Father, we thank you for your
word. Thank you for recording here
for us about our Lord Jesus Christ, how he would save his people
from their sins and how he actually did save his people from their
sins. We thank you, Lord, that he was
strong and he did not fail, but that he accomplished all your
will. He came to do your will. It was
in his heart. He loved you and loved his people.
And He actually saved them from their sins by His own obedience
and death, even the death, the obedience unto death, the death
of the cross. And Lord, we thank You for the
Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, our Lord, our King. Thank You
for Him as our High Priest and Mediator who speaks Your Word
as our Prophet. He's everything to us, and all
we need from God we find in Him. And all of our thanks and our
worship to God, we worship and give to Him. So Lord, we thank
You for Him. We pray that You would open Your
Word to us today. Teach us about our Savior. Teach
us about our enemy. And teach us about Your victory
and Your glory in that victory. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. It says in Matthew chapter 4,
we're going to read the first 11 verses. Matthew chapter 4,
verse 1. Then was Jesus led up of the
Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. And
when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward
and hungered. And when the tempter came to
him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these
stones be made bread. And 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 to 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 to 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 showeth him
all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them, and saith
to him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall
down and worship me. Then saith Jesus to 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 to him. The devil
leaveth him, the devil left him, and the angels came and ministered
to him. Now these temptations of the
Lord are very, very, I don't know, unexpected of us to find
that God would drive the Lord Jesus into the wilderness to
be tempted of the devil. Don't you find that unusual?
That raises the question, why did God send Jesus to the wilderness
to be tempted of the devil? And then it also seems strange
that the devil, who obviously knew that Jesus was the Son of
God, would ask him these questions. If you are the Son of God, then
do this or do that. It is even more strange to us
that the devil would take it upon himself to tempt the Son
of God. It seems strange. And then we
always ask the question, how does this relate in any way to
me? And how does God, through these
things, save us from our sins? So this temptation is, the title
of our sermon today is The Temptation of Christ, The Temptation of
Christ. And I have labored over these
passages, not just today, but in the past a lot, because I've
just, I have just found it I'm just very interested in why God
would have the Lord Jesus tempted by the devil. And really, what
was the devil's design? What is his goal? What is the
devil's goal? What is his strategy? When I
was at work, they always tried to distinguish things like goals
and strategies. We were constantly trying to set goals and strategies
and objectives and all these things. You might do that in
your own work. But we define goals to be the long-term thing
you're trying to achieve, and the strategy is how you get there.
The devil had a long-term goal in mind, and he had a strategy
for getting there. It's the same goal he has always
had in mind, and it's the same strategy he's always used to
get there. And so we're going to look at
that. But before we do, turn to Luke chapter 4. We'll read the same
verses in Luke 4. so that you can think about these
things because I think the way that the Word of God sticks with
you is by meditating on it. And if you don't have a question
as you read God's Word, then the answers won't mean much to
you. I know I read sometimes and you'll read for a while and
you think, what was I just reading? You have to go back and start
over again. Have you ever done that? That's the way my mind
works at least. And so it's often the case that, and I love the
way that God is gracious to us, and we can ask Him questions.
Lord, what does this mean? I don't know what this means.
Have you ever confessed that? I don't know what you mean by
this. Why did you send Jesus to be
tempted? What did He accomplish through this temptation? And
all these questions that come to us. So, in chapter 4, verse
1 of Luke, "...and Jesus, being full of the Holy Ghost..." Remember,
the Spirit of God came down from heaven and descended upon Him
at His baptism, and it abode upon Him. He was filled with
the Holy Spirit, and He was always filled, but it openly showed
that He was the Son of God, and He definitely was full of the
Holy Ghost. "...without measure God poured out His Spirit upon
Him." and says he was full of the Holy Ghost, so we know this
was God's will. He returned from Jordan, where
he was baptized, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did
eat nothing. Now, both Moses and Elijah didn't
eat anything for 40 days. When Moses went up to the Mount
Sinai, he was without food 40 days and 40 nights. After Elijah
defeated, he called upon God and God sent fire from heaven
and destroyed, or burnt up the sacrifice and the altar. And
then Elijah had all the prophets of Baal put to death. Then Elijah
left there, and he went out and ran away from Jezebel. And God
fed him through an angel, and he was on the road for 40 days
and 40 nights without food. But here Jesus is without food
for 40 days and 40 nights, and He's in the wilderness. There's
no one around, just Him by Himself with the wild beasts. And it
says, He was there, in those days He did eat nothing. Not
in the night time. Sometimes the Jews would fast
and they would fast in the day time and eat at night. That's
not the kind of fasting He fasted. He was without food. And it says,
And when the days were ended, He afterward hungered. And the
devil said to Him, If Thou be the Son of God, command this
stone that it be made bread. So think about that. Why did
the devil choose that as a temptation? Well, clearly he was hungry,
but why did he say, if you are the Son of God, command this
stone to be made bread? Why was that a temptation for
him, besides the fact that he was hungry? Why would he say,
if thou be the Son of God? You see, listen to Jesus' answer. His answer, remember, the devil
is a very powerful evil. It says that he deceives the
whole world. That takes a certain measure
of power, doesn't it? And it says in the Old Testament
that the angel didn't dispute with the devil, but he said,
the Lord rebuke thee. He was not an entity to be taken
lightly. He was a powerful agent of evil. He is the evil one. And so when
Jesus answers him, remember that the Lord Jesus Christ has the
Word of God in his heart. Everything God said, he understood. He understood why he gave it,
what it meant, and he understood the devil's deception. And when
he speaks to him, he sees him coming, not in just the outward
temptation of this first temptation, but he sees his end game and
he sees the goal he has in mind and the strategy. He knows what
he's out to do. And so when Jesus answers him, realize that he
could pull all of that knowledge out and have a debate with the
devil at this point in time. But he doesn't do that, does
he? He answers with the greatest wisdom. Remember, one greater
than Solomon is here. And Solomon was the wisest man
on earth. So whatever Jesus says at this point, we know it's the
wisest thing that he could have ever answered with to the devil. And Jesus answered him, saying,
It is written that man shall not live by bread alone, but
by every word of God. Now that particular text was
quoted from the Old Testament in Deuteronomy when the Israelites
were in the wilderness and they were tried of God. The Israelites
complained all the time. They complained to Moses, God
has brought us into the wilderness to kill us. He promised he was
going to do this for us, but he hasn't kept his promise. He
doesn't intend good for us. He intends evil
against us. They were constantly, constantly
in unbelief. They doubted God's goodness.
