SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Kingdom Ambers 74 Helly Road Extension in Middlebury, Connecticut.
SPEAKER_00: We gather forcome to Kingdom Bound Church.
SPEAKER_00: We're continuing our sermon series study through the Gospel of Luke.
SPEAKER_00: So we are opening up the fourth chapter of Luke, and our primary thing we are going to work through is when Jesus was tempted by the devil himself.
SPEAKER_00: Whenever we read a passage of Scripture, we really need to know what happened before.
SPEAKER_00: So that's called context.
SPEAKER_00: That's important.
SPEAKER_00: What happened before is what we worked through a little while ago, and that's the baptism of our Lord, and our Lord's Jesus is genealogy.
SPEAKER_00: And the primary takeaway from it has to do with the identity of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: Who is Jesus?
SPEAKER_00: Who is he?
SPEAKER_00: Well, he is, of course, the promised Messiah.
SPEAKER_00: He is the Son of God, he is God incarnate, God with us.
SPEAKER_00: When Jesus was baptized, we'd read that the Father proclaimed, You are my beloved Son with you.
SPEAKER_00: I am well pleased.
SPEAKER_00: In short, what's really at stake here is the identity of Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: And now we are reading about the temptation of Jesus, where the devil challenges Jesus' identity.
SPEAKER_00: So if you haven't already, let's make your way to the fourth chapter, right?
SPEAKER_00: And let's work our way through this familiar passage piece by piece.
SPEAKER_00: So that's it's going to be Luke chapter 4, verses 1 through 13.
SPEAKER_00: Alright, let me read the first couple of verses.
SPEAKER_00: Then Jesus left the Jordan full of the Holy Spirit and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for 40 days to be tempted by the devil.
SPEAKER_00: He ate nothing during those days.
SPEAKER_00: And when they were over, he was hungry.
SPEAKER_00: Now let's stop.
SPEAKER_00: First, we see the immediate transition from Jesus' baptism into the wilderness to be tempted.
SPEAKER_00: The first thing we need to understand is that Jesus was led into the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: This was intentional.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus didn't just get baptized, went off to the next thing on his daily agenda, and received a surprise attack from the devil.
SPEAKER_00: The Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness.
SPEAKER_00: We need to continuously remember that Jesus came on a mission to save you, and this temptation that he is going to face is a necessary component of that mission.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus came to live a sinless life.
SPEAKER_00: He came to be mocked.
SPEAKER_00: He came to die.
SPEAKER_00: He came to resurrect from the dead.
SPEAKER_00: He came to do for you what was necessary to reconcile you to a holy God, to save you from God's wrath.
SPEAKER_00: He came to do for you what you couldn't do yourself.
SPEAKER_00: We need to remember that always as we read through the story of Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: And now for 40 days, Jesus was in the wilderness and it says that he ate nothing.
SPEAKER_00: When those 40 days were over, he was hungry.
SPEAKER_00: During those 40 days, he was tempted by the devil.
SPEAKER_00: Now, a couple of words about this.
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes it's asked if Jesus could really be tempted since he was God and God cannot sin.
SPEAKER_00: To answer this, allow me to appeal to Scripture as Jesus does to the devil, and then I'll share with you a thought from C.S.
SPEAKER_00: Lewis.
SPEAKER_00: Hebrews chapter 4, verse 15 says, For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weakness, but one who has been tempted in every way as we are, yet without sin.
SPEAKER_00: 1 Peter chapter 2, verse 22 says, He did not commit sin and no deceit was found in his mouth.
SPEAKER_00: 1 John chapter 3, verse 5 says, You know that he was revealed so that he might take away sins and there is no sin in him.
SPEAKER_00: Right there we see from Scripture, from God's word, from the Bible, that Jesus has been tempted in every way as we are.
SPEAKER_00: So yes, he truly was tempted in every way that you and I are, but we might protest and say, yeah, but could he truly have wrestled with temptation being the son of God?
SPEAKER_00: If, again, God cannot commit sin.
SPEAKER_00: Listen, listen again.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus was tempted in every way as we are.
SPEAKER_00: And I'll argue, he probably faced the intensity of his temptation more than most of us, if not all.
SPEAKER_00: Well, what do I mean by that?
SPEAKER_00: Well, C.S.
SPEAKER_00: Lewis once wrote in Mere Christianity, a great classic apologetical book, by the way, you should pick up.
SPEAKER_00: He wrote this A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means.
SPEAKER_00: That is an obvious lie.
SPEAKER_00: Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is.
SPEAKER_00: A man who gives in to temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later.
SPEAKER_00: That's his quote.
SPEAKER_00: This is going to sound hard, but it needs to be said.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be careful in assuming that those around us who don't easily give in to temptation actually don't experience true temptation.
