Click ⟳    |    Please refresh this document to insure the latest copy. Note, the Firefox browser does not reliably give an updated copy. One may try the “F5” key as well to request a fresh copy from the web-server.

May 14, 2023
Matthew 4:1-11

READ

The Title of the Sermon is “Jesus’ Victory Over the Enemy’s Tactics.”

OUTLINE
In temptation Satan appeals to …
1 … the lust of the flesh, the desire to do something apart from God’s will.
2 … the lust of the eyes, the desire to have something apart from God’s will.
3 … pride of life, the desire to be something apart from God’s will (Constable)

Our response is with the Word of God …
1 We rely on God to take care of us.
2 We walk by faith and don’t test God.
3 We worship and serve God only.
4 We respond with the Word of God.

Jesus must have told the disciples what He went through for us to have these temptation accounts; for other humans were not with Him. The temptation of Jesus is in all the synoptic accounts, that is, the account is in Matthew, Mark and Luke. I am so glad we have these passage in our Bible this morning. The temptation accounts confirm Jesus’ humanness and victory and I am grateful for that, but I am also grateful, because in the temptation accounts we have some of the general tactics and patterns of all of our temptations. These temptations are common to all --including Jesus. (Barclay). ¶ Of course Jesus’ temptation was on the heals of the heavens opening up, the Holy Spirit descending upon Jesus and God speaking Jesus’ praises from heaven. What a sight! From that “high and holy” experience of Jesus’ baptism at the Jordan, Jesus was led into the wilderness for what apparently was His necessary testing as the Last Adam. The Father knew His Son would pass the tests but, the testing had to come and be passed so that, as Wiersbe put it, “every creature in heaven, on earth, and under the earth might know that Jesus Christ is the Conqueror.” But I also see a spiritually legal reason as well: God’s plan included His Son’s punishment for mankind’s sin, and it seems that Jesus had to pass the tests that the first Adam failed to be an acceptable sacrifice —God’s propitiation— for our sins. ¶ While we surely can compare Adam and Eve’s temptation to Jesus’, there are some contrasts as well. Adam and Eve was tempted by Satan in a garden of paradise, but Jesus met him in a desert wilderness. Adam and Eve had everything they physically needed, but Jesus was hungry after forty days of fasting. “Adam lost the battle and plunged humanity into sin and death. But Jesus won the battle and went on to defeat Satan … in His final victory on the cross” (Wiersbe, p 2:16). Thank you Jesus for your victory! ¶ As we compare Jesus’ temptations to Adam and Eve’s many “have observed that Satan followed the same pattern of temptation with Jesus that he had used with Eve (Gen. 3). First, he appealed to the lust of the flesh, the desire to do something apart from God’s will. Second, he appealed to the lust of the eyes, the desire to have something apart from God’s will. Third, he appealed to the pride of life, the desire to be something apart from God’s will (cf. 1 John 2:16)” (Constable). I like the way Keyser described Satan’s three-fold tactics too: 1) the desire to enjoy things, 2) the desire to achieve things, and 3) the desire to obtain things.[356] So we would do well to keep these ideas in mind as we work through this passage.

4:1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.”

