will come to me, and they will say, “Well, I’m not so sure that we should be as cagey as we are concerning this situation or regarding this individual, because after all, he is a very nice man, and he quotes the Bible.” Now, of course, it is good to quote the Bible, but we recognize that it is possible to quote the Bible in a way that is incorrect or motivated by a desire to do something that is contrary to the plan and purpose of God.

And it is just this that we find in this temptation. Jesus is committed to doing the Father’s will and to making his way to Jerusalem and fulfilling the great eschatological purpose of God. The ultimate destiny to which he is heading is found in Calvary, and he has this clearly in his mind from the very inception of his ministry.

But what the devil tries to do in this temptation is to recruit Christ to participate in a test of the promises of God. And essentially, if we might paraphrase it (and I hope accurately), he’s coming to Christ, and he’s saying something along these lines: “Well, Jesus, if you are so committed to obeying God and trusting him, why don’t you show everyone, starting with yourself, how trusting you really are and how much you believe in the promises of God’s Word by throwing yourself from the pinnacle of the temple here? You’re a man of faith, aren’t you?” he might have said. And of course, Jesus was. And there is a unique temptation in that. For Christ, in the same way as being called upon to produce bread, might so easily have done so in order to rebut the evil advances of Satan himself—and here, as he is challenged, if you like, on the level of his trust of God, might easily have been tempted to take him at his word.

The ultimate destiny to which Jesus is heading is found in Calvary, and he has this clearly in his mind from the very inception of his ministry.

“Why don’t you just jump?” the devil is saying—and the crowds that are assembled down below, in the temple precincts or out in the Kidron Valley, some of whom may have been there as a result of their coming to worship (perhaps it was the hour of the evening sacrifice; we don’t know)—but he says, “Why don’t you throw yourself off here from the pinnacle? And all the people down below will be able to say, ‘Ah-ha! This is the Messiah after all!’” Because here we see him hurdling some 450 feet down towards the Kidron Valley, and just when he is about to hit the ground, God Almighty comes and picks him up and prevents him from even stubbing one of his toes through his sandals against the hard-bitten flint of the ground that he is about to hit.

Now, Jesus says, “Don’t put the Lord your God to the test. That’s what the Bible says,” says Jesus. Why does he respond in this way? Because he knew that he’d had no word from his Father directing him to do a swan dive from the edge of Herod’s Royal Portico. He understood what it was to do the Father’s will, and the Father had in his plan to that point revealed no such suggestion to his Son, and Jesus was well aware of it. And so he recognized that the motivation of the Evil One was essentially to test Jesus, to see whether he is prepared to test the faithfulness of God in a purely arbitrary manner: “Oh, well, let’s see if God is true to his word. Maybe I will throw myself off and see if he’s prepared to make a spectacular intervention on my behalf.”

So, quoting from Deuteronomy again—Deuteronomy 6:16—Jesus says, “It says in the Bible, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” Now, that reference there in Deuteronomy 6 is referencing the events that we have just read in Exodus chapter 17, where the people of God, at this place called Massah or Meribah, rebelled against Moses, complained about his leadership, questioned his motives, and instead of going to God, who was their Deliverer, in the spirit of childlike trust, they essentially threw down a challenge in their fairly defiant phrase “Is the Lord among us or not?”[3] In other words, “Okay, show yourself if you are here.” It wasn’t in a spirit of humble dependence upon God; it was really quite defiant.

And so Jesus is saying to the devil, “You’re not going to get me to put God to the test in that way. I am not about to try and force my Father to act on my behalf.” After all, why would he expose himself to danger just to see what his Father’s reaction might be? Why would he put himself in a dreadful predicament, put his own life in jeopardy, just to see whether his father was going to fulfill Psalm 91? Jesus, you see, knows that the devil’s proposal has nothing whatsoever to do with humbly trusting in the protective care and custody of God as described in Psalm 91.