They held him suspect, and they were constantly doubting whatever
he said. And so when they ran out of food,
what did they do? They immediately accused him
of wrongdoing. We're suffering. Why are we suffering?
It's God's fault. But that's not what Jesus says
here. And it was at that time in the Old Testament that God
gave this. Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every
word of God. And so Jesus takes that. Israel
failed. Jesus did not fail. Adam failed. Jesus did not fail. And so we
see that in this text. He says, man shall not live by
bread alone. Notice, he didn't, Jesus, I mean,
the devil said, if you're the son of God. Jesus didn't say,
I am the son of God. I am the son of God. He didn't
defend that, did he? The devil knew he was the son
of God. Why would he say, if you're the son of God? Well,
look at Jesus' answer. Man shall not live by bread alone. Who is he talking about? He's
talking about himself, isn't he? Man shall not live by bread
alone. Now the answer of the Lord Jesus
Christ is just full of meaning. Every word, man shall not live
by bread alone. There was a verse, I wrote it
down here, oh here it is, in Jeremiah 15, 16, it says, Every
time you read a prophecy like that, remember, ultimately, it has to have first been spoken
by the Lord Jesus Christ. Thy words were found, and I did
eat them, and they were unto me the joy and rejoicing of my
heart. And so when God commands his
people, man shall not live by bread alone. The Lord Jesus Christ
here who is the Son of God. God spoke from heaven. This is
my beloved Son. Hear Him. I'm well pleased with
Him. But Jesus doesn't take that name
here, that title. Why doesn't Jesus say, I am the
Son of God and you get out of here because... or something
like that? He could have. He could easily.
But that was not why He was led to the wilderness. He was not
led to the wilderness to destroy the devil as God. Because how
does God destroy the devil? Couldn't God have destroyed the
devil when he first thought in his heart, I shall ascend into
the heavens, I shall set my throne above? Look at Isaiah 14, this
passage of scripture. This is what he said in his heart.
He didn't even have to say it out loud. He just thought it
in his heart. And God says this about it in Isaiah 14 verse 13.
Look at verse 12. For thou hast said in thine heart,
I will ascend into heaven. I will exalt my throne above
the stars of God. I will sit also upon the mount
of the congregation in the sides of the north. I will ascend above
the heights of the clouds. I will be like the Most High."
You see that? That is the greatest arrogance,
the greatest assault on God's throne that could ever be. That's
what he thought. He had a plan in his mind. And yet he says
in verse 15, "...yet thou shalt be brought down to hell to the
sides of the pit." You see, when Satan thought that, God immediately
pronounced judgment against him. He didn't wait. That judgment
was pronounced against Him. And yet, God didn't take Him
at that point and cast Him into hell. He prophesied what would
happen to Him, that He would eventually be consigned to hell
forever. And yet, it was God's will, it
was God's purpose, to use Him even to praise His own name,
to His own glory. And that's what He's doing here.
God is using Satan. You see, God, it says in Colossians
1 16 that everything was created by the Lord Jesus and for the
Lord Jesus. It says all things were created
by Him and for Him. That includes angels, men, animals,
the world, stars, sun, everything. Not anything was made that was
not made by Him. So the angels were all His and
when Satan fell Jesus didn't change. His authority didn't
change over Him. He still had the same power as
Creator over Him. He could have done anything He
wanted with Him. And after He fell, all the time God permitted
Him to exist and to go about His business, He was still under
the control of His Creator. For the purpose, His Creator
created Him. And that was to be a ministering
angel, to serve those who were the heirs of salvation. To serve
the Son of God and to serve His people. That was his job. But
he said, no, I want to be like the Most High. I'm going to put
my throne, I'm going to set my throne right up there in heaven.
I want to sit in the congregation and I want to be worshipped as
God. That's what he said. And so when he comes to Jesus,
realize that his goal, his goal is to be like God. His goal is to be worshipped
in the place where only God can be worshipped, on his throne.
He wants to sit on his throne. Those thoughts are just too high
for us, aren't they? We can't really understand it.
How could anyone have the stupidity and the arrogance to think they
could go sit on God's throne. Who could be higher than God?