• “The same Spirit who brought Jesus into the world (1:20), and demonstrated God’s approval of Him (3:16), now led Him into the wilderness for tempting by Satan.” (Constable)
• We see other types – other parallels here also: just as God led Israel out of Egypt, through the waters and into the desert, so the Spirit of God led Jesus through the water and into the desert after he is baptized.¹
• “God had intended Israel’s hunger in the wilderness to teach her that hearing and obeying God’s Word is the most important thing in life (Deut. 8:2-3).” Israel grumbled and demanded food when they went without in the wilderness. Jesus when without food and thereby submitted to the Father’s will. Israel failed to trust God in hunger, Jesus proved He trusted the Father in hunger. (Constable)
• George Smith traveled over the wilderness Jesus was in and described it as “an area of yellow sand, of crumbling limestone, and of scattered shingle. It is an area of contorted strata, where the ridges run in all directions as if they were warped and twisted. The hills are like dust heaps; the limestone is blistered and peeling; rocks are bare and jagged; often the very ground sounds hollow when a foot … falls upon it. It glows and shimmers with heat like some vast furnace [, …] and then there comes a drop of twelve hundred feet, a drop of limestone, flint, … down to the Dead Sea.” (Barclay)
• It was in that environment that Jesus was alone to face His the strongest enemy as a human.
• One of Satan’s names is the devil = diabolos = prone to slander, slanderous, accusing falsely.
• Jesus was placed into Satan’s influence so that Satan might tempt Jesus to the “uttermost.” [329, Lenski, p. 148.]
• Again, verse 2 And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.”
• It seems to be a pattern used of God here that, often, after a spiritual victory, comes the testing. The tempter often comes “carefully, subtly, and skillfully” choosing his time carefully to conquer in life’s victories. “We will do well” then to be on guard for our enemy after every height in ministry, for it is then that we are at the greatest danger. (Barclay)
• The tempter “tempted.” Two terms in the Greek describe a temptation or test. One has the idea of “to test with a view toward strengthening” [dokimazo] and the other “to test with a view toward destruction” [peirasmo]. “The term used here is the one for destruction … God will never tempt us to destruction, but He often tests us, with a view toward strengthening us …” “Satan tempts to destroy!”(Utley)
• These temptations were not for Jesus to prove He was God’s Son. That was a given. This first temptation was for Jesus to exercise His power and rights to satisfy His physical needs "independent of His Father. … Satan urged Jesus to use His Sonship in a way that was inconsistent with His mission … (Constable)
• In this case, to feed himself and satisfy Himself preemptively: God wanted Him to be hungry during this time of His life. Satan countered with --if I could paraphrase, “Jesus, prove that you are able to fix your own problem: make bread.”
• Jesus was hungry as He was fully man.
• How is a man creating food for himself a temptation? How would this have been a failure?
  • God wanted Jesus to be hungry. Satan wanted Jesus to meet His physical needs without God.
  • Jesus’ temptation in part was Satan suggesting that God was withholding good from Jesus. The devil wanted Jesus to doubt God’s love. This is the same tactic the devil used for Eve. Satan suggested to Jesus, “Since You are God’s beloved Son, why doesn’t Your Father feed You? Why does He put You into this terrible wilderness?” (Wiersbe, p 2:16)
  • Satan wanted Jesus to doubt the Father’s care and goodness.

ILLUSTRATIONS

• Men’s Ministry plan disregarded because of a quarter of a million dollar budget.

JESUS’ APPLICATION

• 4 But he answered, "It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”
• Wiersbe said it best, We must not think that Jesus used His divine powers to overcome the enemy, because that is just what the enemy wanted Him to do! (p 2:16, emphasis added) >>
• In other words Satan wanted Jesus to use His divine powers to meet His own needs. “Do this without thing apart from the Father Jesus.” was Satan suggestion (Wiersbe, p 2:16)
• Jesus faced Satan as a man. He did not use His own divine power to overcome His enemy, which is what Satan tempted Him to do. Rather, He used the spiritual resources that are available to all of God’s people, namely, the Scriptures, and the power of the Holy Spirit (v. 1).[340]³
• Jesus faced the enemy as a man equipped by the Father’s will and the Holy Spirit.
• We have the same equipping today as Christians.
• Satan suggested that Jesus should prove Himself the Son of God by shortening the Father’s will. To satisfy a need before the Father desired for that need to be fulfilled.
• Jesus refused.
• The Lord quoted Scripture Deuteronomy 8:3 to defeat Satan. Feeding on (a metaphor for obeying the word of God is more important than even consuming physical food. (Wiersbe, p 2:16)
• Jesus is our Savior but He also taught us the way to victory in our own lives. His personal victories over our common enemy the devil qualifies Him to become our great high priest as explained in Hebrews (2:10; 3:1-2).

