Thursday: “Christ the Victor”
Luke and Matthew reverse the order of the second and third temptations. The reason is not clear, but that need not detain us. The crucial point is the ultimate victory of Jesus over Satan, proclaimed by both Gospels. The significant factor that emerges from study of the temptations is that Jesus Christ is a real Person-tempted as we are but without sin (Heb. 4:15).
Image © Bill Osborne from GoodSalt.com
With victory in each of the temptations, with His triumph over Satan, with the Word of God in His mouth, and connected with Heaven’s powerhouse through prayer, Jesus emerges to proclaim the kingdom of God and to inaugurate the Messianic age.
Read Luke 4:9-13 and Matthew 4:5-7. In the first two temptations, Jesus used the Scripture to overcome Satan’s enticements. Now, in the third, Satan does the same and quotes the Scripture to test whether Jesus really takes the Word of God seriously. What is happening here, and how does Jesus respond?
Satan takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple in Jerusalem, the most sacred place in Jewish history. The city of Zion, the temple where God dwells among His people, becomes the avenue for Satan’s confrontation with Jesus. If you are the Son of God
is once again the preface. Watch what Satan says: If God is indeed your Father, and if your mission is indeed at His bidding, throw yourself down from the pinnacle, and check it out once for all. Surely, if all that is true, God will not let you get hurt. He then quotes Scripture He shall give His angels charge over you, to keep you
(Luke 4:10, NKJV).
Satan knows the Scripture but misinterprets it. His tactic is to lead Jesus to put God to the test. God has indeed promised the protection of His angels, but only within the context of doing His will, such as in the case of Daniel and his companions. Jesus answers Satan decisively again by using Scripture, declaring that it is not for us to put God to the test (Luke 4:12). Our duty is to place ourselves in God’s will and let Him do the rest.
Note four major biblical teachings on temptation: (1) No one is free from temptations; (2) when God allows temptations to come to us, He also provides grace to resist and strength to overcome; (3) temptations do not come the same way every time; (4) no one is tempted beyond his or her strength to bear (1 Cor. 10:13).
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Satan tempted our Lord on 3 basic points of sin we find in 1 John 2:16.
1. Lust of the flesh - (Turn stone into bread)
2. Lust of the eyes - (Receive the power and glory of the kingdoms of this world)
3 Pride of Life- (Jump from the pinnacle of the temple)
Jesus did not have any love for these things because the Love of the Father was in Him.
"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever." 1 John 2:15-18 (KJV)
It is our part to ask God to search our hearts by His Spirit (Psalms 139: 23,24) and reveal to us things that are still connecting us to the world, so we can repent, confess and ask God to put His love in our hearts so we can like Jesus "Be a Victor" in every temptations.
God Bless
I like the way Jesus defeated the devil, that's the way we should also defeat the devil when he is trying to tempt us . but all that is done if we know the scriptures and we regularly visit them. my advice to my peers and my generation is that in order to see gods power working on us we must believe in him and not let the devil conquers us. I want a help on the issues of the temptation we as students at varsity we are facing. the issue of writing a test on Sabbath and other social issues. I want to know how to resist that ?
I dont know about youre varsity, but for some varsities you can write a partition for the exam to be moved. Pray about it, inform the authorities concerning youre conviction. Above all stand for the truth.
Its wonderful to know that God has made MORE THAN sufficient provision for us to be saved! What a merciful and faithful God is HE!
we shuld lean on God only not on our own understanding .amen
These lessons are blessing me. Thanks to our saviour JESUS CHRIST for the perfect life HE lived so as we can follow as an example.
What is amazing to me is that Jesus gained the victory the same way we must. He never used divine prerogatives to accomplish what He did. Texts such as the following testify to Jesus' dependence on the Father for everything:
It is all about having faith in God to gain the victory, "I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing" (Jn. 15:5 NKJV). Further, Jesus condescended (Phil 2) to demonstrate that in no way did Adam have to sin. He could have had victory for "With men this is impossible, but with God all things are possible" (Matt. 19:26 NKJV).
As it is written, "without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him" (Heb. 11:6 NKJV) "for whatever is not from faith is sin" (Rom. 14:23 NKJV).