At the same time, in approaching things in this way, the devil fails to recognize an even greater mystery—namely, that with Jesus, as with us, the divine rescue may come through suffering and death. You see, because when we read Psalm 91 and it says, “He will give his angels charge of you to keep you in all your ways,”[4] what are the ways? They are the ways of God for his people, and all his ways are pleasantness, and all his paths are peace.[5]

Does that mean that all his ways are easy? No. Does that mean that all his ways are within the framework of attendant encouragement and joy? No. Does that mean that all of his ways are sidestepping unpleasantness and illness and disappointment and disruption? The answer is no. And Jesus understood that. The people never understood it. Because the devil’s temptation here appears again, his mentality appears again, in the words that are cried to Christ when he is up on the cross, remember, when the people shout up to him, “He saved others; let him save himself if he is the [Messiah] of God, [his] Chosen One.”[6] So they wanted to make sure that they knew that he was the Messiah by his coming down from the cross. And he was declaring himself to be the Messiah by remaining on the cross.

And the devil here in his temptation misses the fact that you or I may die in a fiery torment; we may die as a result of a prolonged, debilitating illness; we may die in an instant as a result of a massive thrombosis. But in doing so, he still will have protected us in all of our ways, and not one of our bones will have been harmed without his proviso, nor will our feet have been caused to crumble in disrepair. And the devil didn’t understand that. So he says, “Why don’t you throw yourself down? And when he catches you, then you will know that he’s your heavenly Father, and everyone will know that you are God.” He failed to understand that when Jesus threw himself down, he threw himself upon a cross, and it was the will of God to bruise his Son.[7] And by means of his suffering and his death, he was to declare him to be Messiah, and he was to overrule in his fatherly care.

So, let me try and wrap it up. Jesus firmly rejects the suggestion of the devil that he should test the faithfulness of God by exposing himself to danger in a way that would be self-willed and unlawful. It would be wrong for him to expect God to preserve him in that way. He doesn’t waver for a moment in his trust of God, and he is not about to put God to the test. Because frankly, whoever seeks to test God in this fashion proves thereby that he doesn’t trust God completely. If we really trust God, we don’t have to come up with little arbitrary tests for God to see if he’s worthy of our trust; we just trust him. We trust him “as the moments fly.” We trust him “as the days go by.” We trust him “whate’er befall.” We just trust him, “that[’s] all.”[8] And when the devil comes, he says, “Why don’t you find out if God really is true to his promises? Why don’t you come up with a little test for this or a little test for that?” And every so often, you meet Christian people, and that’s exactly what they are doing.

So, let me apply this to ourselves.

Illustrations of presumption or of false confidence similar to that which the devil urged upon Jesus are all around us: “Go on and take a swan dive, and see if God will look after you.”

For example, diving into a marital relationship that doesn’t have the approval of God’s Word: “Whoa, here we go! Let’s see what God will do.”

Asking God to bestow the blessings of health while neglecting to observe the rules of health. After you’ve had seventeen pizzas, forty-three milkshakes, smoked eighty-five pipes, seventeen cigars, and drowned yourself in great gallons of aspartame, you then kneel down by your bed, if you can get remotely close to it, and pray, “O God, now bless me with health before I go to sleep.” That is stupidity, presumption, and false trust. That is putting the Lord to the test.

Asking God to save us while neglecting the means of grace that he uses to save us. Asking God to answer our questions while never placing ourselves under the instruction of his Word, never putting ourselves in the framework of the fellowship of God’s people, never listening to the study of it in our own personal lives. That’s presumption! God is able to save despite all these things and absent all these things, but the Bible makes it clear that God has chosen to save by means of certain things and to encourage by means of certain things. And it is sheer foolhardiness to take a swan dive into oblivion and then to say, “Well, we’ll see if God catches us before we hit the bottom.”

Asking God to ensure the welfare of our children while at the same time neglecting to bring them up in the way of the Lord.

Asking God to keep us from iniquity while constantly feeding our minds on trash. It’s the same kind of thing: “God, I know I’m going in here, but I ask you to close my eyes at all the bad bits, if you would. I want to see if you really love me and if I can trust you, so I’m going into this filthy escapade, and I’m trusting you, because you are an almighty God, and you guard my feet lest they are dashed against the stone,[9] and I’m sure that you will close my eyes, or you will have something happen—make the lights go out, or drop a ceiling tile on my head, or do something like that—and show what a wonderful God you are.” Do not put the Lord your God to the test!

That’s what the devil is doing here with Christ. He said, “Go ahead and throw yourself off. Why don’t you jump? You’re a man of faith.” And Jesus answers so clearly.

Well, look what verse 13 says: “When the devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time.” And that opportune time, of course, comes again and again as you read the Gospels. Because if you look carefully, you will discover that these three temptations reappear throughout the course of Jesus’ ministry. He was continually tempted to shrink from what was involved in fulfilling his statement in John 4: “My food … is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.”[10] He was continually facing the temptation to take another route.