OUR APPLICATION

1. To be clear, Scripture absolutely teaches that God does not “tempt” us to sin (James 1:13). Nevertheless He does test us through several avenues: we are tested through our relationships with others, through the world ways, the flesh, and through spiritual forces that align with the devil. [333]²
2. When we are lead by our circumstances in our own actions instead of following God’s instructions in His Word, we sin.
   – Jesus obviously could have turned stones into bread, but in doing so, He would have been exercising His powers independently of the Father. Jesus came to obey they Father. (Wiersbe, p 2:16)
3. We fall into Satan’s trap when we compromise God’s ways when we compromise the Word of God to get out of any hardship --even the smallest of hardships.
   – A common ministry prayer: “God, help me not get ahead of you.”
4. It is imperative that we understand that Jesus used the spiritual resources that are available to us today: the power of the Holy Spirit and the power in the Word of God. Jesus experienced the same temptations we do. At the core of our temptations is the desire to do our will instead of God’s. (cf. Wiersbe, p 2:16)
5. Our highest priority is to obey the Father.
6. The Lord quoted Scripture … that is exactly how we remain spiritually strong in trial.
7. We need to understand that God will take care of us. Sometimes His great care may involve great hunger. Let us place our lives in the hands of God.

TRANSITION

Now that we see that Jesus was tempted by Satan by appealing to the appetite of the flesh and appealing to the flesh’s desire to do something apart from God’s will. Let’s turn our attention to Satan’s second tactic. He appealed to Jesus to have something apart from God’s will.

5 Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him on the pinnacle of the temple 6 and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, “‘He will command his angels concerning you,’ and “‘On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”

• “Devil took Jesus.” This phrase adds weight that these tests were necessary. God will was that His Son be tested.
• The temple complex was on the east side of Jerusalem. The “pinnacle of the temple” was most likely above the front entrance that faced east and was about as high as a 15 story building.⁵
• Garlington rightly observed that the God’s Word places Jerusalem at the center of the world, so thus the Jews did as well. So Jesus being on top of the temple put Him at the center of the nations, in the central city, in the central religious area, and the absolute central point of the entire earth. [346] ⁴
• We see here that Satan changed his tactics: Satan used the Word of God for his second temptation of Jesus. He quoted in part from Psalm 91:11–12.
• The devil in essence said, “Jesus, prove who you are and prove what God said about you by doing something reckless.” OR “If You really believe the Scriptures, then jump!” [344]
• The devil left out the phrase in the middle of the passage:
• It reads in full: “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways. On their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.”
• Satan left out an important context: “to guard you in all your ways.”
• Satan used Scripture improperly --imagine that.
• Note our Lord’s reply in verse seven, we see the similar phrase as before, “It is written again…” We must never separate one part of Scripture from another, but we must always “compare verses --what we call correlate verses-- to get to truth. The Bible interprets the Bible. >>
• We can prove almost any theology via the Bible if we isolate verses from their contexts “and turn them into pretexts.” (Wiersbe, p 2:17)
• Jesus replied with Deuteronomy 6:16, verse 7 Jesus said to him, “Again it is written, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
• We put God to the test (Wiersbe wrote) “when we put ourselves into circumstances that force Him to work miracles on our behalf.” (p 2:17)

APPLICATION

• The Father did protect His Son Jesus until the proper time of the Father’s choosing. Romans 5:6 reads, “For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.”
• Psalm 91:11–12 was of course was proved right.
• God expects His people to take risks in order to be true to him, but he does not expect them to take risks to enhance their “own prestige.” Barclay commented, Faith which depends “on signs and wonder(s) is not faith. If faith cannot believe without sensations it is not really faith, it is doubt looking for proof and looking in the wrong place.” (Barclay)
• Testing God is doing what Satan did when He fell. >>
• We are to have faith in God and His Word. We realize everything God has said is true as we walk by faith in this life.

