Matthew 4:1-11
“Dueling With The Devil”
By: Kenneth Emerson Sauer
Pastor, Parkview United Methodist Church, Newport News, VA
If I recall correctly through my very limited
knowledge of Greek mythology, Achilles was the guy who was dipped head first into the River
Styx, and this made him immortal and invulnerable, except for his heel that he had been held by.
Achilles later suffered a mortal wound to his heel---his vulnerable spot.
And Satan is quick to notice our Achilles heels....and this is where he stoops for his
attack.
Since Jesus had fasted 40 days and nights, the devil figured He would be famished and,
like Esau, be willing to sell His soul for a pot of stew or loaves of bread.
But Jesus was ready with the defense: “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone,
but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.”
The devil tempted Christ to use His own power to meet both a personal and a world-wide
need: hunger.
No doubt Jesus had seen how Roman taxes ground down the poor.
Humanity’s pathetic struggle for livelihood must have touched Christ’s heart.
Surely it is righteous and merciful to overturn social injustice; surely it is by that path
that the kingdom shall come.
What a subtle temptation!
But the problem is that Christ came to save humankind from sin and death.
We all sin and fall short of God’s glory, and the payment we receive for these sins is
death.
Therefore, the center of Christ’s mission was not an economic crusade.
Jesus would not live merely for time, or forsake the Cross for a bakeshop.
Human beings do live by bread, and economic righteousness is a Christian concern; but
we do not live by bread alone.
All the bread in the world can not save a single soul.
Bread gives us life for a brief time, but Jesus gives us life for eternity.
Remember how the crowds followed Jesus after the feeding of the five thousand?
And what did Christ tell them?
“You are looking for me, not because you saw miraculous signs but because you ate the
loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils, but for food that endures to eternal
life.”
Then Jesus went on to say, “The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has
sent.”
There is a spiritual hunger that is just not met by bread.
As a matter of fact there is nothing that can fill our spiritual hunger other than Christ.
This is why Jesus has declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never
go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.”
Do Christians experience physical hunger and physical thirst?
Of course! And in this life we always will!
Can Christians die of starvation or lack of water?
You better believe it!
But when a person comes to Christ....when a person believes in Christ...really believes in
Christ for his or her salvation.....his or her spiritual needs are fulfilled!
Can someone who has been born again through the Bread of Life die the death that one
deserves and go to hell?
Absolutely not!!!
I’m sure most of you have heard Frank Sinatra’s song: “I Did It My Way.”
And this is what sin is.
Satan was tempting Jesus to do things from a perfectly logical human perspective....
And we are also often tempted to try set up a different means of accomplishing
something...a means that is our way--not God’s way.
Basically what Jesus said, and what we too need to do is to make the decision....to sing a
different tune....to sing... “I’m Going To Do It God’s Way.”
Here at the beginning of His ministry Jesus is subjected to the devil’s scheming and
temptations.
Like the Hebrew word for “Satan,” the Greek word for “devil” means “accuser” or
slanderer.”
The devil is a personal being, not a mere force or influence.
He is the great archenemy of God and the leader of the hosts of darkness and everything
that is evil.
Just as God loves us more than we can comprehend or imagine...and is doing everything
to save us, the devil hates us more than we can comprehend or imagine and is doing everything
he can to destroy us.
Every time the devil attacked Jesus....Jesus spoke the Word of God.
This shows us the importance of knowing who we are.
All sin comes from a deluded or perverted sense of the self.
In His baptism, Jesus received affirmation of His identity as the Son of God.
In all these temptations, Satan’s tactic is to bring about doubt in the mind of Jesus
concerning the truth of His identity.
Satan led off his assault, “If you are the Son of God....”
But Jesus proved that He was the Son of God--not through performing the magic that
Satan was tempting Him to do,
But by living “on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.”
And whereas Adam failed and gave into the temptation and plunged the entire race into
sin, Jesus was faithful and thus demonstrated His qualification to become the Savior of all who
receive Him.
When we think that we have to prove to ourselves or somebody else who we are or
what we can do, we are already skating on thin ice.
