By Every Word

The Grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Love of God, and the Fellowship of the
Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.
4:1 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted
by the devil. 2 And after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He
then became hungry. 3 And the tempter came and said to Him, “If You
are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” 4 But He
answered and said, “It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD
ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS OUT OF THE
MOUTH OF GOD.'” 5 Then the devil took Him into the holy city; and
he had Him stand 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
GIVE HIS ANGELS CHARGE CONCERNING YOU’; and ‘ON their
HANDS THEY WILL BEAR YOU UP, LEST YOU STRIKE YOUR
FOOT AGAINST A STONE.'” 7 Jesus said to him, “On the other hand,
it is written, ‘YOU SHALL NOT PUT THE LORD YOUR GOD TO THE
TEST.'” 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 things will I give You, if You fall down and worship
me.” 10 Then Jesus said to him, “Begone, Satan! For it is written, ‘YOU
SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD, AND SERVE HIM
ONLY.'” 11 Then the devil left Him; and behold, angels came and began
to minister to Him. (NASB)
This is the First Sunday in Lent. As such we find ourselves once again in the
Garden of Eden with Adam and Eve and the devil and in the wilderness with our
Lord Jesus and the devil.
The temptation in the Garden of Eden began with the serpent raising a
question about what God had said and underlying that question, a challenge to the
proper relationship between God’s created and God the Creator.
Those same basic elements are also present in the wilderness temptation.
Jesus had just been baptized by John the Baptist in the River Jordan. Jesus and
John (and the devil) had just heard God’s voice from heaven saying, “This is my
beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased. Listen to Him.”
There at the moment of His baptism, the devil found His target, just as he
had in the Garden of Eden thousands of years before. The Son of Mary and
Joseph, the Son of God had grown up. He had just entered His offices of Prophet,
Priest, and King. Jesus had spent 30 years preparing for this war against sin, death,
and the power of the devil.
The devil now knows where the promised Messiah is to be found. He knows
that he must do what he can stop the Messiah from Him from completing His
mission, although he doesn’t understand how the Messiah was going to wage this
war.
At the heart of Jesus’s mission was to do what sinful man had failed to do
back there in the Garden of Eden and every day since. A good portion of this
mission was to effectively repeat history, but without sin. He came to do what
Adam and Eve and everyone since failed to do – resist temptation. He came to do
what the Israelites failed to do. They failed to live faithfully and without
complaint over their forty years in the wilderness and throughout their entire
history in the promised land.
Matthew’s Gospel tells us that after Jesus was baptized, the Holy Spirit “led
[Him] into the wilderness to be tempted.” St. Luke describes it more as a drive. It
had a more urgent sense to it. St. Luke wrote, the “Spirit impelled Him to go out
into the wilderness.” Immediately after Jesus’s baptism, the battle between God
and the devil was joined.
Jesus goes out into the wilderness to revisit Genesis 3, the fall into sin, and
Numbers 14, wherein the Israelites were commanded to invade the promised land,
Canaan. In preparation for that Joshua sent out 12 spies. When the spies returned,
instead of trusting God’s word of promise of a certain victory, they were terrified
and refused to take hold of what God had given them because the Canaanites had
such a superior army. God punished their doubt by making them wander the
wilderness for forty years as a test of faith; a test they failed time and time again.
Most preaching on this text this morning are using this Gospel lesson to
instruct their congregations how to resist temptation and fight the devil. They are
telling the people that all they have to do is to cite Bible passages, kind of like an
incantation, in order to overcome temptation. It is unfortunately that the same
pastors who are preaching this way, have failed to train their people to properly
interpret, understand, and apply the Bible.
Now is it a good thing to know your Bible, to know the Word of God and
theology and to take refuge in it in times of temptation and especially when you all
into sin. But does it make sense that Jesus Christ would walk out of the River
Jordan after being baptized as our perfect substitute, only to be led into the
wilderness to endure forty days of hardship and temptation to serve as the “poster
boy” for how to fight the devil so we can be more like Him. Does it make sense
that the perfect One of God came into the world in order to help make us a less
“imperfect?” After all, the Law requires complete perfection.
No, Jesus went out into the wilderness to do what Adam and Eve failed to
do and to do what the children of the Old Testament could not do. He goes out to
do what you and I fail to do as well every day of our lives. For we too wander in
the wilderness our whole lives. We are baptized and from that moment on we live
in the wilderness, in a world corrupted by sin. As God’s children we are called to
trust all of His promises and act accordingly. Yet, we fail. So Jesus goes out to do
it for us.