TRANSITION

Now that we have seen Satan’s second tactic were he appealed for Jesus to have something apart from God’s will. Let’s look at Satan’s third tactic, he appealed to Jesus to be something apart from God’s will.

Verse 8 Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9 And he said to him, “All these I will give you, if you will fall down and worship me.”

• This could have been a vision as many suggest (Utley, Barclay, et al.), or perhaps Jesus and Satan were physically on one of the tallest mountains in Israel or perhaps they were on Mount Everest; we don’t know.
• But it was on that very high mountain that the tempter offered his third tactic. Satan showed Jesus the world that Jesus came to save and offered Him a shortcut: “Fall down and worship me, and I will give you all the kingdoms of this world.”
• But Jesus knew of Psalm 2:8, “Ask of me and I will make the nations your heritage, and the ends of the earth your possession”? (Barclay), >>
• Satan offered the same thing with one caveat: worship me instead of your Father.
  • Tasker said that, “Jesus was in effect tempted to subscribe to the diabolical doctrine that the end justifies the means; that, so long as He obtained universal sovereignty in the end, it mattered not how that sovereignty was reached …”[352, Tasker, p. 54]
  • It will one last a second.
  • What a short-cut!
  • What a small thing.
  • Satan’s offer? Just bow to me and you wouldn’t have to deal with the weeping, betrayal; You won’t have to thirst or get tired or suffer shame; You won’t have to deal with that old rugged cross. In other words, take the easy way to what is yours.

JESUS’ APPLICATION

• 10 Then Jesus said to him, “Be gone, Satan! For it is written, “‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.’” 11 Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.
• “For a third time, Jesus responded by quoting Scripture to His adversary … He banished Satan with the divine command to worship and to serve God alone…” (Constable)
• The successful passing of our Lord’s temptation prepared Him to be what Hebrews says of Him: He is our sympathetic High Priest. >>
  • Hebrews 2:16–18, For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham. Therefore he had to be made like his brothers in every respect, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in the service of God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For because he himself has suffered when tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.
  • Hebrews 4:15-16, For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne.
• Our Hero won and will win in the end and by extension His people win with Him.
• But God’s ways are not humanistic ways. His ways of ultimate victory build character in His people. We are to get rid of the shortcut mindset.
• Garlinton noted, Matthew placed two mountains as book ends of his account of the gospel. One where Satan offered Jesus all the kingdoms of the earth and the other mountain where he would ascend into heaven after 1) “on which He later affirmed that all ‘authority’ in heaven and on earth had been granted to Him”, and 2) commanding his disciples to continue to make disciples building His kingdom life-by-life, sacrifice-by-sacrifice, suffering upon suffering. [350, Garlington, pp. 301-2] (Constable)

QUOTE

“The Jews had a saying, ‘The Holy One, blessed be his name, does not elevate a man to dignity till he has first tried and searched him; and if he stands in temptation, then he raises him to dignity.’” (Barclay)

