Grab Their Attention
“No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find out the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness — they have lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it: and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation means — the only complete realist.”
So wrote C.S. Lewis in Mere Christianity. As we study Luke’s account of the temptation of Christ we see that Lewis is proved right. Jesus Christ is the only human who knows the true strength of evil precisely because he outlasted everyone else. He got into the ring and went all 12 rounds.
Raise the Need, State the Destination, Signposts
Now, you and I must pay careful attention to this narrative for two reasons. First, you and I have failed to resist temptation. We’ve already lost the battle, and we need a savior who in his mastery over temptation can save us. For that reason, we must first understand that this passage isn’t chiefly about how we can face temptation. It’s about how Jesus Christ succeeded where we failed. He’s the true Son of God who came in the flesh, was tempted such as we are, died in our place, and was raised.
But second, even after you’ve received God’s forgiveness, temptation keeps coming, sometimes with even more fury. Some people think that Christians are goody-two-shoes who have risen above temptations, but that’s simply not true. In some ways, Satan comes after Christians with more intensity, frequency, and duration than any non-believer. And most of us lose the battle with temptation far more often than we win.
This passage teaches us four truths about temptation:
- When It Comes
- Why It Never Stops
- What It Asks
- Who Can Master It
The Text
The text for today’s sermon is Luke 4:1-15.
And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry. 3 The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” 4 And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’ ” 5 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 And Jesus answered him, “It is written,
“ ‘You shall worship the Lord your God,
and him only shall you serve.’ ”
9 And he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written,
“ ‘He will command his angels concerning you,
to guard you,’
11 and
“ ‘On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.’ ”
12 And Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’ ” 13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.
14 And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit to Galilee, and a report about him went out through all the surrounding country. 15 And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified by all.
This is the Word of the Lord
- When Temptation Comes
Notice what’s just happened to Jesus. The passage begins saying that Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit, is led by the Spirit into the wilderness. This happens immediately after God the Father publicly praises Jesus Christ in his baptism. The Father says, “This is my Son, in you I’m well pleased.” He’s filled with Spirit and, BAM… into the wilderness.
There’s a spiritual baptism followed by a spiritual battle. There’s a voice from heaven, then comes the voice from hell. There’s heavenly assurance, then hellish accusation. Think about it… there’s water followed by desert.
And don’t miss this… the Spirit led him there. In fact, the first word in verse 1 is translated “and,” but it’s not “and now this,” as if there’s no connection between what came before and what’s about to happen. It’s not like the news, “And now this, and now this, and now this.” It means, “Thus.” Spiritual blessing therefore spiritual battle.
Here is when temptation often comes: it comes on the heels of closeness to God, service of God and love of others. Friend, temptation often comes when you feel like nothing can touch you.
I know many Christians who say to themselves, “Why am I struggling with temptation? I’m reading my Bible. I’m serving in my church. I’m loving my family well. I shouldn’t be facing temptation like this.”
I’ve known several people who, the moment they professed faith in Christ, or the moment they began to repent of sin, immediately they began facing intense spiritual conflict. In fact, when Mark records this narrative, Jesus is baptized, the Father says, “You are my beloved son, with you I’m well pleased,” and Mark writes, “The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness.”
Temptation, spiritual battle, spiritual conflict and closeness to God are not mutually exclusive. Luke 4 says “there was one who was completely led by the Spirit, who was completely pleasing to God… how did his life go?” He didn’t just face seasons of intense temptation the Spirit of God even drove him into those seasons. He was living to honor his Father, and he faced intense spiritual opposition and difficulty.
Here’s what this means, don’t be surprised when temptation comes. We shouldn’t expect to live for Christ without any conflict. Anyone who offers you a Christianity without tears is not offering you the true Christ. Anyone who offers you a Christianity without seasons of doubt, months of temptation, long sleepless nights of prayer, isn’t offering you Christ.
You may be thinking, “I don’t really sense any temptation in my life right now. I’m not really aware of any sin. I don’t feel a spiritual conflict. What does that mean?” Friend, it may be that you are so at ease because you are devoid of the spirit and a slave of Satan and he’ll make you as comfortable so long as he can keep you.
In the end we should be far more concerned when our life appears tranquil than when it’s tumultuous. Jesus himself told a parable of a man who was rich, productive, and said to himself, “Ok, I have ample good stored up. Let me relax and enjoy myself.” But God said to him, “Fool, this night you soul is required of you.”
Church, if you are facing intense temptation, do not be dismayed. Praise God that you are aware of your sin. Know that even the Lord Jesus endured seasons of spiritual conflict. Facing temptation is no sign that God has abandoned you.
