The Temptation of Christ
Matthew 4:1-11
The Lord enters the wilderness which is the field of battle for establishment of the Covenant of Grace. In the wilderness our Lord would meet Satan face to face, and He would conquer where Adam failed.
Where Adam’s failure in the Covenant of Works plunged the people of the world into an estate of sin and misery, the Lord Jesus Christ would do battle and save His people by His righteousness.
#1 The character of the Tempter...
The Temptation of Christ
Matthew 4:1-11
The Lord enters the wilderness which is the field of battle for establishment of the Covenant of Grace. In the wilderness our Lord would meet Satan face to face, and He would conquer where Adam failed.
Where Adam’s failure in the Covenant of Works plunged the people of the world into an estate of sin and misery, the Lord Jesus Christ would do battle and save His people by His righteousness.
#1 The character of the Tempter
One of the ways he tempts is he entices you to partake of the fruit of destruction by making it look so good.
First, he entices you makes you double minded. Once you have bitten, he then accuses you for having done so. He is a short-lived friend. He is the enemy of our soul. And his goal, seen in his nature, is our destruction.
In God’s covenant of redemption, He enters into divine conflict with Satan by the Lord Jesus Christ, and God’s people must not be deceived by the nature of that battle.
Let us remember his nature and his purposes.
#2 The tactics of the Tempter
When we see his tactics in those three temptations, we see the tempter in each of these three temptations attack our Lord’s trust in His Father’s providence.
Tactics #1
Since You are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread. He tempts the Lord to exercise His divine power, to bring relief to His human suffering.
He tempts Him to think, well, perhaps the Father will not provide for my hunger. I am famished. I have been without for forty days, perhaps the Father will not provide for Me. He tempts the Lord to an explicit distrust of the Father’s providence.
Tactics #2
You are the Son of God, then throw Yourself off of the temple mount. Scriptures say that the angels will bear You up so that you will not strike Your foot against the stone. He tested the providence of goodness.
Tactics # 3
I will give you the kingdoms, I will give you their glory, if you will just bow down and worship me. He tempts the Lord to disobey the first commandment.
He knew the Lord Jesus had already set in his heart the motion towards the cross. You won’t have to go the way of the cross.
He cannot produce in any of these temptations what he promised. Yet, he is ready to lie to deceive. But he presents what is evil in attempt to convince us that it is good.
He will deceive you saying, righteousness is bad for you. Sin is satisfying, it is fulfilling.
And only we have taken the bite of the apple, do we find out that the exact opposite is true.
Only in the light of God’s character and in His word, do we find out how miserable a mistake that we have made to trust Him. But this is precisely what He does to every one of us.
#3 The response of Jesus
Jesus responds by saying it is written. He depends upon Scripture. He asserts the authority of Scripture.
He refuses to be tempted to mistrust, to distrust, to abuse God’s providence. It means that I refuse to be putting the Lord to the test, rather put my complete trust in him.
Do not foolishly test His providence. When we face temptation, we too, must resort to the word.
We must use the Scripture as we face temptation, and we must rest in the grace of the victory that our Lord Jesus has won for us.
We must remember our adoption because over and over, Satan will want us to forget that we are the adopted children of God. He will want us to forget that the Father cares for us. He will want us to think that the Father is stingy in His provision for us.
Satan brings his charms, and he says these will make your life whole. And we take the charms instead of the blessings of God.
This tempter can only be met by the Armor of God provided by grace. Embrace Jesus now and find in Him your everything. Let us pray.
Prayer
You are our Lord and our God, we thank You for the victory of the Son on this field of battle and on all the fronts that He fought. We pray O God, that we would embrace Him and that you would deliver us from the evil one for His sake. We ask it in Jesus’ name. Amen.