SPEAKER_00: On desiringgod.org, John Piper said, said this: Don't you ever think that because you have lived a life of sin, that you know more about temptation than the godly person who would walk that razor's edge of the straight and narrow, gritting his teeth in the power of the Holy Spirit and saying, no, no, no, no, no, no, and fighting his way through every day with righteousness and laying his head down and feeling the full force of evil upon him day after day after day and triumphing over it in God.
SPEAKER_00: So, in other words, you who live a life of sin say you wrestle with temptation for five minutes and then gave in.
SPEAKER_00: No, that's not wrestling, that's giving in.
SPEAKER_00: Our Lord wrestled with it.
SPEAKER_00: Many people pursuing righteousness and holiness wrestles with it.
SPEAKER_00: You want to know what it is to wrestle with temptation?
SPEAKER_00: It's hanging in there with a tough marriage and resisting the temptation to bail.
SPEAKER_00: It's resisting the temptation to do something immoral.
SPEAKER_00: Not just for a few minutes or hours even, but for days, weeks, months, and years, all in the power of the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_00: That's wrestling.
SPEAKER_00: And our Lord Jesus wrestled.
SPEAKER_00: He was tempted in every way imaginable, and that's been the case, his entire earthly presence, by the way.
SPEAKER_00: Have we forgotten that Jesus was?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, fully God, but also at the same time, fully human.
SPEAKER_00: So here's another thing I want to mention here, and it's the fact that the devil tempted Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: The devil is real, but the devil isn't everywhere.
SPEAKER_00: To ascribe to the devil the same attributes as we ascribe to God, being omnipresent, omnipotent, omniscient, all-knowing, all-powerful, all-present, is straight up heresy.
SPEAKER_00: Here, the devil really showed up in time, in space, and tempted Jesus for 40 days while he was hungry.
SPEAKER_00: I mention this because we need to have a word about our sin and our temptation.
SPEAKER_00: James chapter 1, verse 13-14 says, No one undergoing a trial should say, I am being tempted by God, since God is not tempted by evil, and he himself doesn't tempt anyone.
SPEAKER_00: But each person is tempted when he is drawn away and enticed by his own evil desire.
SPEAKER_00: First, God does not tempt.
SPEAKER_00: Second, stop blaming the devil.
SPEAKER_00: For the devil cannot be everywhere at every time.
SPEAKER_00: He isn't God.
SPEAKER_00: And third, you don't need the devil, for it is the evil desire that's in you that'll work on his own.
SPEAKER_00: When we sin, we need to be man enough to say, I'm responsible for sinning and for giving in.
SPEAKER_00: Don't blame the devil, don't blame circumstances, don't blame location, don't blame people, don't blame how we grew up, blame ourselves, take responsibility and repent.
SPEAKER_00: So let's continue in verse 3 through 4.
SPEAKER_00: It says, The devil said to him, If you are the son of God, tell this stone to become bread.
SPEAKER_00: But Jesus answered him, It is written, man must not live on bread alone.
SPEAKER_00: Again, Satan goes right after Jesus' identity by saying, If you are the Son of God, now Satan knows who Jesus is.
SPEAKER_00: He's just being wicked, crafty, and sly.
SPEAKER_00: As we encounter the three ways in which the devil tempts Satan, we are immediately, I'm sorry, as we encounter the three different ways that the devil tempts, got my words all mixed up there.
SPEAKER_00: We are immediately brought back to Adam and Eve, where both were tempted by the serpent.
SPEAKER_00: The theme in Luke is this idea that Jesus would be the second Adam.
SPEAKER_00: Adam and Eve were tempted and gave in.
SPEAKER_00: They failed.
SPEAKER_00: Jesus would be brought through the ringer with Satan, and Jesus would secede where Adam had failed.
SPEAKER_00: When the devil tries to get Jesus to just turn this stone into bread, since Jesus was very hungry, Jesus responded with the authority of Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Could Jesus have easily turned these stones into bread?
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
SPEAKER_00: His divine nature would allow him to do so, but in appealing to his human nature and being tempted while hungry, he chose not to.
SPEAKER_00: And in choosing not to, he appeals to the word of the God.
SPEAKER_00: It's thus saith the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: And to be honest, many Christians and churches can learn a lot from this today.
SPEAKER_00: Our pulpits are being filled with individuals who simply won't appeal to Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Churches everywhere are tempted to cave into culture, bend the knees to society for fear of losing money and members.
SPEAKER_00: And they twist scripture to suit those needs.
SPEAKER_00: And what's ironic is that the only ones who twist scripture is Satan himself, as we will find out in this very next verse.
SPEAKER_00: At best in many of our churches, is that we'll preach a sermon and sprinkle a couple of Bible verses on it, which it needs to be the other way around.