When all of the ways leading from Jerusalem and the cross lay open to him, Jesus had to avoid the temptation not to take that road, even when the voice that spoke the suggestion to him came from the nearest and dearest to him. “Remember,” he says to the group gathered in Matthew 16, “now, here’s the deal. I have to go up to Jerusalem now, and I’m going to suffer, and I’m going to be crucified. On the third day I’m going to rise again.” And Peter takes him aside and remonstrates with him, and he says, “Lord, this will never happen to you.”[11] And in that instant Jesus faced the temptation: “Do I then set my face steadfastly towards Jerusalem, or do I listen to Peter here, and do I keep going?” What does he say to Peter? Yeah. Here’s Satan again—same old stuff, same old temptations.[12] Three bullets in his gun, firing them all the time.

And he had constantly to resist the temptation to oblige those who were curious in an idle kind of way by working some kind of sign that might gain their temporary allegiance. You read it as you go through the Gospels time and again. They come to him, and they say, “Jesus, do some sort of sign for us, and then we’ll believe in you, and then we’ll know who you are.” You have it at the beginning of Matthew 16, when the Pharisees and Sadducees come to him, and they make this suggestion, and Jesus says, “No, I’m not going to do that. I’m not going to do this for some kind of temporary accolade.”[13] Why? Because he would not put the Lord his God to the test.

Couple of closing observations.

Jesus, as we note from this, emerges victorious despite all the attempts of hell to overturn the plan of redemption. Jesus emerges victorious despite all of Satan’s attempts to overturn the plan. And his victory is our victory. I constantly come up against people who tell me that there are great problems with the devil, and he’s invading them and living with them and living with his mother-in-law and so on, and they have all these dramatic things that they are concerned with. And I feel dreadfully sorry for them. They really need to get a Bible and start reading it. All hell is let loose against Christ, and he defeats them by the power of the Word of God. And his victory is our victory.

Jesus emerges victorious despite all the attempts of hell to overturn the plan of redemption.

In Scotland, we used to sing,

On the vict’ry side,
On the vict’ry side!
No foe can harm me,
No fear alarm me,
On the vict’ry side.

On the vict’ry side,
On the vict’ry side,
With Christ within,
The fight we’ll win,
We’re on the victory side.[14]

And we need to understand that what Christ has accomplished in the battle with the Evil One here in temptation he has vindicated in that ultimate battle upon the cross. And it is checkmate for the devil. He can play a few more moves on the board if he likes. He can move pawns around and take his knight and his bishop and his castle and push them all around the board and enjoy himself and fiddle around to a certain degree, but he cannot alter the fact that victory has already been accomplished at the cross.

And as Christians, we live in the benefits of that victory. You can constantly tell the devil to go back to hell where he belongs. And I find myself saying that every so often as I go through my days: “Now, devil, don’t you come here with that garbage again in my mind, filling me with all that trash. You just go back to hell where you belong. It’s checkmate! You’re done.” “Resist [him], and he will flee from you.”[15] Don’t put up with this stuff, and don’t buy these books about “bondage breakers” and all that kind of stuff. Just get rid of all those books. We’ll have none of those books in our bookstore. We don’t need to answer dumb questions created by other people; we’ve got enough dumb questions of our own.

That’s the first closing observation.

Secondly, because we are on the victory side and because Jesus has secured this victory, we can call upon Jesus in times of temptation. And the reason we can is because he is with us. He is with us. When Martin Luther was asked how he overcame the devil, he replied in this way: “Well, when he comes knocking on the door of my heart and asks, ‘Who lives here?’ the dear Lord Jesus goes to the door and says, ‘Martin Luther used to live here, but he has moved out. Now I live here. Can I help you?’” What a wonderful picture!

When Satan tempts me to despair
And tells me of the guilt within,
Upward I look and see him there
Who made an end [to] all my sin.[16]

But he is not merely up there, ascended to the right hand of the Father;[17] he is in here and lives with me by his Spirit and goes and answers the door, in the way that we sometimes say to somebody, “Oh, would you go and get that for me? I’m afraid that if I go to the door, something dreadful may happen.” And so someone else goes on our behalf. Wonderful picture! Underscored by Augustus Montague Toplady’s wonderful two-stanza hymn:

A sovereign protector I have,
Unseen, yet forever at hand,
Unchangeably faithful to save,
Almighty to rule and command.
He smiles, and my comforts abound;
His grace as the dew shall descend;
And walls of salvation surround
The soul he delights to defend.