There is none like God. And yet the devil said, I want
to be like him. I want to be like him. Sit on
his throne. Receive the worship, the honor that he receives. And so, realize that when we're
reading through this temptation of the Lord Jesus Christ, that's
his goal, to be worshiped. But what is his strategy? What
is his strategy? Well, his strategy His strategy
is very, very wicked and evil. And his strategy is the same
throughout time. Is to cause God to fail. Is to make his oath, his promise
of no effect. So that what God said he would
do, he's unable to do. And in fact, what God has to
do is to bring justice and judgment on those that he promised to
save. You see, from eternity, God promised salvation to his
people in the Lord Jesus Christ. And so, the devil's aim, his
strategy, is to defeat the one through whom salvation would
come. To defeat His purpose, to defeat the purpose and promise
of God, the provision of God, and to prevent Him from saving
His people from their sins. To prevent Him from having a
people to honor Him. And instead He wants to short-circuit
that and destroy Christ and destroy His people in the process. The name devil means accuser. The name Satan means slanderer. And he's the deceiver. He's the
tempter. He does all these things to accuse God to his people,
and then to slander God to his people, and then to accuse his
people to God. That's what the devil does. That's some of the
strategy he uses. That's his mechanisms. But in
his strategy to stop the salvation, to stop the glory of Christ,
to get in the way of God's work, and then if he could somehow
keep God from realizing His purpose, what would that do? What would
that do? If God swore by himself with
an oath that he was going to give eternal life to his people,
that he was going to give them all blessings in Christ and make
them his sons and bring them to glory. If the devil could
somehow bring that plan to an end, what would that mean? It
would mean that God himself would cease being God. That he failed
in his promise. That he failed in his oath. He
didn't have power to do his will. And so that would be a total
ruin, wouldn't it? Of the universe, of everything.
That's the devil's strategy, is to make God fail. and to make
him fail. And you see this throughout the
Old Testament. We'll refer to that in some way, but let me
keep going here. It says here, "...Jesus answered
him, saying, It is written that man shall not live by bread alone."
Man. And here we see the wonder, the
wonder of our Savior, and the wonder of the way He saves. What
does He say? He doesn't say, I am the Son
of God, now you bow down and worship me. He could have said that, but
that wouldn't have achieved God's goal, would it? Would that have
done the will of God? Why did God send him into the
world? Was it to come as the Son of God with all the power
of God and just destroy evil and by his omnipotent power bring
people to heaven who were sinners? No, not at all. He had to be
born as a man. He had to live as a man. And
this, I think, is the hardest thing for us to realize. That
when the Lord Jesus Christ came into the world, He didn't come
as God only. In fact, when He came, He was
born, He lived, and He died as a man. And He lived His life,
every moment of His life, as a man. Doing the will of God
as a man taking place with his people as a man he delighted
his delights were with the sons of men from eternity and He was
not ashamed to be called their brethren He was not if he was
not ashamed to be made lower than the angels for the suffering
of death that he might take their cause and Save them by his own
work. And how does he do that as a
man? How does he do that? Well, it's not by Raising up
himself as God and doing things in the power of God, but it's
living as a man in complete dependence on his father. Doing the will
of God as a man, obeying his word from his heart, doing his
will with everything, his soul, his body, and everything. with
no regard for himself, but only for the glory of his God and
for the salvation of his people. And he does all that as a man. And it's hard for us to accept,
to realize that Jesus lived as a man. He lived as a man. And
there's a man in glory. There's a man in glory because
that man overcame. Now, turn with me to a couple
of places here in Scripture to see this. First, go to Philippians
chapter 2. I just want you to see these
things because it's very important that we realize the eternal purpose
of God is being unfolded before our very eyes in Matthew 4 and
in Luke 4. We see the mystery of the Godliness
And it says it in 1 Timothy 3.16. It's a great mystery. God was
manifest in the flesh. The Word became flesh. He dwelt
among us. And He actually accomplished
His will. But look at this in Philippians
chapter 2. This is unfolding before us. It's phenomenal. It's
huge. He says in verse 5, Let this
mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus. What mind? This
mind. "...who being in the form of
God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God." He was God.
He was equal with God. And he didn't think that robbery
to be equal with God. "...but he made himself of no
reputation, and he took upon him the form of a servant, and
was made in the likeness of men." made in the likeness of men and
being found in fashion as a man. What did he do? Did he exert
himself as God and cast down kingdoms and come through and
just sweep people into heaven? No, he says he humbled himself
and he became obedient unto death. You see, how did he do what he
had to do? Through obedience. And that obedience
was ultimately fulfilled in His death, even the death of the
cross. Therefore, or wherefore, God
hath also highly exalted Him, and given Him a name which is
above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should
bow. And so now look at 1 Corinthians
chapter 15. I want you to see these verses
with me. So we see here that when the Lord Jesus Christ was
tempted, He was tempted as a man. And the temptation was, well
if you are the Son of God, then do what? Do something only God
can do! Come on! Turn some stones and
you know you're hungry. You need some bread. You've got
to have bread to live. If you don't have bread, you're
going to die. No, no, that's not true. He depended
upon his father all the time. Whatever God gave to him, he
received that from God. And he knew that what seemed
good to God was good. Because God only does good. God
only does good and good to his people and he knew that he would
be with him. Over and over again throughout
scripture you see this. In the trial, in the trial of
the righteous, God is good to them especially. He says the
Lord tries the righteous in Psalm chapter 11. The Lord tries the
righteous. That's what he does. We read
that in Psalm 7 earlier. But look at this in 1 Corinthians
15. He had to be a man. He had to live as a man. Suffer
as a man. Die as a man. He was born as
a man. He was raised as a man. He ascended
as a man. And he sits on the throne as
a man. Look at this, 1 Corinthians 15. Verse 20, But now is Christ
risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that
slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection
of the dead. Do you see that? Now this tells
us, this teaches us something huge that we need to know to
understand the importance of the temptation of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He was tempted as a man. Why?
