#091 "Love Led to Victory" (Into the Wilderness Recap)

After walking verse-by-verse through Matthew 4:1–11, this final recap episode brings us to the heartbeat of it all: Jesus didn’t overcome temptation by sheer willpower—He overcame because of His love for the Father.

In this episode, Kate revisits the wilderness account in full—tracing each temptation, each response, and ultimately revealing what fueled Jesus’ unwavering obedience. This is more than a story about resisting sin; it’s a revelation of a Son who loves His Father so completely that no offer, no shortcut, and no suffering could pull Him away.

As you listen, you’ll gain: A deeper understanding of why Jesus never gave in to temptation, Clarity on what’s really happening beneath our own struggles with sin, A reframing of obedience—not as duty, but as devotion, and A vision for a life where love for God becomes stronger than the pull of anything else 

This episode invites you to see that true victory over temptation doesn’t start with trying harder—it starts with knowing and loving God more.

Because in the wilderness, Jesus didn’t just say “no” to Satan—He said “yes” to the Father.

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Transcript

Welcome And Series Big Moment

Kate 0:00

Hey guys, this is Kate from Abidible.com, and you're listening to the Abidible Podcast. I'm just a regular wife and mom who's had my life transformed by learning to study the Bible on my own. If I can, you can. On this show, I help you know and love God more by abiding in Him through His Word yourself. During our journey into the wilderness with Jesus, these last three months, not counting today, we have spent 10 hours, 28 minutes, and 23 seconds together here on the podcast as I've shared over 90,000 words with you about this story. It's over 220 pages here for me in Google Docs. If you have been with me for all 12 episodes, you know that we've spent this time for good reason. This is the moment the kingdom of God clashes with the kingdom of darkness in the great duel foretold in Genesis 3. Something very significant happened in this wilderness as we have seen. Jesus defeats the devil. He wins. Jesus does not give in to Satan's best, and in the end, the devil is forced to flee. This story has so many implications for our understanding of Jesus, of God the Father, of the devil, of ourselves, and of temptation in general. We need this story to stay written on our hearts. So let's kick things off by rereading the passage in its entirety to refresh our memories about what we have studied together. This is Matthew 4, 1 through 11. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, and after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry, and the tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread. But he answered, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him 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 command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up lest you strike your foot against a stone. Jesus said to him, Again, it is written, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again, 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 I will give you if you will fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. Today we're going to generally and concisely review what we've learned together in an effort to move it into long-term memory. But first, and with her permission, I'd like to share some thoughts from Kelsey H, one of the members of our Women's Abidible Plus membership community. This is what she had to say about Into the Wilderness. I think this may have been my favorite study yet, even though it's very hard to pick. I think a few things will stick with me hard. I feel like my fear of Satan and demons has lessened immensely. To see Satan's strongest tactics used and for him to just fail miserably and have to leave at a word of Jesus and understanding more of the authority that Jesus has over him has been amazing. Also, my gratefulness and awe for Jesus' sacrifices have increased so much as well. I never really understood the significance of his temptation. But now to know that he willingly endured when he could have ended it at any moment, wow, what love. In the last verse, reading how the angels were finally allowed to come and minister to him and cross-references to him in the garden praying that the cup would pass from him, knowing that at any second he could call on legions of angels to come and take him out of any situation he was facing. In the wilderness, in the garden, on the cross, at any moment, in the most intense and unbearable times, he could have left. He could have stopped it. Can you imagine the temptation in that? Not only choosing to turn himself over and allow it to happen, but not stopping the worst pain we can imagine when that option is at your fingertips. And he did it for us sinners. I just can't wrap my mind around it. And I guess that's the point. His love is unimaginable. I am more in awe with his love and sacrifice and much less afraid of Satan, whose power seems embarrassing when compared to Jesus Christ. I love that so much because I feel the same way. We are coming away with less fear of Satan and his demons and their power and their strategies and more in awe of Christ's unimaginable love and power. Praise God for that. I hope you feel the same way too. So here's what I want to