Now, Kendrick is quite good, but he has not come close to the theology that is contained in that stanza. Listen to the second one:

Inspirer and hearer of prayer,
Thou Shepherd and Guardian of thine,
My all to thy covenant care
I sleeping and waking resign.
If thou art my Shield and my Sun,
The night is no darkness to me;
And fast as my moments roll on,
They bring me but nearer to thee.[18]

Toplady died in 1778. He was born in 1740. By the age of thirty-eight, he had assimilated and conveyed a wealth of theology that here, hundreds of years past, must still remain the hymnody of God’s people.

And the final observation is this: as Christ was full of the Spirit and full of the Word of God, so we must be. It is when we walk in the Spirit, when our minds are renewed in God’s truth, then sin and temptation cannot dominate us.

Now, I didn’t say “cannot affect us,” because they clearly affect us. But they cannot dominate us. If we’re going to live by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God, then we are going to know—it demands that we know—the Word that has proceeded from the mouth of God. And therefore, it takes us again back to this book. As Vance Havner said, “This Book will keep you from sin, or sin will keep you from this Book.”[19]

It’s very simple at the end, isn’t it? “Oh, fill me with your [very] fullness, Lord, until my very heart o’erflow.”[20] “Lord, let your Word dwell in me richly.”[21]

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in his excellent Word!
What more can he say than to you he ha[s] said,
To you who [to Jesus for refuge] have fled?[22]

When I have Christ, when I have his Spirit indwelling me and filling me, when I have his Word feeding me and guiding my path, then I have all that I need—all that you need for tomorrow’s temptations, all that we need for as-yet-unseen diagnosis of illness, all that we need for the heartbreaks that remain in his providence that have yet not been made manifest to us. We must, loved ones, resolve in the evenings of opportunity to prepare ourselves for the days of temptation, that we might follow the example of Christ, a wonderful High Priest who is “touched with the feeling[s] of our infirmities.”[23]

We must resolve in the evenings of opportunity to prepare ourselves for the days of temptation.

Father, we thank you again for the Bible. We understand why Thomas à Kempis said he had no greater joy than to be “in a nook, with the book.”[24] Many of our lives will be better served by more time in the nook with your book. Come to us this evening, and speak peace into souls that are troubled. Bring discomfiture to those of us who are playing fast and loose with sin. Grant no peace to those of us who are seeking to find our own peace outside of the provision of Christ. We want to know what it means to love you and to follow you and to serve you, and that’s why we’ve come together, and that’s why now we bring our lives afresh to you, and we bring our evening offerings to you. In the name of your Son, the Lord Jesus. Amen.

[1] See Psalm 19:14.

[2] Psalm 91:1 (NIV 1984).

[3] Exodus 17:7 (NIV 1984).

[4] Psalm 91:11 (paraphrased).

[5] See Proverbs 3:17.

[6] Luke 23:35 (NIV 1984).

[7] See Isaiah 53:10.

[8] Edgar Page Stites, “Simply Trusting Every Day” (1876).

[9] See Psalm 91:12.

[10] John 4:34 (NIV 1984).

[11] Matthew 16:21–22 (paraphrased).

[12] See Matthew 16:23; Mark 8:33.

[13] See Matthew 16:1–4.

[14] Walter J. Main, “On the Victory Side” (1927). Lyrics lightly altered.

[15] James 4:7 (NIV 1984).

[16] Charitie Lees Bancroft, “Before the Throne of God Above” (1863).

[17] See Acts 2:33.

[18] Augustus Toplady, “A Sovereign Protector I Have” (1774).

[19] Dwight Lyman Moody, Notes from My Bible: From Genesis to Revelation (Chicago: Fleming H. Revell, 1895), 8.

[20] Frances R. Havergal, “Lord, Speak to Me That I may Speak” (1872).

[21] See Colossians 3:16.

[22] “How Firm a Foundation” (1787).

[23] Hebrews 4:15 (KJV).

[24] Thomas à Kempis, quoted in C. H. Spurgeon, The Treasury of David, vol. 1, Psalm I. to XXVI. (London: Marshall Brothers, n.d.), 6.