Because by man came sin. And by man came righteousness. By man came obedience to God.
And by man came the obedience that led to everlasting righteousness. By man came sin, and by sin came
death. But by man came obedience, and
by his obedience came eternal life. By man In Adam, that is, when I say
by man, the first man, I'm speaking about Adam. In Adam, we all sinned,
but in Christ, God's people were obedient and fulfilled all righteousness. In Adam, we all fell, we died,
but in Christ, we obeyed God and we live and have eternal
life. By Satan, Adam fell. But by Christ,
Satan was defeated. You see this? You see the two
men side by side? It says in Romans 5.14 that Christ
was a figure of him that was to come. I mean that Adam was
a figure of Him that was to come. Adam was a figure of the Lord
Jesus Christ. Everything Adam did as our representative
head, the one who stood in our place, and everything that he
did, God charged it to us. When he fell, it was charged
to us. His sin was our guilt. His condemnation
was our condemnation. His death was our death. As in
Adam, all die. That's what we see in verse 22.
Even so, in Christ shall all be made alive. Those in Christ
are made alive. Why? Because they did something? No. Because He did something. Because the Lord Jesus Christ
obeyed. Because He overcame. He overcame. It was by His obedience that
He overcame you. So this is the fundamental thing here. We need
to understand this, that God saved us by a man, the Lord Jesus
Christ. It had to be a man. If death
came by a man, it was God's purpose that resurrection would come
by a man. And the two men are Adam and
Christ. Now you see this throughout Scripture.
You see it throughout Scripture. Think about all of the times
where there was a conflict and God sent a man. Think about Moses. Remember Moses? Pharaoh, the
evil king, holds God's people in bondage. They can't get out. He's cruel. He abuses them. He will not hear God. God says,
let my people go. He says, no, who is the Lord?
He's basically defying God. And so God sends Moses. God sends
Moses. God sends, Moses simply just
tells him what God says. This is what God said, let my
people go. If you don't let them go, then I'm going to do this,
I'm going to do that, I'm going to do the other thing. And God
brings all the plagues through Moses. Finally God sends, He
tells Moses to offer up the lamb. Through the Lamb, Israel is delivered.
They're led out of Egypt. Pharaoh finally relents. He lets
them go, but he changes his mind. God hardens his heart. He pursues
after them. He chases them to the Red Sea.
There they are at the Red Sea, and Pharaoh says, Aha! Now I've
got them. My lust shall be satisfied. And
he comes upon them from the rear. And the children of Israel are
completely terrified. They know they're going to be
destroyed because the sea is before them. They can't go forward.
They can't go back. Pharaoh's coming. And Moses,
the man, Moses the man, he mediates between them and God. And the
Lord says, Go forward. Lift up your rod. And God divides
the sea. They go forward. And the people
are saved through the sea. And God destroys their enemies
in the sea. By a man. By a man. He destroyed the king,
the evil king. Delivered them from Egypt. Just
like Christ, like Moses, delivered his people from sin out of the
bondage of Satan. And you see it again in David.
Remember, David, here he is a shepherd. He's feeding his father's flock.
And he sees a bear and a lion come and take a lamb from the
flock. What does he do? The bear and the lion have the
lamb in his mouth and David goes to the bear and the lion and
he smites him. He kills the bear and he kills
the lion and he takes the lamb back out of his mouth. What is
he doing? He's serving his father. He saved
the lamb, the helpless sheep from the lion and the bear, the
mouth of the lion and the bear. And that's exactly teaching us
that the Lord Jesus Christ saved his people out of the mouth,
the deceiving, accusing, slandering, lying, murderous mouth of Satan. and smote him and slew him. And
then later, the giant. First a bear, then a lion, then
a giant. And our Lord Jesus Christ, as
David, He comes and He hears. What is this giant doing? I defy
the armies of Israel. He's reproaching the armies of
Israel. He's saying, come on, send a
man out to me and we'll fight. If I destroy him, then you're
all mine. You'll all serve me. That's exactly
what Satan tried to do. If I destroy the man, then you
all have to serve me. And so he defies the armies of
Israel. And in defying the armies of
Israel, he's saying, your army is wimpy because your God is
a wimp. And so David comes and he hears
these words. He says, who is this uncircumcised Philistine
that he should defy the armies of the living God? And he takes
his, and he goes out before him. And the Philistine, Goliath says,
Who are you, you puny little wimp? Come to me. I'm going to
give your flesh to the fowls of the air." And David says,
no. You have come to me with a sword and a spear, but I come
to you in the name of the Lord of hosts. David was just a boy. He's just a young man. He had
no strength to defeat this giant. But he says, I'm coming to you
in the name of the Lord of hosts. And he takes his sling. He had
the stone where he had selected it, and he slings it. And he
tells Goliath, by the way, I'm not going to just give you, I'm
going to give the armies of the Philistines to the fowls of heaven
and we're going to destroy you. And I'm going to take your head
from you today. And so he does that. He throws
the sling, the stone goes into his head, drops him, kills him,
and then he comes up to him and he takes Goliath's own sword
out of his sheath and chops off his head, holds his head up.