do with our time together in this recap episode. First of all, why do I always try and do a summary episode at the end of our series? I ask myself that because this is like my hardest episode to do every time. Because I sit down and I go, oh, sure, 90,000 words and 220 pages. Let me concisely summarize this for you guys on the podcast. That kind of thing is completely overwhelming to me. Like I taking the big picture and trying to pull out the most important points. So I have very concisely summarized, because this is not my strong suit. So, Lord, in the power of your Holy Spirit, help this to be a meaningful and impactful summary to those who listen. Because I find like, whoo, I put this on the agenda. I'm always going to do the intro episode, then the verses, and then I'm going to close the series with the recap episode. And then the next week, I'm going to start out the intro episode. And those two things back to back are like my most overwhelming episodes to create because of all of the summarizing that goes into the recap. And then like the very next week, I think I need to revisit this and be a little more realistic. Like give myself a breather because the very next week that I'm going to kick off a whole new study and all the research and background info like that I have to do, I'm a crazy person. So I did actually take a week off in case you didn't notice. Um, I needed a breather week, but also that was because I have a ton of pain. I'm trying a new um new idea with a chiropractor. And so uh also going off all ibuprofen, no, no relief from pain meds because I just I can't, I don't want to be taking medication anymore. Um, so it's been a it's been a really intense week and I just gave myself a breather. And all that to say, I think that probably moving forward in the future, I'm gonna do the recap episode, or maybe even give myself a week to do the recap episode, and then give myself a week to do the the research that I need to do before I kick off a new series. It's a little intense when I'm still leading a life as a homeschooling mom and wife and have other commitments to go back to back like that. So I'm giving myself grace. Man, I was like being hard on myself for being late, but I'm just gonna I'm just gonna say that to you guys. Like, thanks, Jesus, for grace uh and time and rest and reasonable goals. 90,000 words, like summarize it. Okay. Anyway, I digress. Oh man. Okay, so here's here's what we're gonna be doing, right? I say, I say that I want to do these some summary episodes, and I do because going back and at least trying to pull the main points and review them, that's how we move learning into long-term memory. So we've done a lot of work together, and it would be easy to forget some of the most important things that we've looked at. So this pause, even though it's hard, is important uh in our pursuit of hiding God's word in our heart. It's a chance to say, all right, what did we really learn here? What are our big takeaways? So we want to remember Jesus in the wilderness, who he proved himself to be and what he did. And we want to solidify what we exposed about the devil and his strategies so that we can continue to resist temptation. And that's what today is all about. I'm gonna be regrouping our recap into five short parts. One, setting and backstory, two, temptation number one, including Jesus' response, three, temptation number two in Jesus' response, four, temptation number three in Jesus' response, and then we'll close. Number five will be Jesus victory. So those are the five parts that are gonna be short and concise, short and sweet here. Um, and then I'll close that with a little personal application. But real quick, if you want to be a part of what God's doing here at Abidible for just a few dollars a month, you can help us, and it's a blessing supporting our mission to help people know and love God by abiding in Him through His Word. You can learn more at the link in the show description. So we're gonna begin with the first part, setting and backstory. Matthew 4, 1 through 2 tells us then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. We saw that this introduction to our story provides us with pretty straightforward character setting and plot. The characters are God the Son, Jesus, God the Holy Spirit, and the devil. Our setting is the wilderness, and our plot, the storyline, is that the devil is going to be tempting Jesus, who not only is in this wilderness, but has also been fasting for 40 days and 40 nights. On the surface, this looked pretty straightforward, but the more we dug in, the more beautiful, valuable nuggets we uncovered, as is true always of scripture. An important element of setting and backstory begins with who wrote the passage and who their audience was and what the purpose of writing was. So we looked at Matthew, the most widely accepted author of this gospel. We learned or remembered that Matthew was a Jewish tax collector in Judea in the first century A.D., meaning that he would have been seen as a traitor to his people. He worked for the very oppressive and occupying force, those who were oppressing and occupying the Jews, Rome. And yet he was called by Jesus to become one of his twelve apostles. Matthew had training as a result of his work in scribal techniques, certainly something Jesus knew and redeemed for good, as Matthew would be one of only four who received the