Sermon-Sunday-Feb 25, 2007
Luke 4:1-13
Brothers and Sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s Gospel lesson tells us about Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. What are some things that tempt you? What does it mean to be tempted? Webster’s, as usual, gives multiple definitions of the word tempt. One definition that the dictionary provides is “..entice as to something immoral,” another one is “to provoke” and another one is “to incline strongly.” An example of how it would be used by this last definition would be when a person says “I am tempted.”
And there appears to be elements of all of these definitions in today’s Gospel lesson where we find Jesus being tempted by the devil. Indeed in today’s Gospel lesson we find Jesus face to face with the devil, the real devil. We can see that this devil that Jesus is confronting is real. It is a real entity and a real being. It is not some metaphorical idea that is merely symbolic of human brokenness, it is a real live devil.
And it says that when Jesus goes into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil for forty days, that Jesus is full of the Spirit. So the Sprit is with Him as He goes to face His temptations, just as the Holy Spirit is with you in the midst of your temptations.
Jesus ate nothing during those forty days and He was famished. The temptations that we read about this morning come at the end of the forty days. It’s almost as if the devil were trying to lull Jesus into a false sense of security.
But then, when the forty days is done, the devil knowing that Jesus is famished tempts Jesus with a loaf of bread. Now the temptation was actually not the bread. The temptation was to serve His own needs rather than to rely on God’s provision for His needs. But Jesus stays faithful and responds not with insults or violence but with God’s Word, specifically from Deuteronomy 8:3 when He says to the devil that ‘One does not live by bread alone.’
Tempting Him with food doesn’t work so next the devil tries to tempt Jesus with power and wealth. He shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and says that they have all been handed over to him but that if Jesus worships the devil, then all the kingdoms will be handed over to Him. And once again, Jesus responds with scripture by citing Deuteronomy 6:13 where it says ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’ Again the temptation is not so much with what the devil is tempting Jesus with, but what he is tempting Jesus to do, which is to stray from His path of faithfulness.
Finally, Jesus is taken to the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem where the devil tempts Jesus to show His divinity by jumping off the pinnacle and thus testing God to save Him. The devil even manages to twist, manipulate, and take completely out of context two verses from psalm 91, which we read earlier. But Jesus once again responds with scripture by citing Deuteronomy 6:16 which says ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’
There is a sense of irony in these temptations. In all three of these temptations, the devil is basically challenging Jesus to visualize His divinity. If Jesus had jumped off the pinnacle and God had saved Him by sending angels to catch Him that would have been quite spectacular. That would have gone a long way in showing everyone that Jesus is who He says He is.
Why do you think the devil would want that?? Why would the devil want Jesus to do something that was going to draw attention to Jesus and visually confirm what Jesus had been saying? Why would the devil want Jesus to do something that in the eyes of many people would glorify Jesus?
Because the devil knew that wasn’t part of the plan. He knew that Jesus would eventually face death in Jerusalem and that was where He would truly be glorified. That is what the devil was trying to tempt Jesus with, unfaithfulness. He was trying to provoke Jesus to choose His own deliverance from suffering rather than faithfulness to the will of His Father. Jesus would fulfill His divine Sonship, not by putting God to the test but by remaining faithful. He would defeat death not by avoiding it but by facing it.
Why did Jesus need to be tempted?? Why didn’t He just go straight to the cross?? Well for one thing, it wasn’t time yet. There was till work to be done. How Jesus dealt with temptation has implications for our past, present, and future.
The fact that this all took place in the wilderness for forty days identifies Jesus with Israel even more profoundly than He was before the temptations, and so through faith we are identified with Israel. It has implications for our present because the temptations remind us of Jesus’ humanity. They remind us that Jesus was not some distant divinity looking down on us, He is human and He entered into our humanity and He experienced our weakness.
When you experience weakness and temptation, you know that Jesus experienced them also. He knows your needs and your weakness and your brokenness because He has felt them and experienced them.
And the temptations have implications for your future because in the temptations we see the faithfulness that would eventually take Jesus to the cross and His greatest glory. We see the faithfulness that would bear the burden of your sin and pay the price that you couldn’t pay. We see the faithfulness that, in baptism, claims you as a child of God and marks you with the cross of Christ. We see the faithfulness that brings you into the eternal kingdom of God.
Now, you are in the wilderness, and Satan is slinging his arrows of temptation at you. And it’s not always the temptation that we would all recognize as temptation such as alcohol or drugs or adultery. Those temptations are real, but the most subversive temptations are often more subtle than that.
Temptation comes to you in a culture that tries to captivate you with material wealth or tries to convince you that it is more noble to try to be successful rather than faithful. Temptation comes through the anger that you might feel towards your neighbor or a loved one. Temptation makes it harder to recognize when you are compromising where you should stand firm.
At the heart of temptation is the devil; the same devil who tempted Jesus in the wilderness now tries to tempt you to forget your baptismal identity and to avoid your call to faithful discipleship. And if you were left to you own abilities, you would lose, you would give in.
But you have One who is faithful. He was faithful to His Father in the face of temptation in the wilderness and He is faithful to you. The one who defeated temptation in the wilderness with God’s Word , comes to you in God’s Word, and in the sacraments and in fellowship with other believers.
Temptation is not overcome through some ethical code or purpose-driven methodology. Temptation is overcome in the realization of your powerlessness to it in repentance, and faith in the one who defeated sin, death, and the devil on the cross.
This is the faith that the Holy Spirit calls you to. It’s the faith that Paul writes of in the lesson from Romans for today where he writes “the word is near you, on your lips and in your heart” “because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” No matter how much Satan might come at you with temptation, Christ Jesus is there calling you to repentance and faith and saving you.