And all the Philistines look in terror and fear and they flee
away. And Israel, the armies come and they spoil the Philistines. God destroyed Goliath through
David. One stone. One stone. The stone of stumbling. The stone
taken out of the mountain. Cut without hands. Destroying
the kingdom of Satan. By one man and his stone. And
then he took the sword that Goliath meant to destroy David. And he
destroyed that giant, that evil man. And you see the same thing
happening here. The man Christ Jesus. He comes
depending on his father. He himself is poor. He himself
is just a man. In himself, he's no stronger
than any man. He has no power against Satan
as a man. But he does have this. He has
the Word of God and he comes to him and he says, in so many
words, you come to me with the sword to destroy me and all my
people with me, but I come to you with the Word of God. It
is written. It is written. And the sword
of the Word of God stopped the devil. and stopped him so that
he couldn't prevent Christ as a man from fulfilling the will
of God and saving his people from their sins. He obeyed God
from his heart. He trusted his father that he
would save him. And he did. And he prayed to
his God. He never stopped. And so you
see this further on. Remember in the book of Esther.
King Ahasuerus, he's the king over all things. And he has a
servant named Haman. The devil is God's servant. Haman
is a wicked servant. He sees Mordecai in the gate.
And Mordecai won't bow to him. And so Haman is indignant. He's angry. Why won't he bow?
He's so mad. So he devises a scheme. I know
what I'm going to do. I'm going to... Here's what I'm
going to do. Go build me a gallows 50 cubits
high. About 75 feet in the air. And
set it up there because I'm going to kill this Mordecai. And then he goes out and he devises
his master scheme, Haman. He goes into the king and he
says, you know king, there's these people in your kingdom.
And they're not like most people, obedient and stuff. They need
to be eradicated. They need to be destroyed. And
the king agrees to it, signs a decree. And so now the Jews,
all the Jews throughout the whole kingdom are consigned to death
or under the sentence of death. But then the king remembers. He calls for the books to be
read. And he remembers, listen, the works of Mordecai. He hears what Mordecai had done.
He hears his faithfulness. How he, by himself, preserved
the king's honor and saved the king's life. Now think about
this. The Lord Jesus Christ here in
these verses, He's carrying the weight of God's glory, the fulfillment
of His eternal oath on His shoulders. All of God's people, their eternal
destiny, hang in the balance. And he goes forward. And he engages
the enemy. And there Mordecai was. He's
back there. The king remembers him. He says, what happened to
this guy? He did these good things. He
saved the king's life. And so Haman happens to come
in about that time. And he asks Haman, he says, Haman. Yes? What should be done to the
man to whom the king delights to honor? And Haman thought,
well who else would the king want to honor but me? So he says,
this is what should be done. Take the king's own apparel and
put it on him. And put him on the king's horse
and put the king's crown on him. And then take the king's most
noble princes and lead him through the city and cry out before him,
this is what shall be done to the man whom the king delights
to honor. And the king said, excellent
idea. Take Mordecai, who's in the gate,
and do that immediately to him. Put the king's apparel on him,
put the crown on him, put him on the horse, and you take him
and lead him through the streets and say, this is what shall be
done to the man whom the king delights to honor. And so Haman
was terrified. He's like, oh my, my greatest
enemy. And I've got to honor him before
all the king's people. The king's own throne is given
to him. This is exactly what Jesus did.
You see this? Jesus is the one who preserved
God's honor in doing the will of God from his heart. He preserved
God's people. He did this without fanfare to
himself. He didn't do it for himself.
He did it for his God and for his glory and for his people.
And the Lord honored him, exalted him. We just read it in Philippians
2. Because he was obedient unto death, God exalted him highly,
highly. And the king's glory was preserved.
And the Lord's people were saved. And so you see through all these
things, and there's more. Think of Daniel in the lion's
den. The presidents and the princes, they determined to kill Daniel.
The only way they can kill him is to find some occasion. of
Daniel before his God. They had to find some sin, not
a sin, it couldn't be sin because he didn't do anything wrong,
but they had to find something that they could accuse him with
that he was doing for his God. That's what they thought. So
they said, aha, this is what we'll do. We'll get the king
to sign a decree that no one can pray to anyone except to
the king for 30 days. And they knew as soon as they
did that, that Daniel would be found guilty, because he went
to his window and he prayed like he normally did, three times
a day. And the princess said, Ah! See? See? It's occasion according
to something against his God. And so Daniel's praying, and
they accuse him before the king Darius, and king Darius is very
sorry. He says, what shall I do? Well,
I can't change it. It's a decree, and according
to the Medes and Persians, I can't change it. You've got to send
him to the lion's den. So they send Daniel to the lion's den,
and Darius, all night, the king is He can't sleep. He won't listen to any music.
No, he won't take any rest. And he's laboring all night.
And then in the morning he leaves to go to the lion's den. Early in the morning. Daniel!
Are you there? Is your God able to deliver you
from the lion's den? He says, Oh King, yes I'm here. Because innocence he was found
in me. And God stopped the mouths of the lions. And so all these
things teach us that our Lord Jesus Christ, as a man, obeyed
His God, and God saved Him. And in saving Him, He magnified
the honor of the King. And He destroyed the enemy. Goliath
was destroyed. Pharaoh was destroyed. Haman was destroyed. And all
of His family was destroyed. The Jews were preserved. And
peace reigned throughout the whole land of King Ahasuerus. And we could go on, there's other
examples, but suffice it to say, the Lord Jesus Christ had to
serve as the second Adam, the last Adam, in order to save his
people from their sins. To save them from their sins.
And this he did as a man. So when Satan comes to him and
he says, if you are the son of God, command these stones to
be bred, realize his goal is to sit on Christ's throne. To
have Christ's people honoring him and to destroy the kingdom. To destroy God. To prevent His
salvation from coming. To prevent God's Word from happening.