great honor of writing a gospel, the story of Jesus' birth, life, ministry, death, and resurrection. Early church tradition has Matthew writing this gospel sometime around 60 AD, which was about 30 years within 30 years of the resurrection. As an eyewitness to all that Jesus had done, Matthew writes as a first-century Jewish follower of Jesus. His primary audience was the Jewish people. One of the most beautiful elements of Matthew's gospel is his many quotations of Old Testament scripture and prophecy. More than any other gospel, we learned that Matthew connected Jesus to the long-awaited promises of old by saying things like, This was to fulfill, and so that what was spoken by the prophets, etc., he desperately wanted his fellow Jews to see and know and understand that Scripture had been fulfilled in Christ and that he was the long-awaited Messiah. Matthew's secondary purpose was to reveal this good news to the Gentiles, and we see that in the way that he carefully takes time to explain Jewish words, traditions, geography, and culture. Matthew wanted his readers to know that through Jesus, God had brought his kingdom to earth, and both Jew and Gentile had been offered deliverance from sin and true peace with God. This was very, very good news. Now, this conflict between God and the devil did not begin here in the wilderness. We took some time to understand the full context of this conflict. This wilderness temptation is bookmarked by two very significant events in Jesus' life. First, we learned that Jesus' temptation came on the heels of his glorious spirit-filled baptism. God's voice from heaven had just been heard saying, This is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. And it's immediately after this baptism that the Spirit led Jesus up into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And second, we also briefly saw that right after this temptation in the wilderness, Jesus will immediately begin his public ministry. Now, this encounter between Jesus and Satan, like I said, is not new. We saw that in our study. It is the great duel foretold in Genesis 3. It's introduced here and continues on to the cross and will be finished at the end of the age when Satan and his demons are forever cast into the lake of fire. But where did this duel get its start? After mankind was deceived by the serpent, meaning Adam was tempted, the first Adam was tempted and gave in. After Adam and Eve saw and took and ate of the one tree in all the garden that was forbidden, sin and death entered the world. Rather than writing us off or handing us over to the eternal consequences of our decision, God acts. This is where we then see the first mention of the gospel, God's plan of redemption and salvation for fallen mankind. This is the proto-evangelium, the first gospel, the first good news. In it, we are given a foretaste, a prophetic promise of a future duel. And the outcome of this duel was already determined. The devil would bruise the heel of the offspring of the woman. This is a singular offspring, one future descendant, Jesus, and Eve's offspring, Jesus, will bruise or crush the devil's head. So this conflict is a long-standing and much anticipated one. Jesus and the devil have much history as well as a clear, predetermined future. Christ is our victor. But at the time of this wilderness temptation, that victory has not yet been secured. Now the setting of this temptation between God and Satan is significant. Matthew begins this passage by sharing with us that the Spirit led Jesus up into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. This is referring, as we saw, to the Judean wilderness. Why the wilderness? Well, we saw that there were several reasons that the wilderness was chosen. First, we saw that this was a brutal, desolate, uninhabited wasteland. Jesus was meant to be completely isolated in a godforsaken place for this temptation. There was no one around, no one to offer the comfort of company or the relief of assistance. It's possible that he was surrounded by predators and dangerous insects, snakes, who knows? It's hard to imagine worse conditions for Jesus to have endured. This was not a temptation with guardrails or bowling lane bumpers, guys. This was the real deal. He was fully exposed for 40 days and 40 nights. And there was a good reason for that. It heightened what he was about to do on our behalf. Second, remember this was a symbolic reenactment. Jesus would enter the wilderness for 40 days and 40 nights, just as Israel had wandered in the desert for 40 years. It is no coincidence that in this temptation, Jesus would all three times draw his sword of truth from the book of Deuteronomy, which is the retelling of the story of Israel's post-Exodus time of testing in the wilderness, where Israel was forgetful and unfaithful in their wilderness, Jesus would not forget, and he would remain perfectly faithful in this wilderness. In short, he would do what Israel, what we never could do, resist every temptation and overcome the tempter. We also discuss why the Spirit led Jesus up into the wilderness. Jesus beautifully submitted to this leading of the Spirit of God, who is co-equal and co-eternal with him and with the Father. All throughout Jesus' life, from conception to baptism, his earthly life, to here in the wilderness, to his ministry and his miracles, and to casting out demons and proclaiming the gospel