We’ve seen when temptation comes… now…
- Why Temptation Never Stops
As a child, I heard the story of Jesus’ temptation a hundred times in church and I always assumed that the temptation came near the end of the 40 days. So, Jesus fasted for maybe 39 days and he faced these three trials at the end when he was physically weak. But that’s not the impression the text gives. The text says Jesus…
“was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil.”
This wasn’t a season of fasting that ended with a temptation. Rather this was a season of temptation which required fasting. This wasn’t a moment of enticement. It was day and night, relentless temptation for the duration of the journey. Think back to the Baptism. The voice from heaven spoke once. The voice from hell chatters day and night.
Here’s the question: why doesn’t temptation ever stop? Why does it take so long to master? Why can’t we just whip it and be done? And why is it that you can repent for so long, fight temptation successfully for so long and in a moment fall right back into temptation’s clutches?
And here’s the answer the Bible gives: because evil and temptation are not abstractions. Temptation is not a mere concept or theory about human behavior. Temptation never stops for us because it’s ultimate source is an undying personality: Satan.
There it is. The devils are real, and they are active. Now, I know what a few of you are thinking:
“Ok, Jonathan, I live in the 21st century. I’m a modern person. I know better than to believe in devils.” Or, even if you aren’t opposed to the supernatural, you probably don’t give much thought to demons and fallen angels. We are at the end of more than a century of scientific skepticism. For decades upon decades the academics and cultural elites have sought to explain everything in the universe in terms of physical causes. And yet, even some of the most committed atheists and secularists have realized that somethings cannot be explained without a real personal devil.
Here’s Andrew Delbanco, an atheist, in his book The Death of Satan. It’s a longer quote, but stick with it:
A gulf has opened up in our culture between the visibility of evil and the intellectual resources available for coping with it. Never before have images of horror been so widely disseminated and so appalling–from organized death camps to children starving in famines that might have been averted. Rarely does a week go by without newspaper and television accounts of teenagers performing contract killings for a few dollars, women murdered on the street for their purses or their furs, young men shot in the head for the keys to their jeep–and these are only the domestic bulletins… The repertoire of evil has never been richer. Yet never have our responses been so weak. We have no language for connecting our inner lives with the horrors that pass before our eyes in the outer world…
We live in the most brutal century in human history, but instead of stepping forward to take the credit, the devil has rendered himself invisible. The very notion of evil seems incompatible with modern life, from which the ideas of transgression and the accountable self are fast receding. Yet despite this loss of old words and moral concepts – Satan, sin, evil – we cannot do without some conceptual means for thinking about the universal human experience of cruelty and pain. My driving motive in writing this book has been the conviction that if evil, with all its insidious complexity, escapes the reach of our imagination, it will have established dominion over us all.
What’s Delbanco saying? He’s saying you can’t make sense of evil in the world without a devil. Can I be blunt with you?
The Bible says, “If you think that all that was behind the gulags was class struggle… if you think that all that was behind the slave trade between African and western nation was just economics or racism… if you think that the only thing behind COVID was a lab breach… you aren’t just naïve…you are like someone who puts on a blindfold at noon and calls it midnight.
Why does temptation never stop? Because it’s not a concept or abstraction. It’s relentless because Satan is relentless. The Bible says that he’s like a prowling lion. All night long, he walks back and forth looking for the weak, looking for a moment of distraction.
Now, Satan isn’t the only reason for human evil. We don’t get to pin every wrong thing we do on him. One person said, “Lead me not into temptation, I can find the way myself.”
In the preface to the Screwtape Letters, C.S. Lewis said that humans basically make two mistakes when it comes to demons. They either have an over fascination with devils and attribute everything to them. Or they ignore demons entirely and are therefore ignorant of their schemes.
The Bible comes to us saying, “Don’t be ignorant. Yes, you are a fallen sinner. Yes, your own heart is capable of sinning on its own. But do not ignore the Tempter.
We’ve seen when temptation comes, why it never stops, the question it asks… now…
- What Temptation Asks
Now, stay with me for a moment, because we have to connect the baptism with the temptation. Remember, John was baptizing people who were repenting of their sins, and here comes Jesus—the sinless one. Remember the question John asked him: “Why are you coming to me for baptism… I should be coming to you.” And Jesus says that this must happen in order to fulfill all righteousness.
In other words, John is saying, “Jesus, you are standing where I should be standing. Why are you coming down into the water and taking my place? You should be baptizing me.”
And Jesus says, “No, John. The entire reason I’ve come is to take your place. I’ve come to be your substitute. I’m taking your place. I have come to assume your weakness, your poverty, your limitations, and to live under them all as a faithful man, and at the cross, I will even assume your sin, and bear God’s curse.”
Now…
In our passage, Satan places three temptations before Jesus, but I want you to see that at the root of these three, at the root of all temptation is really one question. There’s one ultimate question that temptation asks. Here’s the question:
What if God isn’t really good?