And He seeks to do this. How? By attacking the person
and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. By attacking His person
and His work. If you're the Son of God, of
course He's the Son of God. You know He's the Son of God.
The devil said, Are you here to torment us before the day?
Send us into the swine. They didn't even have permission
to go into the pigs. And Jesus said, Go. And they
went. They couldn't move without his word. And so the devil also,
he was subject to him. And here he is, impudently, arrogantly,
horribly, raising himself up against the Son of God. And Jesus
says, man shall not live by bread alone. No, I'm not going to step
forward as God, because I came as a man. to defeat to destroy
the works of the devil as a man because God had determined that
man would sit on his throne it says in Hebrews chapter 2 look
at this with me Hebrews chapter 2 the wonder the wonder of God's
eternal plan and that is fulfilled in our Lord Jesus Christ and
all throughout history this battle has been raging in in prophecy
events in time and is fulfilled when our Lord Jesus Christ goes
to the cross. He says in Hebrews 2, speaking about man in verse 7,
verse 6 he says, one in a certain place testified saying, what
is man that thou art mindful of him? Or the son of man that
thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower
than the angels, and crowned him with glory and honor, and
did set him over the works of thy hands, speaking about man.
And then he says, Thou hast put all things in subjection under
his feet. That's what he said in the garden, everything, everything.
For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that
is not put under him. This is the eternal will of God,
that he would put man, that he created on earth, over all things. But he says, but now we see not
yet all things put under him. Ah, but we see Jesus, who was
made a little lower than the angels as man, for the suffering
of death. Do you see that? crowned with
glory and honor, and why did he suffer? Why did he die? That
he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. For
it became him, God the Father, for whom are all things, and
by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the
captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings. You see,
the Lord Jesus Christ is the captain of our salvation, because
as a man, he obeyed God. And he did not fail. Every one
of these temptations that the devil brought against Christ,
we have failed at. We get into trouble, we immediately
accept the accusation, God is obviously not being kind to you.
How many times do you hear people say, if God is good, why did
he do that? Isn't that just exactly what
the devil would say? If God is good, if he's God and
he's good, if he's true to his word, how could he do that? God
is good, and He is all-powerful. And what He does is good, and
His people understand that. The Lord Jesus Christ knew that.
Though He slay me, He says through Job, yet will I trust Him. He
trusted in the Lord that He would deliver him, yet He didn't. And He did deliver him. He did
deliver him. And so you see all these things in the Lord Jesus
Christ. So the first temptation by Satan was to stop the Lord
Jesus Christ as man from fulfilling the will of God, and by fulfilling
it as man, saving his people, restoring honor to God, and defeating
the works of the devil. That was his purpose. If I can
just get him to step outside of his assigned role as man,
and exercise his power as the Son of God. If I can create between
the Son of God and the Father, you know, like Jesus said, if
a house divided against itself cannot stand, if I can create
that, then his house can't stand, and Satan knows he's got the
day. He's going to destroy everything God purposed. He's going to destroy
God. He's going to destroy God's people. It all hung on Jesus. It all laid on him. And what did he do? He went to
his father and he obeyed God from his heart. He stood on the
word of God. He says, though all in my current
experience looks like God, from the outside, looks like God has
abandoned me. Here I am in the wilderness.
I've gone hungry. I'm very hungry. My body needs food. And yet he
says, But I'm going to live on God's word, and I'm going to
wait on the Lord. You see, waiting on the Lord
is what glorifies God. Waiting on Him. Moses had to
wait. Elijah had to wait. Everyone
had to wait on the Lord. Because God's the only one who
can save. And He saves by His Son. And
so Jesus here is waiting on the Lord. He's just waiting. Whatever
God wants. He's going to take care of it.
He's going to fulfill His will. He sent me into this world. I'm
going to obey Him, and the Lord is going to defeat my enemies.
He's going to put all things in subjection under Him. That's
what God's going to do, because the Lord Jesus Christ obeyed
in everything. So you see that here. And He's
tempted. He's tempted to provide for himself,
to think of himself, to do something for himself. Look at Matthew
chapter 16, going a little further in Matthew. This is exactly what
Peter had trouble with. Peter couldn't handle this. You
need to think about yourself, Peter thought. Verse 21, Matthew
16. From that time forth began Jesus
to show to his disciples how that he must go to Jerusalem,
suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes,
and be killed and be raised again the third day. You see that? That doesn't sound good. So Peter
took him and he began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee,
Lord, this shall not be unto thee. But he turned and he said
to Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan. Thou art an offense to
me, for Thou savorest not the things that be of God, but those
that be of men." And then Jesus builds on it. He says, if any
man will come after me, let him deny himself and take up his
cross and follow me. Whosoever will save his life
shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life for my sake
shall find it. What is it profited if a man
gained the whole world and lose his own soul? Or what shall a
man give in exchange for his soul? And yet Jesus When tempted
to meet the needs of his body, what does he do? He yields himself
to God in obedience. to do the will of God, and he
commits the keeping of his soul unto him that judges righteously."