to the cross and to the resurrection, the spirit is actively involved. The Spirit is Christ's helper in fulfilling the will of the Father, and Jesus willingly submits to that leading. Heading up into the wilderness is no exception. Finally, we spent a significant amount of time discussing why Jesus was fasting for this long period of time. Our ultimate conclusion was that by fasting from food, Jesus revealed the greatest desire of his heart to love the Father. Doing the will of his father was his food. And by fasting from literal food or bread, Jesus would prove that he loved the Father more than anything. Adam faced one temptation, and it had to do with food, and he failed. Jesus, the greater Adam, will now face three temptations and overcome the whole time while he's starving and fasting. In so doing, he would earn the right to lead us into the promised land of eternal glory. Satan had to be overcome. And this wilderness temptation sets the stage for Jesus to do exactly that. Which brings us to our first temptation and Jesus' response to it. The devil, knowing that Jesus is physically hungry, strategically tempts Jesus to turn stones into bread. Jesus responds by quoting Deuteronomy and stating that life is found not in physical bread, but in the words of God. It says, And the tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread. But he answered, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Again, what is happening here? The devil is trying to get Jesus to doubt God's goodness, to believe that God is withholding something from him. And if Satan can get Jesus to believe that, then perhaps he can ensnare Jesus into sinning by providing for himself, by stepping outside of God's will to do a miracle for himself in order to meet his own needs in his own way, in his own timing. This is not a new lie, you guys. Is God really good? Was the underlying implication in Satan's garden lie to Eve. But instead of giving into this temptation by turning stones to bread, Jesus reaches for the literal word of God and quotes Deuteronomy 8.2. He says, Man doesn't live by bread alone. He's referring to the story of God's provision of daily manna for Israel in the wilderness. God spoke and God provided for them on a daily basis throughout their entire wilderness journey. Jesus would not, could not step outside the will of God, doubting the goodness of God, to provide for himself. How? Because he knew that his father is a perfectly faithful provider. Our big ideas were the devil is real and destructive, but he is still God's devil, restrained by God's purposes and defeated by Christ. And our other big idea was eat bread and die, abide and live, meaning that living outside of God and his will, separate from him and as your own God leads to death. Abiding in God and depending on his every word for life brings abundant life. Jesus chose to forsake the physical bread for the eternal relationship with his Father. And that's the first temptation in a nutshell. How about the second temptation and Jesus' response to it? Let's read it to refresh our memory. It says, Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him 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 command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone. Jesus said to him, Again, it is written, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test. That's Matthew 4, 5 and 5 through 7. So what's going on here? Well, we definitely see that the devil is not dissuaded from his first failure. In fact, he again brings Jesus' identity into this temptation. If you are the Son of God, while he remains consistent with that portion of the attack, he does change the setting entirely. Instead of in the middle of the Judean wilderness, Jesus is now somehow brought by the devil to the pinnacle of the temple in the holy city, Jerusalem. Jerusalem, as we saw, is God's city. We spent a lot of time going over the history of this unique place. It's where God set his name, and the temple is where his presence dwelt. It was where and how he maintained relationship with his people, the Jews, and it was holy ground. Of course, the devil would try and destroy the sanctity of this place. He's been desecrating holy ground since the garden. Big idea for this episode was pay attention to where you're standing. The devil will try and use setting, even high, holy places, to get you to slip up. Again, this isn't a new strategy for him. There's nothing new ever to see with the devil. He's not creative. He's a copycat and he's bad at it. Uh, the thing that's new and exciting to see here, the thing that is totally different, is that Jesus is going to be the first to not give the devil an inch to respond perfectly and sinlessly to all of these temptations. Here, Satan wants Jesus to throw himself down in order to test his father, as if the father needed to prove his love, or as if he had anything more he could do to prove his care for the son. Satan gambled on this one and lost terribly. There has never been, nor will there ever be, a more unified relationship than the one that exists within the Trinity. The Father, Son, and Spirit have been loving each other in perfect unity for all eternity. Jesus perfectly trusts in the Father's love and care because his love and care are perfect. Additionally, in this temptation, we saw that Satan misquoted scripture. That he knows scripture enough to