Amen
Brothers and Sisters,
Grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
Today’s Gospel lesson tells us about Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. What are some things that tempt you? What does it mean to be tempted? Webster’s, as usual, gives multiple definitions of the word tempt. One definition that the dictionary provides is “..entice as to something immoral,” another one is “to provoke” and another one is “to incline strongly.” An example of how it would be used by this last definition would be when a person says “I am tempted.”
And there appears to be elements of all of these definitions in today’s Gospel lesson where we find Jesus being tempted by the devil. Indeed in today’s Gospel lesson we find Jesus face to face with the devil, the real devil. We can see that this devil that Jesus is confronting is real. It is a real entity and a real being. It is not some metaphorical idea that is merely symbolic of human brokenness, it is a real live devil.
And it says that when Jesus goes into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil for forty days, that Jesus is full of the Spirit. So the Sprit is with Him as He goes to face His temptations, just as the Holy Spirit is with you in the midst of your temptations.
Jesus ate nothing during those forty days and He was famished. The temptations that we read about this morning come at the end of the forty days. It’s almost as if the devil were trying to lull Jesus into a false sense of security.
But then, when the forty days is done, the devil knowing that Jesus is famished tempts Jesus with a loaf of bread. Now the temptation was actually not the bread. The temptation was to serve His own needs rather than to rely on God’s provision for His needs. But Jesus stays faithful and responds not with insults or violence but with God’s Word, specifically from Deuteronomy 8:3 when He says to the devil that ‘One does not live by bread alone.’
Tempting Him with food doesn’t work so next the devil tries to tempt Jesus with power and wealth. He shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and says that they have all been handed over to him but that if Jesus worships the devil, then all the kingdoms will be handed over to Him. And once again, Jesus responds with scripture by citing Deuteronomy 6:13 where it says ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve only him.’ Again the temptation is not so much with what the devil is tempting Jesus with, but what he is tempting Jesus to do, which is to stray from His path of faithfulness.
Finally, Jesus is taken to the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem where the devil tempts Jesus to show His divinity by jumping off the pinnacle and thus testing God to save Him. The devil even manages to twist, manipulate, and take completely out of context two verses from psalm 91, which we read earlier. But Jesus once again responds with scripture by citing Deuteronomy 6:16 which says ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’
There is a sense of irony in these temptations. In all three of these temptations, the devil is basically challenging Jesus to visualize His divinity. If Jesus had jumped off the pinnacle and God had saved Him by sending angels to catch Him that would have been quite spectacular. That would have gone a long way in showing everyone that Jesus is who He says He is.
Why do you think the devil would want that?? Why would the devil want Jesus to do something that was going to draw attention to Jesus and visually confirm what Jesus had been saying? Why would the devil want Jesus to do something that in the eyes of many people would glorify Jesus?
Because the devil knew that wasn’t part of the plan. He knew that Jesus would eventually face death in Jerusalem and that was where He would truly be glorified. That is what the devil was trying to tempt Jesus with, unfaithfulness. He was trying to provoke Jesus to choose His own deliverance from suffering rather than faithfulness to the will of His Father. Jesus would fulfill His divine Sonship, not by putting God to the test but by remaining faithful. He would defeat death not by avoiding it but by facing it.
Why did Jesus need to be tempted?? Why didn’t He just go straight to the cross?? Well for one thing, it wasn’t time yet. There was till work to be done. How Jesus dealt with temptation has implications for our past, present, and future.
The fact that this all took place in the wilderness for forty days identifies Jesus with Israel even more profoundly than He was before the temptations, and so through faith we are identified with Israel. It has implications for our present because the temptations remind us of Jesus’ humanity. They remind us that Jesus was not some distant divinity looking down on us, He is human and He entered into our humanity and He experienced our weakness.
When you experience weakness and temptation, you know that Jesus experienced them also. He knows your needs and your weakness and your brokenness because He has felt them and experienced them.
And the temptations have implications for your future because in the temptations we see the faithfulness that would eventually take Jesus to the cross and His greatest glory. We see the faithfulness that would bear the burden of your sin and pay the price that you couldn’t pay. We see the faithfulness that, in baptism, claims you as a child of God and marks you with the cross of Christ. We see the faithfulness that brings you into the eternal kingdom of God.
Now, you are in the wilderness, and Satan is slinging his arrows of temptation at you. And it’s not always the temptation that we would all recognize as temptation such as alcohol or drugs or adultery. Those temptations are real, but the most subversive temptations are often more subtle than that.
Temptation comes to you in a culture that tries to captivate you with material wealth or tries to convince you that it is more noble to try to be successful rather than faithful. Temptation comes through the anger that you might feel towards your neighbor or a loved one. Temptation makes it harder to recognize when you are compromising where you should stand firm.
At the heart of temptation is the devil; the same devil who tempted Jesus in the wilderness now tries to tempt you to forget your baptismal identity and to avoid your call to faithful discipleship. And if you were left to you own abilities, you would lose, you would give in.
But you have One who is faithful. He was faithful to His Father in the face of temptation in the wilderness and He is faithful to you. The one who defeated temptation in the wilderness with God’s Word , comes to you in God’s Word, and in the sacraments and in fellowship with other believers.
Temptation is not overcome through some ethical code or purpose-driven methodology. Temptation is overcome in the realization of your powerlessness to it in repentance, and faith in the one who defeated sin, death, and the devil on the cross.
This is the faith that the Holy Spirit calls you to. It’s the faith that Paul writes of in the lesson from Romans for today where he writes “the word is near you, on your lips and in your heart” “because if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.” No matter how much Satan might come at you with temptation, Christ Jesus is there calling you to repentance and faith and saving you.
Amen
posted by Steve at 5:46 AM
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