It is absolutely impossible to overcome the flaming arrows of the Tempter without the
confidence of knowing who we are--or Who’s we are.
Only through a total commitment to Christ, can our spirits testify with God’s Spirit that
we are children of God.
And once we become children of God, Jesus Christ becomes our merciful and faithful
high priest.
And because Christ remained faithful in the heat of temptation He is the model for all of
us when we are tempted.
As the Bible declares in Hebrews chapter 2, Because Jesus “himself suffered when he
was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.”
A wise man once said, “Temptation is to see the tempter standing outside the back door
of your heart.
Sin is to unlock that door so that he can have his desire.
Victory is to open wide from the front door of your heart, inviting the Savior to enter
and give you strength to bar tight the back door.”
It is very important to make the distinction between temptation and sin.
Jesus was tempted in every way that we are, but He was without sin.
So it is very possible to be tempted, but not sin.
God does test us, but God does not tempt us to do evil.
As the Bible says in James chapter 1, “When tempted, no one should say, ‘God is
tempting me.’ For God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he tempt anyone; but each one is
tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed. Then, after desire has
conceived, it gives birth to sin; and sin, when it is full-grown, gives birth to death.”
The key is not to let ourselves be dragged away and enticed.
As humans, we all have an Achilles heel.
The form in which these weaknesses are manifest varies from person to person,
depending on the nature of our own peculiar intellectual, moral, and spiritual vulnerabilities.
And Satan is quick to attack at the point of our weaknesses.
Therefore we need to know our weaknesses so that we won’t be caught off guard.
We also need to know our weapon and how to use it.
Jesus went into the desert to duel with the devil.
He knew that the only way to defeat the Evil One was to shoot it out with him, not with
guns but with the Word of God.
We need to be ready with God’s Word and Spirit as our defense.
How well do we know God’s Word?
And are we in step with God’s Spirit?
It’s interesting that both in the temptations and the rebuttals of the temptations, scripture
is used by both Jesus and the devil.
Satan took certain passages of Scripture out of context and used them to try and deceive
Jesus.
But in rejecting the temptations, Jesus also used scripture but in its proper context.
Do we know the Bible well enough so that we won’t give into the temptation to use it
to support our preconceived ideas and our established behavior patterns,
or have we permitted God’s Word to shape and inform us?
Temptation is like a fork in the road.
We either do it God’s way or we do it the devil’s way.
And we must choose.
If we think we are doing things our way...we are deceived...
When we are tempted we are confronted with an opportunity.
Because temptation is a chance to rise as much as it is a chance to fall.
And here in our Gospel lesson we see Jesus overcoming temptation by the power of God.
Satan wants us to live for the world only.
Satan wants us to ignore the fact that we are destined to live forever.
Our lives in this world are very temporary.
I remember my dad telling me 15 years ago or so, “Life is so short Ken. It seems like
yesterday when I was always the youngest person at work, in meetings, and so forth.
Now, out of the blue, I’m the oldest.”
Life on this earth is short...ever so short...
And we cannot receive from Satan what God has to offer....that is eternal life with Him
in heaven.
Christ was tempted to compromise His ministry and His mission. He was tempted to save
the world without the cross--without paying the price.
He was tempted to choose another way instead of God’s way--to achieve His purpose by
another route.
And so are we.
But we must not listen to Satan’s lies.
There is no other way than God’s Way!
Temptation must be resisted immediately.
Jesus did not hesitate a moment in resisting temptation....and neither should we....
Temptation did not end for Jesus in that desert.
It often recurred.
It came with terrific power when the cross neared, and in Gethsemane.
But Jesus gave his answer in the desert, and chose His path: “Not my will, but thine, be
done.”
What is our answer?
Christ resisted temptation the only way it can be done: by doing exactly what teh Word
of God says.
He simply obeyed God and therefore He never got out of the will of God.
And notice that the devil left Jesus alone for a little while and some angels came and
ministered to Him.
When we resist temptation, the devil flees, and we are relieved for a while.
There is always an escape from temptation.
God knows how to deliver the believer.
One of my favorite verses of Scripture comes from James chapter 4:
“Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Come
near to God and he will come near to you.