Jesus goes out and fasts for 40 days and 40 nights. In His moment of sheer
weakness and exhaustion the devil comes. Forty days earlier God said, “This is
my beloved Son.” Now the devil says to Him, “If Thou be the Son of God,
command that these stones be made bread.”
The devil is challenging Jesus to take matters into His own hands and to
make life better for Himself– basically the same thing he challenged Eve to do.
He wants Jesus to doubt the words of God, His heavenly Father, just as Eve did
and just as the Israelites. He wants Jesus to do what the Israelites did when they
worried more about filling their bellies than about faithfulness to God.
But unlike Adam and Eve and the Israelites Jesus is unwavering in His trust
and devotion to His Heavenly Father. “It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE
ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS OUT OF
THE MOUTH OF GOD.’”
What comes out of the mouth of God? The Gospel , the message of
complete forgiveness of sins because of Jesus Christ perfection, His death, and His
resurrection.
“Then the devil took Him into the holy city; and he had Him stand on the
pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, ‘If You are the Son of God throw
Yourself down; for it is written, HE WILL GIVE HIS ANGELS CHARGE
CONCERNING YOU’; and ON their HANDS THEY WILL BEAR YOU UP,
LEST YOU STRIKE YOUR FOOT AGAINST A STONE.’”
The second temptation is a version of a theology of glory. If Jesus’s jumps
from the top of the temple and remains unharmed, it would be a miracle for all to
see. It would be such a show of power, glory, and of God’s favor.
“Jesus said to him, ‘On the other hand, it is written, YOU SHALL NOT
PUT THE LORD YOUR GOD TO THE TEST.’” This should be a lesson for
every Christian. We do not dictate the terms of our relationship to God. We do not
impose our ideas and doctrines on God. We do not bind God to our interpretation
of what it means to worship and to serve Him. God sets the terms of our
relationship to Him and His relationship to us and He does so in the Law and
Gospel.
The third temptation. “The devil took Him to a very high mountain, and
showed Him all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory; and he said to Him,
‘All these things will I give You, if You fall down and worship me.’”
While the first two temptation pretend to be subtle and even pious, the last
temptation is just a straight out call to reject God the Father and walk away from
the First, Second, and Third Commandments.
10 “Then Jesus said to him, ‘Begone, Satan! For it is written, YOU
SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD, AND SERVE HIM ONLY.’”
Jesus answered with the Word of God and perfect faith. That is what Adam
and Eve didn’t do. It is what the Israelites didn’t do. It is what you and I don’t do
either. Resist temptation. Yes, but know that you will not defeat it, until you breath
your last and leave this sinful world and your sinful nature for the life of the world
to come.
It does not matter what is offered or how appealing it may be. Jesus tells us
that we are to “seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness; and all
these things shall be added to you.” That is what Jesus teaches us to do. Then
knowing that we can’t and don’t do that as we ought, He does it for us and that is
why He was driven, impelled to go out into the wilderness in the first place.
In the temptation of Christ see this One Person in His two natures, Jesus
Christ, engaging the ruler of this world, Satan, battle of wills.
For thousands of years, the devil had won this battle. God’s children fell to
temptation over and over again. The devil has some things going for him. First our
old sinful nature. Second, experience. Third persistence. Luther wrote: “Satan
has gathered experiences from the very beginning of the world and has been
made more cunning by daily practice. If he finds it impossible to overcome us
by the greatness of the temptation, he tries to overcome us by persevering
until he has wearied us.”
God Himself went to that wilderness to face Satan to make certain the
outcome and does so under the harshest conditions. Jesus Christ does not meet
Satan in a garden surrounded by gentle animals and plenty of food where all His
physical needs are met naturally as was the case with Adam and Eve. So certain is
God of the outcome of this battle, God gives Satan is given the “home field
advantage.
Christ’s victory over sin, death, and the devil was guaranteed since the
beginning of time. His victory over Satan in the wilderness, on the top of the
temple, on that very high mountain, in the garden of Gethsemane, on the Cross,
and on Easter morning was first promised to Him and to us in Genesis 3:15, “He
shall crush your head and you shall bruise His heal.”
Jesus Christ emerged from that wilderness unblemished, free from sin, with
His face pointed toward Jerusalem and His crucifixion. He emerged from that
wilderness temptation to worship and serve God only and to do so by dying for
our sin. He emerged from that wilderness temptation without sin-victorious in
battle and John Baptist proclaimed, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away
the sin of the world!”
At the beginning these 40 days of Lent, we now behold the Lamb of God
takes away the sin of the world. At the beginning of these 40 days of Lent, we are
reminded that we live and will live eternally by every Word that comes out of
God’s mouth. Your sins are forgiven
Amen.
May the peace that passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in Christ
Jesus. Amen.