That’s the question beneath all the other questions. Look at the three temptations:
- If you are the Son of God, turn this stone into bread.
- Worship me, and I’ll give you the authority and glory of the kingdoms.
- If you are the Son of God, jump off the temple, and angels will catch you.
Now, consider what’s just happened. In the waters of baptism, the Father has spoken: “You are my Son, in you I am well pleased.” And now the enemy comes asking, “If you were really God’s true Son…if God was really pleased with you… would you be out here starving? If he was really good, would you really have to suffer before he will give you glory and the kingdoms of the world? If the goal is to draw all men to yourself, you don’t have to die… just fly above the temple and everyone will come.”
We can read the entire account in only 12 verses, but this is the question Satan asks for 40 days and nights: “If God really loved you as a Son, why won’t he let you tap into your divine power to feed yourself? If he really wants to give you glory, why are you humiliating yourself? Why not unveil the divine glory you have?”
Now listen to me… here’s what Satan is saying: you can have all the good things God promised to give you, through disobedience to his will. And if God withholds those goods from you… then maybe he isn’t good himself.
In Genesis, God had given everything to Adam and Eve, and said, “I’ve made you in my likeness. And all this garden is yours. Just do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for in the day you eat of it you will die.”
Satan enters the garden, and asks Eve, “Did God really say don’t eat? He knows that if you do, you’ll be like him.” In other words, “There’s something good he’s holding back. And you can have it through disobedience.”
This is the question beneath all questions: Is God really good? Can you really trust him? If he’s so good, and you are really his beloved child, why would he withhold?
Now listen… this is the question beneath the temptation of Eve. It’s the question beneath the temptation of Christ. And it’s the question beneath our temptations as well.
If God loves me, why am I so unhappy? Why can’t I find happiness? If I’m really his beloved child, why is my life going this way?
If you don’t believe Jesus Christ is your substitute, every time you are frustrated, suffering, and angry and temptation knocks you’ll either say, “I don’t deserve this. I’ve lived a good life,” or “I’ve lived terribly. I deserve this.” And both of those are just different versions of the same lie… that God really isn’t good.
We’ve seen when temptation comes, why it never stops, the question it asks… now…
- Who Can Master Temptation
Even since Genesis 3, Satan has tempted. And for millennia, every generation of human beings have fallen prey to his deception.
I wonder what it must have been like for the master tempter, who had caused all men to stumble, to face a man who was unyielding to even the greatest enticements. Here is a man who would starve before he disobeyed God.
For 40 days and nights Satan comes at Jesus Christ from every angle. Testing his defenses, looking for a crack in the shield, and for 40 days and nights Jesus Christ denies himself, rests in his Father’s love, and resists every temptation.
And he does it all without relying on his divine nature. In other words, Jesus didn’t pass the test because, when he got to the end of his human ability to resist, his divine abilities kicked in. It wasn’t like someone trying to jump over the Grand Canyon, and when their human body made it 10’ some divine wind blew them the other 3,000.
No. Jesus Christ faced temptation as our true substitute. This is why he fasted. Notice that he doesn’t go into the wilderness to fast and then Satan happens to find a hungry man to tempt. No. He goes into the wilderness to face temptation, and therefore he fasts. He denies himself physical nourishment in order to master his own physical needs.
This is why he responds to every temptation by quoting Scripture. He is not living by bread alone. He, as a true man, is training himself to find his ultimate dependence upon the sure and steadfast Word of his Father.
Who can master temptation? Only a man totally submitted in body and soul to his heavenly Father.
Look at verse 13. I love this:
“And when the devil had ended every temptation he departed from him until an opportune time.”
That final verse summarizes the entire work of Christ.
Who can truly substitute themselves for sinners? Only a perfectly sinless one. The only way Jesus can die for my sin and your sin is if he has no sin of his own. Satan tempts him in every way possible, and fails to make him fall. So, Christ succeeds on our behalf.
And, having tempted him, he departs until an opportune time. In other words, Satan knows that he will not disrupt Christ’s mission though temptation, he’ll have to kill him. And surprise of all surprises, tactic of all tactics, it is the killing of Jesus that seals and accomplishes Jesus’ mission. Satan planned to take Jesus’ life. Little did he know, Jesus planned to give it.
And here the true goodness of God is displayed. Here God reveals how free and generous he is. He isn’t just led into the desert.. the Spirit leads him onward to the cross. The prince of heaven is torn apart for sinners who have done nothing to deserve it. The Lord of Life dies, so that dead men can be raised.
Friend, if you’ve ever doubted the goodness of God, do not look at your life. Do not measure his goodness by your circumstances, your emotions, your happiness. Would you see the goodness of God? Look at the cross of Jesus Christ. Would you know the love of God? See the man, Jesus, hanging on the tree as your substitute.