SPEAKER_00: We need to be preaching, thus saith the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Our example here is Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: What we should be doing is saying, this is what the Lord has said.
SPEAKER_00: When culture demands an answer to, is abortion wrong, we respond by saying yes, because the word of God says so.
SPEAKER_00: If culture demands an answer to, is marriage really only between a man and a woman, we respond by saying yes because the word of God says so.
SPEAKER_00: We need to get back to this and stop making this concept a gray area.
SPEAKER_00: When the Lord has spoken, it's clear and simple.
SPEAKER_00: When the devil tempts Jesus, Jesus responds with scripture.
SPEAKER_00: Not an opinion, not an article from the newspaper, not a response from a Christian artist at the Grammys.
SPEAKER_00: No, it's scripture alone.
SPEAKER_00: The sufficiency of God's word.
SPEAKER_00: Let's continue in our passage.
SPEAKER_00: Verses 5 through 11.
SPEAKER_00: So he took him up and shoved and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
SPEAKER_00: The devil said to him, I will give you their splendor and all authority because he has been given over, because it has been given over to me, and I can give it to anyone I want.
SPEAKER_00: If you then will worship me, all will be yours.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus answered him, It is written, Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.
SPEAKER_00: So he took him to Jerusalem, had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from there, from here.
SPEAKER_00: For it is written, He will give his angels orders concerning you to protect you, and they will support you with their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.
SPEAKER_00: So what we have here is the devil doing what the devil does well.
SPEAKER_00: Is the devil doing to scripture what many Christians and churches are doing to Scripture?
SPEAKER_00: Did the devil quote Scripture as it is written?
SPEAKER_00: Yes, he did.
SPEAKER_00: In fact, he's quoting Psalm 91, 11 through 12.
SPEAKER_00: So what's the issue?
SPEAKER_00: The issue is bad hermeneutics.
SPEAKER_00: I mean, for starters, we can all agree that the devil here knew exactly what he was doing.
SPEAKER_00: But there is an important lesson for us here.
SPEAKER_00: It's this.
SPEAKER_00: R.
SPEAKER_00: C.
SPEAKER_00: Spro says, the first rule of hermeneutics is the scripture interpretes scripture, which means we are not to set one portion of scripture against another.
SPEAKER_00: Satan ignored that.
SPEAKER_00: So hermeneutics is the art of interpreting scripture.
SPEAKER_00: That's all that means.
SPEAKER_00: And what we have today is many Christians and churches preaching portions of scripture that has absolutely nothing to do with what they are preaching on or talking about.
SPEAKER_00: And one of the reasons for this is that most Christians simply do not know their Bibles.
SPEAKER_00: They don't read it entirely.
SPEAKER_00: They read what they want to read, and that is incredibly dangerous.
SPEAKER_00: Any one of us can take a verse or passage to suit whatever we want it to.
SPEAKER_00: In Jeremiah 29, 11, it says, For I know the plans I have for you.
SPEAKER_00: This is the Lord's declaration, plans for you, plans for your well-being, not for disaster, to give you a future and hope.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, he has plans for you.
SPEAKER_00: He has plans for you.
SPEAKER_00: Yes, life can very much not go the way you want it to.
SPEAKER_00: And when it doesn't go the way you want it to, we get mad at God saying, We've plastered this verse on our cars and you betrayed us.
SPEAKER_00: Um, you betrayed Scripture.
SPEAKER_00: We need to get back to reading Scripture in its context and proper form.
SPEAKER_00: We need to get back to biblical literacy.
SPEAKER_00: Let's finish up our passage here in the last two verses, 12 and 13.
SPEAKER_00: It says, and Jesus answered him, it is said, Do not test the Lord your God.
SPEAKER_00: After the devil had finished every temptation, he departed from him for a time.
SPEAKER_00: So after the devil tempts Jesus with provision, power, and protection, and Jesus doesn't cave in, he simply departs.
SPEAKER_00: I'm going to wrap up with something for you to take away when you are facing temptation.
SPEAKER_00: The first thing is this do not play with it.
SPEAKER_00: If you think that you are strong enough to will yourself to defeat temptation, you're foolish.
SPEAKER_00: Second, run to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You can quote scripture, but I'm also telling you to run to Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: You need to remember that temptation isn't it isn't sin, it's giving into it that is sin.
SPEAKER_00: And thirdly, the victory of Jesus in the desert becomes ours.
SPEAKER_00: And so we are no longer slaves to sin, unable to resist temptation.
SPEAKER_00: One commentator wrote, and I'm gonna end with this.
SPEAKER_00: He wrote, We fight against the allures of sin by going to Jesus in faith and prayer, knowing that the one who fought the tempter on our behalf is with us to help us in our time.