He denies himself in order that he might not just save his soul,
but the soul of those for whom he died. Look at Matthew chapter
27, verse 40. The people were accusing him
and mocking him. He says, "...thou," they said
against Jesus when he's there as a captive. He says, "...thou
that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, Save
yourself, if thou be the Son of God." You see it? If you be
the Son of God, then save yourself. Come down from the cross. Isn't
that what Peter was just saying? No! You don't need to go suffer
and die and be killed. No! Jesus said, get behind me,
Satan. And here, the people are mocking
Him. If you're the Son of God, come down from the cross. And
then it says in the next verse, verse 42, He saved others. Himself,
he cannot save. You see that? That's exactly
true. He could not save himself because
he came to save others. Look at John 18, verse 3. Judas, then, having received
a band of men and officers from the chief priests and Pharisees,
cometh thither with lanterns and torches and weapons. And
Jesus, therefore, knowing all things that should come upon
him, went forth and said to them, Whom seek you? And they answered
him, Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus said to them, I am. And
Judas also, which betrayed him, stood with them. As soon then
as he had said to them, I am, they went backward and fell to
the ground. And then asked..." He could have
done that, couldn't he? Destroyed them with his word. "...but then
he asked them again, Whom seek ye? And they said..." You can
almost hear them in a mouth like, Jesus of Nazareth. "...and Jesus
told them, He said, I told you that I am. If therefore you seek
me, let these go their way." He had to save, he had to save
others. He could not save himself. Let
these go their way. That's what he's doing in his
temptations. He's standing as a man, looking with his eyes
locked on the face of his father, looking at his word, and depending
on his God as a man in everything to do the will of God. And guess
what? In so doing, He knew that God
would defeat his enemies. Philistine said, the Lord, no,
no, the Pharaoh said, and his army said, the Lord fights for
Israel. And right here, the Lord fights
for the Lord Jesus Christ as a man. God himself is going to
defeat Satan. How does he do this? Well, remember, every time an issue comes up,
an issue on earth. Who's going to? What's the judgment
in this matter? What do you do? You take it to
the court, don't you? You take it to the court. And
so every matter in our salvation is taken to the court of heaven.
How did Jesus save his people? He went to court. He went to
court for them. Just like the woman taking an
adultery. Here the woman is. showing us a picture of everyone
saved by the Lord Jesus Christ, the church. Here she is accused
of her enemies. She was caught in adultery in
the very act. Jesus stoops down. He writes
on the ground. He writes on the ground. He stands
up. Whoever's without sin among you,
let him cast the first stone. They all start leaving. He steps
down, stoops down again. He writes on the ground again.
And he stands up and he says, Woman, where are your accusers? She said, no man, Lord. And he
says, neither do I condemn thee. You see, he went to the ground
stooping down twice in order to satisfy God's justice, fulfill
the law that he himself gave. They couldn't keep it. Their
conscience was guilty, but he stooped down to fulfill it. taking
the burden of their sins, doing the will of God himself, and
stood up and pronounces, the battle in heaven, the courtroom
scene has taken place. God has issued the sentence.
The decision of the court has been handed down. And everyone
for whom he died, he pronounces, no condemnation. No condemnation. The accuser of the brethren is
cast down. He's cast down. And so that's
Satan's ploy. He comes to prevent the salvation
of God's people through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And
he tries to get at it by getting Christ to step out of his role
as man and to act as God and provide for himself, to save
himself. But he won't do it. He came to
serve His Father, and His Father He would serve. He loved His
people, and He would not go out free for anything. And so you
see that in the first temptation. And there's many other things
we could say about this, but let's just go quickly through
the next two. He says in Matthew chapter 4, then the devil took
Him up into the holy city. and set him on the pinnacle of
the temple, and said to him, If thou be the Son of God, cast
thyself down, for it is written, He shall give his angels charts
concerning thee, and in their hands shall he bear thee up,
lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. The promise
is in Psalm 91. The promise is much bigger than
this. In all your ways God is going
to keep you, lest you dash your foot against a stone. The devil
twists it. The if in the devil's statement
is always a question of God's Word. If you're the Son of God.
If you're this. Since God has said this, then
you do this. Prove His Word. Go ahead, prove
it. He said He would do it. Make Him do it. See what you
can get Him to do. You see, that's what the devil
does. He tries to get people to presume
on the promises of God. If God has said it, then why
doesn't he do it? It's like man's salvation. Well, all I've got to do is my
part, and then God's got to do his part. That's not the way
it works. Salvation is a sovereign act of God's free grace. In which
He bestows favor on sinners for Christ's sake. Giving them repentance
and faith and everything. We don't arm wrestle God to do
anything. We don't command Him. We don't
manipulate deity. We do. We work out the salvation
He's given to us. It's God who's at work in us,
so whatever we have, it's been given to us. We don't take the
promises of God and presume on God, and we don't try to manipulate
Him in trying to get Him to do things at our behest, and certainly
not at Satan's suggestions. So the Lord Jesus Christ knew
this. He knew that if Satan's thinking or his line of reasoning
is something like this, well, if you cast yourself down from
the pinnacle of the temple, everyone's gonna see. They're gonna know
you're the Son of God then. Then you don't have to worry
about it. Everyone's gonna believe you. In other words, you can
accomplish the will of God By doing this great thing, and God's
going to deliver you up, and then they're going to see how
great, how wonderful you are, and then that'll accomplish it.
That's not the way He's going to accomplish the will of God.
He's going to accomplish, people are going to believe Him first,
by Him going to the cross. By putting away sin and then
having satisfied God's justice and receiving from God the Father,
the Holy Spirit, He sends Him into the world to bring the gospel
to His people and give them life and faith in Him. It's got to
happen according to God. It's not something where I'm
going to go up on a mountain or a temple and cast myself down
and people are going to believe me because I'm distorting God's
Word. No, that's not going to happen.
So it's a temptation here, again, to step out and to do something
to prove to the people that He's God and to presume upon God's
promises. It's a horrid wickedness, again.
