Temptation: Tested And Approved

Temptation- Tested and Approved

Luke 4:1-12

Good morning…if you would turn to Luke 4:1-12 that will be our text this morning.

Prayer-

Last week we looked at crazy Faith!

The faith that would dare to have four men drop a crippled man from a hole in the roof so that their friend could get healed by Jesus!

The kind of faith that doesn’t give up and they were not willing to let some obstacles stop them from achieving and receiving what the Lord has for us.

So many people set out with good intentions and fall short, they hit a snag, they have a set back and they allow that to disrupt all the Lord is doing in our lives.

I am really talking to believers this morning, not that the Lord doesn’t want to see people saved and set free but the text is Jesus going into the wilderness and being tested by Satan.

The unbeliever is not only tempted but has no idea that their life is on track with Satan until they come into a saving knowledge of Christ. When tempted, it is always someone’s else’s fault, someone steered them wrong, they were given bad advice, no one ever told me that, if they did I would have never done that if I would have been told the consequences.

I pray that we see this verse in new light, that we see that without Jesus we cannot help but be tempted but fall to the temptation.

It is through Jesus Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit working in our lives that we have victory.

It is in Jesus that we find a way of escape when we are tempted.

Luke chapter 4 is the Text of Jesus in the wilderness for 40 days without food and He battles Satan and battles the temptations thrown at Him.

Here is what Satan had forgot or put little thought into as He tried to set Jesus up in the wilderness to stumble and fall- (1) “Jesus full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit in the desert, where for forty days he was tempted by the ‘devil. He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry,”

There is so much in that verse you have to stop and let that sink in your spirit-

Jesus just baptized by John the Baptist full of the Holy Spirit was led by the Spirit into wilderness!

What could go wrong Satan as the Son of the living God full of the Holy Spirit led by the Spirit into the wilderness.

3:22- “And the Holy Spirit descended on Him in bodily form like a dove and a voice came from heaven; “you are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased.”

Jesus empowered by His Heavenly Father

Audible approval that all could hear- “This is my Son! Whom I love! Whom I am well pleased!

He left that empowered moment and went into the desert and fasted for 40 days before His confrontation with the destroyer of our souls (Satan)

Think there might be a sermon there of why we sometimes don’t see the results we want because some things only come to us by praying and fasting. I think fighting the devil in our lives might be a time to be fasted and prayed up!.

Jesus tested in the dessert (Scripture says)

Some commentaries want to pick holes in the wilderness experience by saying things like-

There really is no high point anywhere in the world where Jesus could have stood where Satan could offer him the whole world.

That the Hebrews could not understand Satan being the tempter because Jesus had not yet went to the cross and many did not believe him to be the savior.

Some don’t want to believe that there really is a devil-

Then they don’t read their Bibles!

Because my Bible tells me there is a devil and gives him many names Satan, Lucifer, Beelzebub, murderer, liar, prince of this world, god of this world, the dragon, to name a few.

The same Satan that deceived Adam and Eve.

The same devil was trying to stop the second Adam (Jesus) from coming and finishing what he started for mankind.

The failure of the first Adam left mankind dead, sorrowful, without hope, and in darkness.

The second Adam (Jesus, would bring joy, power, peace, light, immortality, and redemption.

It made the devil mad!

I would rather look at it this way-

Almighty God commissioned His Son Jesus Christ full of the Holy Spirit of God to come to this earth.

Jesus Christ takes on human flesh- That is supernatural! That is above my pay grade.

He takes on our flesh which means that he could be tempted and means that he could have failed.