misquote it is a sobering detail that we observed. He's quoting Psalm 91, but he leaves out the part about walking in God's will. He's trying to get Jesus to step outside the will of God and then presume upon his protection. Thankfully, our Jesus knows the word of God better than Satan and isn't fooled by the devil's misquotation or misapplication. Jesus rightly responds, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again, Jesus is pointing back to Deuteronomy. And this verse in particular, Deuteronomy 6, 16, is a verse where Moses is actually also pointing back to something. And we learned that Moses, when he said, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test, adds, as you tested him at Massa. Moses is here referring to the grumbling of the Israelites against God over water and provision that God had already consistently been providing. They had already seen God's miraculous might on full display in the Exodus and even before that in the plagues, as well as in the parting of the Red Sea, provision of water and manna, and yet still they demanded God act according to their timeline and their will to prove himself worthy of their worship and obedience. It was like nothing was ever enough. Remember, Jesus is reenacting the wilderness story of Israel, but this time he's doing it perfectly. He will not demand anything of God. His worship of the Father is not contingent on the Father bending to the Son's will. Rather, we see that Jesus' greatest desire was to do the will of the Father and thus prove his love for the Father. Satan fails the second temptation badly. In the third and final temptation, the devil reveals what he's really been after all along. Again, 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 I will give you if you will fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. That's Matthew 4, 8 through 10. The devil is willing to hand over all the kingdoms of the world and their glory to Jesus in exchange for worship. Satan has always wanted to be like God. We learned that when we looked at the background story of his rebellion in Isaiah 14 and Ezekiel 28. And we saw it in the garden when he whispered and taunted to Adam and Eve, trying to get them away from worship and obedience of God toward, moving them toward worship of Satan and self. And thus sin entered the world. But here we see something new. Now we see that he not only aspires to be like God, but even above God. Here we have him asking the Son of God, co-equal and co-eternal with God, to fall down and worship before him. What Satan ultimately desires is not just a part of us, not just a tiny blip or slip or sin, but all of us. Because God wants our whole heart, so does Satan. We worship what we love, and Satan now tries to get Jesus to love and worship him. But it's a huge mistake. This time Jesus doesn't start with scripture, but a rebuke. The request is so offensive to exchange the love of the Father for the love of Satan that the Son commands Satan to leave his presence. Be gone, Satan. And he pulls from his final verse of Deuteronomy, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. That's 6 13. In submitting to the leading of the Spirit up into the wilderness, Jesus demonstrated his love for the Father. In fasting, Jesus demonstrated his love for the Father. In refusing to doubt God's goodness and do a party trick and turn stones to bread, Jesus demonstrated his love for the Father. In refusing to put God to the test by throwing himself down off the temple, Jesus demonstrated his love for the Father. In refusing to fall down and worship Satan in exchange for the kingdoms of the world and their glory, Jesus demonstrated his love for the Father. Jesus ultimately overcame temptation, the very worst the devil had to throw at him, because of his love for the Father. We'll be right back after this message. Next week we begin a very important new study that perfectly complements what we've just finished studying here in the wilderness. We've watched Satan come after Jesus again and again, pressing, twisting Scripture, trying to shake his trust in the Father. And each time Jesus stood firm. Next Monday, we're going to begin equipping ourselves to stand firm too by studying Ephesians 6, 10 through 20 and the armor of God. Because the Bible is clear, the battles we face aren't just physical or emotional. They're spiritual. We are not battling flesh and blood, but spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. The amazing news is that God has not left us exposed or unprepared in this battle. We are going to really learn what it means to put on the full armor God has given us, the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shoes representing the readiness given by the gospel of peace, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God, and prayers that can be prayed at all times in the Spirit, so that when temptation comes, when trials come, when the enemy whispers lies, we are able to stand firm. This is what we need. This is how we fight. And I'd encourage you, don't step into this study alone. Grab a friend and say, Hey, will you do this with me? Again, we'll start this coming Monday, so if you want to follow along live, grab your copy ASAP. I've linked both the digital and printed versions in this episode's description. Join us as we learn together what it really looks like to be strong in the Lord and in the