Jesus confronts the devil with the confirmation of his commitment to his mission. Christians should confront the devil with the same principle in Jesus,Let our focus be on the mission, what Jesus has called us to do, it is not food, wealth or fame but salvation.
please note satan's strategy: Twice he employed, "If thou be the son of God......" Why this conditional phrase? He is certain that when he gets us to doubt God's authority, our relationship with God (contingent upon his promises) we are LOOSERS. God asks us to seek first the kingdom of God through a relationship of obedience, but the enemy overwhlelms us with "If."................Then we
Here again in the Holy City of God, atop the temple, Satan challenges Jesus, using these words, "If You are the Son of God...". He tempts Jesus to throw Himself off the temple and then proceeds to quote scripture. He quotes Psalm 91:11, 12 out of context to suit himself. He omits verses 9 & 10 which say, "Because you have made the Lord, who is my refuge, Even the Most High, your habitation, no evil shall befall you, nor shall any plague come near your dwelling." He leaves out the second part of verse 11 which says, "to keep you in all your ways."
Psalm 91 is about those who abide the Lord. They put their trust in Him and in His truth which is their shield. Proverbs 12:21a says, "No grave trouble will overtake the righteous." And Hebrews 1:14 says, "Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for those who will inherit salvation?" After the devil left Jesus, the angels came and ministered to Him (Matthew 4:11).
Satan tried to use God's Word to tempt Jesus as he did with Eve when he deliberately contradicted God's Word. It didn't work with Jesus, though. Jesus used the Word of God to make it clear to Satan that it is not for us to tempt God. We ought rather to obey Him.
Jesus defeated the Devil who tried three times to get Him to disobey His Father. He used appetite, possessions and scripture to do it. In the Garden of Eden, he used the fruit of the tree to whet Eve's appetite. He told her that she would have wisdom like God and he told her that she would not surely die. He puts the temptation before us, makes it look very attractive in order to draw us away from God. The temptation is used to appeal to self, making it seem that we don't need God when we can have whatever we want through our own efforts. His aim is to get us to act independently of God as Eve did when she decided to listen to the serpent and take and eat the fruit.
The Devil tried to get Jesus to act independently of His Father with the three temptations but he failed. Unlike him, Jesus is not about self. He is about God and others. He operates in humility while the Devil is still filled with pride.
Imagine he wanted the One through all things were created to worship him in exchange for kingdoms that are going to fall and for an earth that is going to be destroyed! That's prideful thinking and the Bible states that those who exalt themselves will be brought low. Satan was brought low when he was kicked out of heaven and will be brought even lower when, in a last ditch effort, he goes into battle against the Son of God and His redeemed and loses. He will be cast into the lake of fire.
Jesus showed the Devil and us that we too can overcome temptation. We don't have to give in. We can resist and be victorious by using the Word of God as our defence. Jesus showed us that the Devil is no match for Him. Satan is a defeated foe.
Thanks for all of the inspiring comments. How would you encourage someone who is getting the victory of tempation during the day time hours, but loses the battle over temptation during the evening hours after work at home. Please advise. thanks
Hi Regina,
I would humbly recommend looking into how the victory is being gained during the day and working earnestly to carry that forward into the evening hours as well. With determined effort being conscious that God's grace is available to give you victory at any time of the day or night, the victory will be gained. It helps to bear in mind that God's angels are sent to aid us to prevail over the enemy and that indwelling of the Holy Spirit is the greatest blessing which brings with it all other blessings including power to live a consistently victorious life.
I hope that helps! Just said a prayer for the struggling one.
The same power that gives you power to become victorious during the day will do the same in evening time, trust him and allow him to do it for you.
does God allow one to tested on one thing more than once.I have been robbed on the several times on different times on things that dont belong to me leaving in debt.
What was the real temptation in this issue of throwing himself off the top of the temple?
One that occurs to me - if Jesus jumped and landed safely, then to the people it would look like he was coming out of the sky, from heaven and he would be fulfilling the people's expectation of the coming Messiah and they would have accepted him immediately, based on a miracle/sign.
What else could be part of this temptation? Here was Satan - looking like an angel - quoting Scripture or rather twisting Scripture to try and get Jesus to do the wrong thing. But Jesus showed that he knew the character of God and could not be confused by a text out of context.
But most of all he was saying to Jesus just the same thing as he did to Eve - you can't really trust what God says. Maybe Satan was hoping that Jesus would say I can trust God and jump and kill himself? But Jesus proved we can trust God but we must know God's character and not trust someone else's idea of who God is.
In summary the temptations are:
Prove you are the Son of God
Prove that the Son of God is divine
Prove that you know and trust God
It's a big challenge to us Christians, our Lord Jesus was tempted while in same flesh we are in and he defeated the devil yet us we fail,lets ask for powers to over come the temptations.
strugglng with masturbation.help me to be a victor as jesus was