OUR APPLICATION

1. Worshiping Satan should never sound appealing, but that is what we do when we try to get the things God has promised without any sacrifice, without spiritual hard work and doing things God’s way.
   – We must involve God in every step of our journey’s. The way of God is the way of sacrifice.
   – There are no shortcuts to God glory. Peter reminded us that if we want to share in the glory, we must also share in the sufferings (1 Peter 5:10).
2. The Word is our only offensive weapon in the armor of God. It is our sword.
   – It is how we resist the devil’s tempational onslaughts.
   – “Satan tempts us to doubt, deny, disobey, or disregard God’s Word…” (Constable)
   – The victory is won “not by debate,” but by the Word of God. [353, Ironside, Expository Notes …, p. 38]
   – In all situations the Word of God will equip us. Study it; read it; listen to it; know it.
3. Temptation is not given to us to sin; it is meant to demonstrate that we have overcome sin. It is not to make us weak but to strengthen us. Overcoming temptation is not the penalty of being a man or woman, (Barclay right said) “temptation is the glory of being a man.” We must always be ready for temptation, “Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.” (Barclay)
4. In the daily war that we Christians face there is no let-up. There are times when Christians think that they should have lived past temptations only to find that they only get more intense and constant. (Barclay)
   – Stan wasn’t done with His tactics either: in Luke account of our Lord’s temptation he wrote in Luke 4:13, “And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.”
   – I had a professor that claimed that, it is harder to walk with God the older one gets.
   – Our enemies seem to have endless energy; many of our brothers and sisters get exhausted fighting the fight and succumb to the enemies tactics. >>
   – Let us listen to Galatians 6:9, “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.”

So remember: Satan appeals to three things:

1. the lust of the flesh, the desire to do something apart from God’s will.
2. the lust of the eyes, the desire to have something apart from God’s will.
3. pride of life, the desire to be something apart from God’s will (Constable)

What is our response?

1. We rely on God to take care of us.
2. We walk by faith and don’t test God.
3. We worship and serve God only.
4. We respond to life with the Word of God.

Notes

¹ W. D. Davies and D. C. Allison, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel according to Saint Matthew, 1:354. Cf. Deut. 8:2, 16. As cited in Constable.

² See Sydney H. T. Page, “Satan: God’s Servant,” Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society 50:3 (September 2007):449-65. As cited in Constable.

³ See John W. Wenham, “Christ’s View of Scripture,” in Inerrancy, pp. 3-36; Pierre Ch. Marcel, “Our Lord’s Use of Scripture,” in Revelation and the Bible, pp. 121-34; Robert L. Saucy, “How Did Christ View the Scriptures?” ch. 8 in Scripture, pp. 109-23. As cited in Constable.

⁴ Garlington, p. 299. Cf. Davies and Allison, 1:365; T. L. Donaldson, Jesus on the Mountain: A Study in Matthean Theology, pp. 59-61. As cited in Constable. See Ezek. 5:5; 38:12.

⁵ See a artist concept of the temple here and here. One could fall from a higher distance perhaps as Wiersbe notes, but the test reads “pinnacle of the temple.”

Works Cited

Scripture quotations [unless otherwise noted] are from The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Click here to access the works cited web-page for this document, save those marked as “Notes” or “Other Works Cited”–if any. Most of these cited works correspond to the verses they are outlined with. In the case of general background information and references, one will find cited material with the Bible books the citations are associated with. ¶ Furthermore, there may be numbered notes that are URL linked; these are usually retained numbered notes from Thomas Constable’s, “Dr. Constable’s Expository (Bible Study) Notes.” These links are preserved “as is” at the time of this work’s formation and sometimes include other citation information from Constable.

Other Works Cited

Blomberg, Craig L. Matthew. New American Commentary, vol. 22, ed. David S. Dockery, et al., Broadman Press, 1992. Sourced from archive.org.
(https://archive.org/details/matthew0000blom)

________. Preaching the Parables: From Responsible Interpretation to Powerful Proclamation. Baker Academic, 2004. Sourced from archive.org.
(https://archive.org/details/preachingparable0000blom/page/82/mode/2up)

Bradley, Marshell C. Matthew: Poet, Historian, Dialectician. Studies in Biblical Literature, ed. Hemchand Gossai, vol. 103, Peter Lang, 2007.

Evans, Craig A. The Bible Knowledge Background Commentary: Matthew-Luke. Victor, 2003. Sourced from archive.org.
(https://archive.org/details/bibleknowledgeba00crai/mode/2up)

Hendriksen, William. New Testament Commentary: Exposition of the Gospel According to Luke. Baker Book House, 1984.

Phillips, John. Exploring the Gospels: John. Loizeaux Brothers, 1988.

^1.1