Verse 7, Jesus said to him, it is written, thou shalt not tempt
the Lord thy God. Hebrews chapter 3 as the Holy
Ghost says today if you will hear his voice harden not your
hearts as in the provocation in the day of temptation in the
wilderness when your fathers tempted me proved me and saw
my works 40 years what was the result of that did they believe
God God for 40 years took care of them no every turn they were
accusing God of wrongdoing, accusing Him of unfaithfulness, of not
being good, and not fulfilling His Word. And God spared them. He took care of them. It wasn't
because of them. And so you can see this, that
they tempted Christ. But the Lord Jesus Christ says,
no, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. Do not put Him to the
test. God tries the righteous, and
the righteous depend on Him to bring them through. That's what
the Lord Jesus Christ did here. And He doesn't say, you've got
to get me out of this now because you promised this or that. That's
not the way God works. And so in verse 8, the devil
again takes him to an exceeding high mountain and shows him all
the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them and said, all
these things will I give you if you will fall down and worship
me. Ah, now he reveals what's in his heart. He just wants to
be worshipped. That's his whole goal. Just worship
me. I'll give everything to you.
It's all been given to me. No, it hasn't. It's been given
to the Lord Jesus Christ. So he lies. He just flat out
lies. He's a deceiver and he lies.
And this is the way he does. Notice, everything Jesus said
to defeat Satan here, he said it from the Word of God. What's
the sword of the Spirit? It's the Word of God. And I think
we need to just look at a couple of verses here and I'll let you
go. One place here. Look at 2 Corinthians chapter
10. And it says here, we walk not,
in verse 3 of 2 Corinthians 10, For though we walk in the flesh,
we do not war after the flesh. For the weapons of our warfare
are not carnal." They're not things you can touch and feel.
Swords and spears and guns and atomic bombs. They're not pieces
of paper. Things like that. Not philosophies
of men. But they're mighty. The weapons
of our warfare are mighty, through God, to the pulling down of strongholds. Notice, He gives all the credit.
The power goes to God. God gave us these weapons, and
He's the one who puts them to use. And what do they do? Casting down imaginations. And every high thing that exalts
itself against the knowledge of God, bringing into captivity
every thought to the obedience of Christ. You see that? Every
thought to the... The things He's given us, the
weapons of our warfare, are the truth of the gospel. The truth
of the gospel. It's the Word of God. And it
casts down imaginations. The gospel does that. Because
it tells of Christ, the truth. And it says in verse 6, "...and
having in a readiness to revenge all disobedience when your obedience
is fulfilled." And that's what happened in the Old Testament.
When God gave the victory in Christ, the spoils were taken
from the enemies. And when God gives us the victory
through the Gospel, then we have all that Christ obtained for
us through that. Look at 2 Corinthians 11, just
across the page. Verse 2, Paul says to the church,
he says, I'm jealous over you. With godly jealousy, I have espoused
you to one husband that I may present you as a chaste virgin
to Christ. But I fear, lest by any means,
as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtlety, your mind should
be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. You see that?
What he's saying here, there's only one thing. It's Christ and
Him crucified. And if you depart from Him, then
you have succumbed to the temptation that there's something other
than Him that you need. But the fullness of the Godhead
is in Christ. Everything is in Him. To depart
from Christ is to transgress the doctrines. It's to go apart
from Him. It's to leave God. is to leave
him. It's to be outside of the will
of God. And that's what Satan wants. He uses the attacks on
the gospel. Galatians chapter 1 says the
same thing. And listen to these words in Galatians 1. I just
want you to hear them from the pronouncement. This is God's
word. He says, Paul says, I marvel in verse 6 that you're so soon
removed from Him that called you into the grace of Christ
to another gospel, which is not another. But there be some that
trouble you and would pervert the gospel of Christ. What's
the strategy? To pervert the gospel of Christ. What did Satan try to do? To
stop the person and work of the Lord Jesus Christ. And so to
pervert the gospel is to stop, put your barrier up in front
of that which is the power of God unto salvation. The gospel
is the power of God to salvation. And so these men were coming
and perverting the gospel of Christ. He said, but though we,
we apostles, or an angel from heaven, Satan himself, any angel,
I don't care who he is, preach any other gospel unto you than
that which we have preached to you, let him be accursed. And then he says it again, as
we said before, so say I now again, if any preach any other
gospel to you than that you have heard received from us, let him
be accursed. That's what Satan's strategy
is. To distort, to twist the gospel. To make the gospel man-centered. To get man's will in there instead
of God's will. But salvation is not by the will
of man. It's not of him that runneth.
It's not of the will of the flesh. It's not of anything from man.
It's of God. That's what the gospel says.
The gospel says Christ has done everything. And Him having done
everything has saved His people. And there's nothing else you
can do. If God doesn't save you by Jesus Christ, you're lost.
You'll still be in the hands of the enemy. You'll still be
in the mouth of the lion and the bear. But the lion and the
bear comes with his deceitful mouth to devour the lamb, to
devour God's people, to devour Christ by the deception, by the
twisting of the gospel, twisting of God's words, by preventing
Christ from doing what he was sent to do. That's his goal.
Jesus says, no, I've set my face like a flint. I will not be turned.
I'm going to do God's will. I'm going to save us. And God's
glory and all of God's person and authority rests on the shoulders
of his son. And he holds him up. He's so confident that he says,
no, he's going to bruise the head of the serpent. And the
serpent does everything he can, wiggling around, trying to get
out from that. And he just crushes his head. No problems here. The king has no problems dealing
with the enemy here. And so Jesus looks to him and
he does it. Let's pray.