strength of his night. Let's stand firm and fight together, keeping alert with all perseverance. And now back to the show. What I shared before the break is our big idea for this series. Jesus overcame temptation because of his love for the Father. Love led to victory. In our final verse, we read, Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. An old school theologian once said, There is nothing weaker than the devil stripped naked. Remember that no one was with Jesus in the wilderness. If he had wanted this encounter to remain unknown, it would have remained unknown. But we see it in three of the gospels for a reason. Clearly, Jesus shared the story with his followers, and clearly the Holy Spirit inspired them to write it down. Why? Think about this. So that you could read it, so that you could know this happened. At the core, as I've thought about this, I believe that he wanted us to see the David and Goliath comparison. When we stand next to Satan, he is a terrifying being. He bests us in every way. But when we put him up against our champion, Christ the victor, he looks pathetically small and impotent. Now revisit this final scene with me. Jesus has just sent Satan away, and God sent angels to his son. They'd been ordered, as we can presume, to hold back throughout all three of the temptations, and now they come in haste to attend to his every need. Messengers on mission from the Father, bringing tidings and food and water and whatever he needed. Most of all, I think they worshiped. They just witnessed the duel they'd been waiting millennia for. Think again about the family history here, how they must have rejoiced. Remember, these same angels now attending to Jesus, these are the counterparts to Satan and his demons. These are the ones who chose the Father, who were faithful and loyal to him and the Son and the Spirit. They were present at creation, front row for the rebellion, and aware of every subsequent treasonous, poisonous, hateful act that the fallen had ever committed. They now get to see their champion defeat the great demonic Goliath. And they knew what that meant. They knew that his victory in the wilderness cleared the way to the cross. So what now? How now shall we live? I guess is the question. Here are the final three takeaways I'd like to share with you. I've pulled them from commentator Alexander McLaren, and I'd like to leave you with these as we close out our Into the Wilderness series. Our first takeaway is you don't have to look out for yourself. McLaren says the first temptation addressed to Christ's physical nature was to put it roughly, look out for yourself. His answer was, as a son of God, I hold by my filial dependence, meaning as a son, as man, I share my brethren's lot and am content to live as they live. He has come to bear all man's burdens. So shall he begin by separating himself from them? Friend, friend, because Jesus refused, refused to grasp for his own provision, to look out for himself, you don't have to live in self-protection or self-reliance. That is good news for someone today. That is a huge sigh of relief to know that you are not responsible or asked by God to sustain your own life. You can trust your good father, just as Jesus trusted his good father in the worst of circumstances. You can obey without scrambling or striving or securing things for yourself in your own strength, because your life is not upheld by what you can get for yourself, but by what God faithfully gives. Because of Christ in you, you can live a life marked by restful dependence where you stop grasping and start trusting. Again, you don't have to look out for yourself. That's really good news. Our second takeaway is to trust God where He has you. Don't grow impatient and step outside of His will. Here's McLaren again. God's promised protection is available, not in paths of our own choosing, but only where he has sent us. If we take the leap without his command, we shall fall mangled. It is when we are in the way which he has prescribed that the angels of God meet us. So here's the eye-opener, okay? Faith does not demand if we have faith, right? It does not demand that God prove himself. It's the idea of trusting him enough because of everything that he's shown you, everything that he's done for you, everything that he's said to you, trusting him enough to remain where he's placed you. And we can do that more and more the more we know him, which is why we abide and why I'm so passionate about being in the word. We are so prone, aren't we, to step outside of obedience just to feel secure, just to force clarity or just to make something happen. But God's protection and presence are promised in his will, not guaranteed outside of it. Because of Christ in you, you can live a life of quiet, steady obedience where you don't rush ahead or test God, but walk faithfully in his way, trusting that he will meet you there. Again, trust God where he has you. And finally, our third takeaway is worship of God alone that leads to victory. Jesus knew the Father, so he loved the Father. He naturally worshipped who he genuinely loved. I'm gonna say that again. He naturally worshiped who he genuinely loved, and that'll happen for you too, but you will naturally worship the father the more you genuinely love him. And the way that that happens is to know him more, and we know him more by abiding. It's exactly why we do what