1st Sunday in Lent 2023. Matthew 4:1-11 The Temptation of Christ
Like the Transfiguration, the three accounts of Jesus’ temptation in the Matthew, Mark, and Luke all focus on different things.
Now we will continue to spend a fait bit of time in the gospel of Matthew this year, and Matthew’s dominant theme is that all of the Old Testament, the law and the prophets, are fulfilled in the person of Jesus Christ, so this is the way we are to read today’s account of the Temptation.
Our context for today’s gospel is that Jesus has just been baptised, and in v.1 of today’s reading, “then was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” It is not God who tempts, but the devil. Yet God the Holy Spirit led him to the wilderness and allowed it to happen.
Why? Why does God allow temptation? Jesus had just come from the spiritual high of his baptism, where the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove and God himself announced that Jesus is the Son of God.
Now temptation of some sort always comes after a spiritual high. It is a proper and good thing as its purpose is to sort out the emotional high, from the reality of spiritual conquest and growth. We are not meant to live on spiritual ‘highs’, but rather the bread that comes from God alone. Our walk with God is one of perseverance and faith.
God deliberately permits or allows temptation, perhaps a better word is testing. It does not mean that God has withdrawn his blessing. It simply allows that which is merely ‘feeling’ or emotional to be separated from what is real and permanent. Testing and temptation build spiritual muscle.
Knowing that Matthew’s purpose is to reveal Jesus as the fulfilment of all Old Testament law and prophesy; I think these temptations were specifically messianic, and unique to God’s Son.
The Jews expectations of the coming Messiah were huge. They Messiah would be the new David. The King who would lead Israel out of Roman occupation and establish the Kingdom of God in the same sort of way David did.
The Messiah would feed people the very bread of heaven, just as God did to the Israelites in their journey from Egypt through the wilderness. The Messiah would restore the glory of God’s people Israel.
But this is not the messiah prophesied by Isaiah. The true messiah will be a suffering servant who would take all the wounds of the world onto himself, so that by his wounds we are healed.
These temptations happened after Jesus had fasted 40 days. But all through those days of fasting he was being tempted by the devil, not just after forty days, but for the whole time. The account here is of the final three temptations that Jesus encounters at the end of those 40 days, we aren’t told what all the other temptations were.
In these messianic temptations, the devil offers a life of self-indulgence, (make yourself bread from stones), self-aggrandizement and power (all the nations of the world will belong to you if you worship me), and self-serving religious identity (you are like God aren’t you? Throw yourself down from the top of the temple, your angels will save you.)
These messianic temptations were the devil’s ways of tempting Jesus to bypass the cross, to satisfy the expectations of the Jews and bring down the fire of heaven on the Romans. To be a hero. To be obedient to someone other than God and adopt the role of the Son and King of Kings without being the suffering servant prophesied in Isaiah.
Now Jesus came for us, the world. “For God so loved the world that he gave his only son” So what do these temptations mean for humanity? If we use the outdated term “mankind,” it may make more sense, particularly when we bring to mind todays Genesis reading.
The word Adam means man. So Man failed by succumbing to temptations. Adam (or Man) had disobeyed God even though Adam knew he was the son of God! Adam had grabbed at the shiny apple of self-indulgence and material satisfaction because he wanted to.
The second and perfect man, Jesus, won where the first man failed. Not only that, but Jesus also succeeded where the nation of Israel had failed. Moses tells the Israelites in Deuteronomy that God led them in the desert for forty years “to humble and test you in order to know what was in your heart, whether or not you would keep his commands.”
The Israelites failed spectacularly. They tested God at Meribah and Massah. They were idolatrous with the Golden Calf; they were constantly disobeying the commands God had given them.
Jesus the very fulfilment of the nation of Israel, succeeded where Israel had failed. When Man and Israel had failed Jesus didn’t. This is why Jesus came, because God is his infinite foreknowledge knew we would.
Now just as the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness, it is the Holy Spirit in Jesus that overcame these temptations. After the temptations are announced, Jesus says, “It is written … again it is written.” Jesus defeated Satan’s false promises by quoting the very same Scripture that he himself fulfills.
All his responses come from the book of Deuteronomy (8:3, 6:16, 13), so perhaps he had been studying that book in his daily devotions.
From within these verses of Scripture, the Holy Spirit which had come so powerfully upon him just a month before at his baptism, was able to bring these verses to mind in Jesus and use them to defeat the devil. This is called the sword of the Spirit.
Paul writes to the Ephesians (6:17) that “the sword of the Spirit … is the word of God.” The bible is the sword of the Spirit. This is why I encourage you all to read the bible, just a little bit every day, even if it’s a couple of verses, for then the Holy Spirit will be able to bring them to mind when we, too, are tempted, as we most certainly are and will always be.
Satan attempted to tempt Jesus by promising personal glory to him. This too is the way we are tempted. To focus on ourself, to glorify ourself, and not our glorious and loving Father. What would the sword of the Spirit say about that? It would say “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and love your neighbour as yourself,” which is also from Deuteronomy.
If we do that, our father then will lovingly and personally take care of our needs to such an extent that it seems as though we no longer live, but it is Christ who lives in us. Let me pray.