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INJ
'Christ is Tempted for Us'
St Matthew 4:1-11
Divine Service
Invocavit, Lent I
March 5th, 2006
Hope Lutheran Church, Aurora, CO
Dear Saints,
“Jesus is lead by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” [St Matthew 4:1] With this text we begin our Lenten journey, for just as our Lord Jesus was fasting for forty days in the wilderness, we will spend our forty days of Lent meditating upon the sufferings and death of our Lord, rejoicing all the while that He suffered all this for us. So we will spend the days of Lent, indeed as we spend all our days on this earth, in repentance, feeling the sorrow that our sin brings, but also rejoicing in the forgiveness of sins, and then training ourselves to resist sin and the devil.
So we meditate on the Gospel text before us, appointed, from ancient times, for this, the first Sunday in Lent. The narrative of Jesus' temptations is given to us for two reasons: for our instruction and for our comfort. First, our instruction, for the Lord Jesus is our chief example of how to resist the devil's temptations. We learn from Jesus how to rebuff the devil's attack and stop his flaming darts, for the Lord Jesus perfectly uses the shield of faith and the Sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God [Ephesians 6:16,18]. Jesus, here, is our Teacher and our prime Example.
First, notice how the temptation comes right after Jesus' baptism. The verse just before our text is Jesus coming up out of the water and the Father's voice from heaven, “This is My Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.” [St Matthew 3:17] And then, with the water, it seems, still dripping from His head, “Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted.” [4:1] In this, already, Jesus is our example, and we learn here that all who are baptized in the name of Jesus will be tempted, for wherever the Holy Gospel is, there the Holy Cross will follow. “Every Christian as soon as he's baptized, is marshaled into an army in confrontation with the devil, and from his baptism onward is saddled with the devil who harasses him as long as he lives.” [Martin Luther, Complete Sermons of Martin Luther, 5.313] Just as the world and the devil hate our Lord Jesus, so these two hate all who are called by Jesus and forgiven by Jesus, all who hear Him and follow Him. So you can be sure, dear Christians, dear baptized, that you, too, will be tempted by the devil, that He will never give up trying to tear you from Jesus and from your baptism every day of our life.
And how does the devil tempt us? We see Jesus tempted in three ways: first by hunger, persecution and hardship, second by false teaching, and third by fame and wealth, and in all of these he tempts us to doubt God's Word. Just as we heard that it was in the beginning, when the devil tempted Eve, saying, “Has God indeed said...” [Genesis 3:1]
So the devil tempts us to doubt God's goodness, saying, “If God really cared for you, surely He would give you more, more money, a nicer home, better health, longer life, less suffering, less worry, fewer tears.” Whatever it is, the devil uses our hunger and pain, our sickness and suffering, our weakness and all the difficulties in life to tempt us to doubt that God is our good and gracious heavenly Father. But we learn from Jesus how to send the attack back, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.” [4:4, Deuteronomy 8:3] The devil can give us all the trouble in the world, and take all from us (“And take they our life, Goods, fame, child, and wife, Let these all be gone, They yet have nothing won; The Kingdom ours remaineth.”), and yet we still have and hold God's Word, and in this we have life. For there is a bread that nourishes our stomach for a moment, but the Lord Jesus Christ is the Bread of Life, and His word is food which endures to everlasting life [St John 6:27], whoever comes to Him will never hunger, whoever believes in Him will never thirst. [St John 6:35]
The devil also tempts us to doubt God's word by twisting it and confusing it. So he does with Jesus, taking Him to the top of the temple and quoting the Scripture to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: 'He shall give His angels charge concerning you,' and 'In their hands they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot against a stone.'” The devil is hear quoting Psalm 91[:11-12], but he leaves out a few very important words. The Psalm actually reads: “For He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways.” The Psalm is promising God's protection and provision as we live out the vocation that the Lord has given us, as we do the things that He has set us to do. The Lord has sent Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted, He has not sent Him to the temple to jump. So the devil tempts us to expect and even demand God's blessing on the things that we want to do, that God would bless and reward our will, not His. But this is tempting God, and so Jesus teaches us how to resist this temptation, again quoting the Scriptures, “You shall not tempt the LORD your God.” [4:7, Deuteronomy 6:16]
The third temptation is of power and wealth and fame. “All the kingdoms will be Your's,” the devil tempts Jesus, “if you will worship me.” So the devil tempts us with pride and temporal gain. Just a little bending the rules here and there. “No one will ever notice,” the devil says, “and look at how much you will gain.” It all seems so innocent, but Jesus sees it as it is, and puts the devil in his place, again quoting God's word, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.'” [4:10, Deuteronomy 6:13]
We see how the Lord Jesus beats back the temptations of the devil: with God's word. “Your Word I have hidden in my heart,” prays King David, “that I might not sin against You.” [Psalm 119:11] And Luther urges us, “Therefore you must always have God's Word in your heart, upon your lips, and in your ears. But where the heart is idle, and the Word does not sound, [the devil] breaks in and has done the damage before we are even aware of it. On the other hand, such is the efficacy of the Word, whenever it is seriously contemplated, heard and used, that it is bound never to be without fruit, but always awakens new understanding, pleasure, and devoutness, and produces a pure heart and pure thoughts. For these words are not inoperative or dead, but creative, living words.” [Martin Luther, The Large Catechism (3rd Commandment)] Thus the Lord's example in the wilderness teaches us to take up the Lord's Word with all diligence, to hear it, read it, contemplate and inwardly digest it, and use it to fight off the devil's temptation.
But this is just the first part. This text, if you remember, is both for our instruction and our comfort. We have heard how it instructs us to take up God's Word and use it to fight against the devil, but you and I have been in this fight for years, and it continues to take its toll on us, it continues to weary us. For as we fight against the world and the flesh and the devil, we fail, we fall, we are overtaken by temptation, and we sin. Adam and Eve tempted in the Garden, and they fell. We all, the sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, are tempted, and we too often fall.
But not Jesus. He stands. He stands where Adam and Eve fell. He stands where you and I have fallen. He stands, and in His standing, in His victory over the devil, in His prefect resisting of temptation, we, too, stand are given victory. For St Paul says, “For as by one man's disobedience many were made sinners, so also by one Man's obedience many will be made righteous.” [Romans 5:19] Jesus is more than our Example, He is our Savior, our Lord, our Captain, the One who goes before us and makes the way. He is in the wilderness being tempted for us, in our place, and He is there doing what we could not do, resisting and destroying the devil, crushing his head. Jesus was tempted in every way, and yet without sin. [see Hebrews 4:14] “But He who knew no sin became sin for us, that we might be the righteousness of God in Him.” [2 Corinthians 5:21]
And this, dear saints, is great and wonderful comfort, that Jesus was not just showing us how to defeat the devil, but that He was doing it for us, and in Christ, by faith in Him and His promises, we have the victory that overcomes the world. [see 1 John 5:4] Jesus takes back paradise in the wilderness, for you. By His obedience you are made righteous.
May God grant us that Jesus' temptation in the wilderness would encourage us in our fight against temptation, and more, that Jesus' victory over the devil would give us comfort and peace, that we, by faith, would be sure that the Lord has overcome the devil for us. Amen.
And may the peace of God, which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
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Pastor Wolfmueller