we do here. It's important for us to make a point here. This story isn't just about Jesus resisting temptation. It's not just a tale of saying no, it's about who Jesus chose in place of the no. He didn't just resist temptation, okay? He revealed what it looks like to love the Father above everything else. Yes, he said no, but then he turned every time to the Father, to the words that come from the mouth of God, to trusting the provision and the will of God by not testing God, and ultimately to not worshiping anyone other than God. Because of Christ in you, you can live a life of undivided worship where because you know and love the Father, you repeatedly choose God's way over the easy way, trusting that true victory only comes through surrender to Him. Again, worship of God alone leads to victory. You will fail, I will fail, but on our behalf, Christ never failed. Remember that. Remember what he did on your behalf, and worship will naturally follow. McLaren rightly points out Christ is king of all because he is servant of all. His cross is his throne. You guys, because he endured perfectly, we are not left to figure this out on our own. We are simply invited to follow him, to trust like he trusted, to obey like he obeyed, and to worship God alone from the wilderness, from the pinnacle of the temple, and from every mountaintop. Because he was victorious, we will be victorious. Satan's time is running out. So I'm gonna close with this beautiful thought from McLaren. That duel was fought for us. There we all conquered. If we will hold fast by him who conquered then, and thereby taught our hands to war and our fingers to fight, the strong man is bound. The spoiling of his house follows, of course, and is but a question of time. And that's it for this episode and this series. If you know someone who would be blessed by what you just heard, please share the Abidible podcast with them. Keep spreading the word so we can make much of the word. Drop us a review, tell us what you love and what you're learning. Check out the link to learn more about partnering with us by buying us a coffee one time, by joining our Abidible Plus women's Facebook membership community for $10 a month, or by becoming a monthly supporter. Again, this is it for our Into the Wilderness series. So next week before listening, you'd ideally, if you're going to be joining us for the Armor, you would have the Saturate Steps done ahead of time. We'll be going over our Abidible Intro steps, including annotation and background research. For those of you following along in the workbook, go ahead and begin working on pages two through four in your new study workbook. Ideally, you would have these sections done before you listen to our next episode number 92. If you need assistance with these skills, be sure to scan the QR codes in your workbook for some helpful tutorials. I'll pray for us and then close us out with our memory work for our entire passage, verses one through eleven. Father, we come to you in awe. All of your son who stood where we would have fallen, who endured what we could not endure, who faced the full force of the enemy and did not give an inch. Jesus, you did not look out for yourself. You trusted the Father. You did not test God, you obeyed him. You did not bow to Satan, you worshiped God alone. And because you did, you won. You won in the wilderness, which meant that you would soon win on the cross. And in the end, you win it all. So today we fix our eyes on you, not on our failures, not on our weaknesses, not on the weight of our temptations, but on Christ the Victor. Would you please teach us, continue to teach us what it means to abide in you? Where we are prone to strive and grasp, teach us to trust. Where we are tempted to step outside your will, teach us to remain. Where our hearts are divided, call us back to worship you alone. Spirit of God, strengthen us, not in our own might, but in the strength of the Lord. Remind us when we feel overwhelmed that the battle has already been won. Remind us when the temptation feels so strong that Satan has already been defeated. Remind us when we feel weak that Christ in us is stronger. Make us a people who endure. Make us a people who stand. Make us a people who worship you alone, no matter the setting, no matter the cost. And when we fail, because we will bring us quickly back to the truth that our hope is not in our perfection, but in Christ's. We love you, we trust you, we worship you. In Jesus' name. Amen. Let's close by doing our memory work together. I'm going to say all of Matthew 4, 1 through 11, one time. Say it out loud with me or quietly to yourself. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread. But he answered, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God. Then the devil took him to the holy city and set him 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 command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up lest you strike your foot against a stone. Jesus said to him, Again, it is written, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again 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 I will give you if you will fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve. Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him. Matthew 4 1 through 11. Remember, you are able to abide in the Bible. We'll see you next time. Until then, let's abide.