Varied Temptations

Varied Temptations

And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread. But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me. Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.

Matthew 4:3-11

How will Satan tempt us? We considered yesterday when Satan will tempt us. Today let us consider how he will. In our passage today, we find Satan appealing to Christ to do three things. He tempts Him to, ‘command that these stones be made bread.’ Does not this correspond to the lust of the flesh; to which John refers in I John 2:16? He then tempts Chirst to, ‘cast Himself from the pinnacle of the temple,’ citing Psalm 91, that the angels would bear Him up. Is not this, ‘the pride of life’ to which John again refers in the same verse we cited earlier? He then shows Christ, ‘all the kingdoms of the world,’ and declares that he will give them to Christ, if He will but bow down and worship Satan. Is not this, ‘the lust of the eyes,’ to which John refers in I John 2:16 as well? If Satan thus tempted Christ, we should expect him to tempt us along the same lines. Have we not found it thus far, to be so with us?  To our great sorrow, we find that we often fall to temptation in these areas. The comfort we may gain from this, is that Christ utterly and completely understands what we face.  He ‘was tempted in all points like as we are.’ We are greatly encouraged that we are not isolated and alone in our temptations. Others around us face them, and more importantly, Christ Himself, Who counts more than all the others, has faced them too. We follow the Christ, Who is always going before us.

Our Loving and Sympathetic Savior,
we praise You that You understand all we face,
we rejoice that You ever go before us
and set us in the way of Your steps.

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning