The Temptation and Testing in the Wilderness

It will take me just a minute to get everything connected up here. I apologize for the little bit of a late start today. To count it up, I think we have about 10 different pieces of equipment and about five or six different adapters and seven or eight different cables. I'm trying to get them all to talk together.

Sometimes they have a bad day, kind of like some of us sometimes do. Not everything worked quite right. For some reason, something's still not working quite right. Okay, now we're almost talking. This is not supposed to be happening in case you're wondering. Why did you break it? When all else fails, unplug and replug everything. There we go. Not the right color, but at least we've got an image.

There we go. Okay. Now we're cooking. Okay. By the way, is there anyone who doesn't have a harmony here to go through today? Okay. Let's see. A couple of people who need one, but only have one here. Does anybody have two of them that you can spare for some of our visitors or guests? Okay. Yeah. We will be using that quite a bit today. Today we're going to be talking about a spiritual battle. It's a battle in which the stakes could not be any higher. It's a battle to be blunt.

It's over our salvation. Because if Jesus of Nazareth failed in this battle… What we're going to be talking about today is a spiritual battle, a battle in which the stakes couldn't be any higher. Because it is a battle that to be blunt is about our salvation. Because if Jesus of Nazareth failed in this battle, if he gave in to Satan's temptations and sinned, we would have no Savior. God's plan would have been thwarted, and we would have been left with no sacrifice to pay the penalty for our sins. We would all have been dead in our sins.

This is also, we'll be talking about today, a battle for ultimate control. Because in what we'll be covering today, we have the ruler and the God of this world, Satan the devil, doing battle against the one who has come to replace him, and to overthrow Satan as that ruler so he can return as King of kings and Lord of lords to establish the kingdom of God on earth, and to end Satan's reign so they can no longer deceive mankind, so he can no longer lead mankind into slavery and sin.

And so again, the stakes could not be any higher than in the battle that we'll be talking about today. And for those of you who are visitors, this is part of an ongoing series we're going through the Gospels, verse by verse, line by line, chapter by chapter. And that's why we have this harmony of the Gospels that we're going through, because it compares all four of the Gospel accounts side by side so you can read and pick up details that one of the Gospel's writers mentions that others may leave out.

So it's become a very helpful tool in going through the Gospels this way. And what we see in this story that we'll be talking about today, which is the temptation and testing in the wilderness, the battle between Satan the Devil and Jesus Christ, we see the story of how Satan is once again trying to thwart God's plan. We saw this earlier, we talked about several lessons ago, when Satan tried to use Herod, King Herod the Great, to kill the infant boys there in Jerusalem. And we'll see it again later, a number of times in the Gospels, when Satan tries to have Jesus killed before his time, before God's plan is fitting together correctly.

So this is not the first time that Satan is trying to thwart God's plan, and it will not be the last. It will happen a number of other times. And the time-sending is also important here to consider, because when Satan tried to have Jesus killed as an infant, what was he trying to do? He was trying to end Jesus Christ's ministry before it ever got off the ground.

And we see that again here, because Jesus is just beginning his ministry. So we talked about last time, we talked about his baptism there by John the Baptizer. So Satan does not want Jesus to begin his ministry, does not want that message to go out. He does not want to see Jesus called the disciples, who would carry on his work after him. He does not want the story and the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth to be recorded and passed down to all mankind. He does not want Jesus to be successful in his mission and purpose.

So he's doing everything he can to try to thwart that and short-circuit it before this can ever happen. And that's where we'll pick up the story today. And to use an analogy, what we're doing in this is we're acting like archaeologists. And I think this is a very helpful analogy, because when you just look at the surface of the ground, you see a little bit of the story.

You may see a broken pot shirt here, or a worn-out used tool here, something like that. But it's only when you start really digging down, digging through the layers, digging through the differences in culture and history and understanding, because we are in a culture that's very different from that of 2,000 years ago. It's only when you really start digging down below the surface that you really begin to dig out and learn a lot of the lessons that are there for us to understand.

So that's a helpful analogy in going through this today. So let's set the stage for what we'll be talking about today. The events that we read about today take place in what is called the Judean Desert.

And I've been there before. A few others here have as well. It's called wilderness in the Gospels there. Most scholars identify it with the Judean Desert or Judean wilderness, basically on the west side of the Jordan River in the Jordan Valley, going up into the foothills of the Judean Mountains there. Again, it's a very desolate area. It makes some of our desert areas like Utah or Arizona or parts of California look positively lush by comparison.

Here's another view of it showing what it looks like. Very rugged, very inhospitable there. It's very hot, very dry. And yet at the same time, it's very humid because the Jordan River Valley is several hundred feet at the deepest, about a thousand feet below sea level. So you get all the humidity from the Dead Sea and the Jordan River in here as well.

So it's really a very miserable environment there. All in all, it's a place that's quite dangerous where you can find a number of creative ways to die in a very short time if you're not careful and paying attention to what you're doing. So this is the setting for the story that we'll be talking about today. I'll start with Mark's Gospel, and you'll find it down at the bottom of page 10 in the Harmony of the Gospels.

Mark, as we've discussed before, is a writer of action, very little words, very little conversation, just all action, all the time, is the way I would describe Mark. And we see that here. He summarizes his story in just a couple of verses. So let's take a look at those, because he adds a particular element to the story that Matthew and Luke leave out.

So Mark says, Immediately the Spirit drove Jesus into the wilderness, and he was there in the wilderness forty days, tempted by Satan, and was with the wild beasts. And then he summarizes it again, and the angels ministered to him. So the element that Mark introduces here, that is not included in Matthew and Mark and Luke, is that there were wild beasts there in this desert as well. In earlier times, we read through the books of the Old Testament. You'll see references to other creatures in this wilderness, like lions, for instance, occasionally a bear that you run into, the stories of David and Samson and individuals like that.

Now, a thousand or so years later, those animals are no longer mentioned. They've apparently been driven out of that area. However, there are still some pretty dangerous creatures there in that area, creatures like scorpions, for instance, that are endemic to that area, the desert scorpions there. There are also creatures, the desert jackal, that lives in that area.

They would occupy kind of the ecological niche of coyotes and wolves in the American West here. They would hunt in packs and could bring down animals like antelope, things like that, and a human being, especially a human being who's out in the desert all alone, as Jesus is. There's also another type of wild creature that we talked about last time in discussing John, and it is the desert viper, a very dangerous animal that burrows itself down into sand like that. So, they're almost invisible.

So, these are some of the kind of wild beasts, wild creatures, that would have been there in the desert environment where we're reading about this story today. So, again, there are a number of ways to die in this kind of environment here. From heat, it gets very hot down in the Jordan Valley, maybe up to about 120 or so. From exposure, because it gets very cold at night there in the desert at the same time.

From accidents, from bandits, a lot of bandits hanging out in that area as well. From encountering these snakes and scorpions and jackals. You could die of thirst. You could die of starvation, especially for fasting 40 days and 40 nights as Jesus is here. So, why does Jesus go into this dangerous environment? What's really the backstory that's taking place here? Matthew, Mark, and Luke all tell us that the Holy Spirit led Jesus into this environment.

Mark, being the writer of action, even says the Holy Spirit drove Jesus to go there. But why? Why? You ever thought about that? Why did Jesus go to this very inhospitable place for these events that we read about here? Well, because in that environment, you know one thing for sure. You don't know where your next meal is coming from. You don't know where you're going to be able to find water. You don't know where you're going to sleep at night, but you know one thing for sure. And that one thing is that you have to rely on God to survive.

Because if you don't, if God does not supply your needs, you're a goner. You're going to die in that environment. It's that simple. So you have to rely on God to survive, and without Him, you're dead in that kind of environment.

So while physically, Jesus may have been incredibly weak after fasting for 40 days and 40 nights, but spiritually, He was very strong because He is very reliant on God during this time. Luke 4 in verse 1, you can read there in your harmony, says that He was filled with the Holy Spirit. And this filled is a Greek word that means filled to the brim, filled to the full, to overflowing, saturated, you might say, permeated, lacking nothing. Those are some of the meanings of that Greek word. So He is filled with God's Spirit, filled to overflowing, and He would certainly need that through the events that are coming, as we'll see here in the rest of the study today.

So let's pick up the story now in Matthew 4 and verse 1, and get right into it here. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And this word tempted can also mean testing, or tested, or put to the test to prove something, like test driving a car to make sure that it runs, you might say the same word would apply there. And that's why I've called this lesson the temptation and testing in the wilderness, the temptation and testing, because it's Satan doing the tempting, but it is Jesus who is being tested to see if He's going to pass that test. And both of these concepts of temptation and testing are at work in the story that we're covering today. And verse 2, and when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry. Now let's notice several things here. Again, it's easy to read through a lot of this and think we know and understand the story, but when you really analyze it, there's a lot going on here that you miss if you're just looking at the surface.

So first of all, this was not just a forty-day fast. This was an all-out spiritual struggle on Jesus' part in which the stakes are enormous, as I talked about a bit in the introduction there.

Fasting without food or water for forty days and nights is impossible for a human being without God's help there. But there was much more to the ordeal than just fasting. I mean, for us, thinking of fasting forty days or forty nights would be absolutely overwhelming. But there's actually much more to it there. There's the temptation element, the testing element, there as well. Now we tend to read this story the way Matthew words it here and assume that Jesus fasted forty days and forty nights, and then after that these temptations come at the end of that, bang, bang, bang, right in a row there. And Jesus, being spiritually strong, then shoots down those temptations all in a row as well. But is this the way that it happened? Let's take a look at Luke's Gospel here, and this is why it's very helpful to compare the different Gospel accounts, because you get different shades of meaning and understanding from this. So notice the way Luke words this.

Luke 1 and Luke 4 and verses 1 and 2. Then Jesus, being filled with the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, where he was baptized, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, and being tempted for forty days by the devil. You notice the difference in the wording.

Luke is saying Jesus was tempted for forty days. Matthew, the way he words it, makes it sound like he fasted forty days and forty nights and then was tempted. Luke is saying, and I think this is the way it's happening here, is that it was forty days of temptation, not forty days of fasting, followed by temptation. So in other words, it's a forty-day process of tempting and testing there.

Not forty days of fasting and then three temptations, and it's over with. This adds another dimension to the story here, because it's not forty days of just fasting, but forty days of fasting combined with the temptations of Satan the devil thrown in there. And in those days, Luke 4 and verse 2, he ate nothing, and afterward, when they had ended, he was hungry.

So again, this indicates that temptation took place not at the end, but over the duration of this forty-day span here. And again, I think that is a more likely explanation of the way things took place here. Because, after all, probably any of us could have one really spiritually good, strong day when Satan could tempt us and we could stand up to it. But how many of us could endure forty days of intense temptation by Satan the devil? Probably not many.

Probably not any of us there. So this adds a deeper level of our understanding of what is going on here. One brief side note here. This is on a side to this. People read this, and they clearly accept that when this is forty days and forty nights, that is what it means. Forty days and forty nights. But notice, just as a side note, when Matthew also records that Jesus says he is going to be in the grave three days and three nights, most people don't accept that.

They interpret that to say, no, he really meant a day and a half there.

The time he was in the grave, because they try to fit it between a Friday night or a Friday sunset and a Sunday morning resurrection. My point is that people have no problem accepting forty days and forty nights in this account. But when Matthew also says three days and three nights, they say, no, that really means a day and a half there. So next time somebody tries to explain to you that's what that means, just say, well, are you saying then that Jesus was only tempted for twenty days? How does that work? Same wording as you do. See what they say. Mostly they won't have any kind of comeback to that, because there is no comeback. So again, Matthew is consistent in his wording there. Three days and three nights means the same as forty days and forty nights. It's three full days and nights and forty full days and nights. Just something to file away and keep in your mind if that discussion comes up. Yes, David. I think it's interesting that it didn't just happen right? Right. Yeah, yeah. Forty day period there. Yes, Cal. I have a problem with the reading that I'm talking about. That is, that is the working period. Yes. Right. Right. Yeah, yeah. What Cal is referring to there.

In Islam, if you've probably heard of Ramadan, it's their month of fasting. And the way they fast is they fast during the day. But come night, as soon as it's sunset, it's party time. Man, you make up for, you're not allowed to eat, drink, smoke, or have sex during the day during Ramadan if you're a Muslim. And I've been over there several times during that period of man. Come sundown, it's party time. And you can see the smoke just start rising from all the guys, you know, the nicotine addicts. We've got to have their... Yes. Right. I tell you, it's dangerous to drive over there, too, during that period. Because, yeah, we've been over there for the feast a couple of times when it's overlapped. And the drivers are just thoroughly and irritable. Because, again, they're not eating, they're not drinking. And 90-100 degree heat and can't have their nicotine fix. So it's a dangerous situation there. So got to take that into account there. Yes.

All right. Yeah, Kadi was reminding me, we'd be on tour buses in Jordan or Egypt during this period. And, yeah, as soon as it's sundown, we're on a tour bus, 30-40 people on this bus. And as soon as it's sundown, yeah, the bus pulls over and the driver gets up, got to have his smoke.

Smoke two or three cigarettes and get on the bus, and then we're off again. So it's interesting the way that that happens here. But, yeah, to fast 40 days and 40 nights is, again, something that's humanly unendurable there. So you definitely need God's help in that.

So let's go to something else here. I've talked about the concept of Rimes before. And if you haven't heard that sermon, please download it from the website or listen to it here. I gave it about two months ago. Sermon on Rimes, R-E-M-E-Z. It's a Hebrew word that means hint or clue or look back or echo. It has a number of different meanings here. And basically we find it used a number of times in the Gospels. I gave 12 or 15 different examples of it in that sermon. And basically we find it taking place in the Gospels time after time after time. I'll give you a few examples of it. There are examples of spoken Rimes where Jesus will quote part of a passage and he expects his audience to fill in the rest of it. We find all four of the Gospel writers using it where they will refer to something and not explain it. And they expect you as the reader to fill in the rest of the story. We find also action Rimes where people will do something to specifically remind their audience of something else. As an example of that, we talked about recently with John the Baptist. How was John dressed? He was dressed wearing a leather belt, which is quite distinctive at that time because most people just wear a robe or cord around their waist to hold their robe shut. He was also wearing an animal skin or camel skin, camel hair garment there. Why is he doing that? Well, if you go back and read the way Elijah was dressed, he's dressing exactly like Elijah.

What message is he sending by dressing like Elijah? He's sending the message that he is the prophesied Elijah to come who is going to prepare the way for the coming of the Lord.

Jesus, in one of his healings that we talked about, heals the son of a widow, the only son of a widow, her only child. Where does he do that? He does it in a little town in Galilee that's about a half a mile from where Elijah healed the son of a widow, the only son of a widow. What message is Jesus sending by doing that? He's sending the message that he is a prophet, like Elijah. When John the Baptist is baptizing, there are two places that are specifically mentioned where he's baptizing in the Jordan River Valley. Those two places, one of them, is very near where Elijah passed his mantle off to Elisha at the end of his ministry.

And the other, where he actually baptizes Jesus, is about a half a mile from where he crossed the Jordan River with Elisha. If you remember the story, he struck the Jordan River with his cloak and it parted like the Red Sea, and they crossed over. Jesus was baptized within a few hundred yards, or half a mile or so, from where that took place. And Elijah then ascended into heaven with the chariot from the place of Jesus' baptism. You can see the hill, whereby tradition that took place. So that's just a little hint or clue as to some of the content of that sermon and the method. And we find Jesus Christ using this method. We find John the Baptist using it. Most of the last two weeks ago, three weeks ago, sermon was about examples of Rimes when Jesus is baptized. There, we find God the Father using Rimes. We find all four gospel writers using it. So if you don't understand that principle, you miss an awful lot of the story as you go through the gospels. When you understand that's what the writers are doing, it suddenly clears up a lot of things that may be puzzling there. So with that background here, let's notice something else. How many days did Jesus fast? Anybody? 40 days and 40 nights. Didn't fast 20 days. Didn't fast 30 days. Didn't fast 39 days. Didn't fast 41 days. He fasted 40 days and nights. Exactly 40. What's the Rimes? What's the point? What's he trying to send a message about? Yes, David? I think it links with Noah. The 40 days he's on the Ark. Yeah, okay. Good one. I hadn't thought quite about that one. Yeah, 40 years in the wilderness.

Interesting. 40 and wilderness. Double connection there. Faye? Yes?

Exactly. Yes. Moses fasting 40 days and 40 nights. Actually did it twice.

Carefully there. Anybody else? Anybody else that fasted 40 days and 40 nights? Elijah. Yes, yes. Very good. Very good. Yeah, that's one reason I sent out the study questions for us to think about some of these things here. So yes, here Jesus is fasting specifically 40 days and 40 nights to send a message. This is what I would call an action Rimes.

He's doing something. He's sending a message that isn't evident on the surface by fasting specifically for 40 days. So let's take a look at these. Dissect them a little more clearly here. Let's look, first of all, the example of Moses that was mentioned there. Deuteronomy 9, verse 9. And this is Moses speaking. He says, When I went up into the mountain, Mount Sinai, to receive the tablets of stone, the tablets of the covenant, which the Eternal made with you, then I stayed on the mountain forty days and forty nights. I neither ate bread nor drank water. So this is what Moses did. Jesus comes along 1500 approximately years later and fasts 40 days and 40 nights. What's the message?

What message is he sending by fasting 40 days and 40 nights like Moses? What's the point?

That's why Rimes is so important because there's a point there that isn't necessarily stated but he wants you to understand. So, yes, Tim.

Exactly, exactly. Yes, Moses prophesied that he would send a prophet like him. And we find that Deuteronomy 18, verses 17 and 18. This is again Moses speaking. And the Eternal said to me, I will raise up for them the Israelites a prophet like you from among their brethren, and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command him.

So what message is Jesus sending? He's sending the message that he is that prophet like Moses.

He's not coming right out and saying, yes, I'm the prophet that Moses prophesied about. No, but by his actions he's saying the same thing. People read through the Gospels and they say, well, why doesn't Jesus just come right out and say he's the Messiah? Well, he does again and again and again and again and again. He just does it in a Jewish way. He does it in a Middle Eastern way by his actions. Same way that John sent the message that he is the second Elijah, because he's carrying out his works at Elijah places, where Elijah did great things. He's dressing like Elijah. He's sending the message by his actions without explicitly stating it there.

Okay, let's look at another example here. The one of Elijah fasting 40 days and 49. We find that in 1 Kings 19, verses 1 through 8. And Ahab, this is after Elijah has executed all the prophets of Baal, and Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, also how he had executed all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, So let the gods do to me, and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by tomorrow about this time.

When Elijah saw that, he arose and ran for his life and went to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah and left his servant there. This is about 120 miles that he ran from the northern part of the country down to the desert at Beersheba in the south of Israel. But he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness, the desert, and came and sat down under a broom tree. And he prayed that he might die and said, It is enough. Now, eternal, take my life, for I am no better than my father's. Then as he lay and slept under a broom tree, suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, Arise and eat. And then he looked, and there by his head was a cake baked on coals and a jar of water. So he ate and drank and lay down again. And the angel of the Eternal came back the second time and touched Elijah and said, Arise and eat, because the journey is too great for you. So Elijah arose and ate and drank, and he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights as far as Horeb, our Mount Sinai, the mountain of God. So again, here's another Rimes. Jesus, by fasting forty days and forty nights, is doing a double Rimes. He's reminding people he's the prophet like Moses, and he's also reminding people of Elijah fasting forty days and forty nights. So again, what's the point? What's the point of the Rimes? Sometimes you just have to think it through. Well, the point is he is a great prophet like Elijah. Same thing when he heals, as I mentioned ago, the only son of a widow half a mile from where Elijah had done the same thing. He's sending the message that he is a great prophet like Elijah when he heals the widow's son. Now he's sending the message that he is a prophet like Elijah. Here. So you have to, again, as I mentioned before, if you don't know the story, if you don't know the text, if you don't know what's gone before, you miss it. You can't play if you don't know the text. So let's look at another example here. Notice, too, you know, Jesus doesn't just fast for forty days and forty nights. There's another element of that in where he goes to fast because he could have fasted anywhere. He could have stayed there by the Jordan River where he was just baptized and fasted there. He could have gone up to Galilee and fasted. He could have gone to Jerusalem and fasted. But no, what he does is he goes into the wilderness to fast. Again, this reinforces the connection with Moses and Elijah. But there's another story as well. And this was mentioned, I don't recall who brought it up here. But that is the example of Israel. Israel's forty years of wandering in the desert, in the wilderness. Because, as you mentioned to a Jew, the number forty in the wilderness, they would have immediately thought, yes, Israel wandering forty years in the wilderness. It's just a natural connection there that they would have made. So what Jesus wants you to think with this number forty in the wilderness is to think of Israel's forty years of wandering in the wilderness. Now, does that sound like a bit of a stretch? Well, consider a few other things. When Jesus responds to Satan, where does he choose to quote from? Anybody know? Quotes from one biblical book all three times. Which book? Deuteronomy.

What's the story of Deuteronomy? It's a recounting of the Exodus story and the lessons that Israel learned or failed to learn from their forty years of wandering. So Jesus is reinforcing that connection of Israel with the forty years of wandering by quoting from Deuteronomy. He quotes three of the great lessons that Israel was to learn from that. We'll see when we go through the specifics of what he answers here. So, let's turn over to another scripture here that talks about that, Deuteronomy 8, verses 2 and 3. This is Moses speaking for God to the Israelites. And you shall remember that the eternal your God led you all the way these forty years in the wilderness to humble you and test you to know what was in your heart, whether you would keep His commandments or not. So He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna, which you did not know nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the eternal. And last part sounds familiar. Jesus is going to quote it in just a minute here.

When we get to that. So why then does Jesus want the readers of this to think about the Israelites in the wilderness? What's the message? What's the connection?

There are a number of reasons, but I wrote down just a few of them that came to be here, parallels here. First, God led Israel into the desert to be tested for forty years.

God led Jesus into the desert to be tested for forty days. Second point, Israel failed their test, but Jesus passed His test. Third point, Israel failed. Why? For lack of faith.

Jesus passed His test because of faith. Fourth point, Israel failed to trust God.

Jesus, on the other hand, completely trusted God. Fifth point, Israel was a faithless nation and people, but Jesus is building a new nation and people based on faith.

There's just a few. There's probably a number of more parallels you could think of in this, but these are some of the things that Jesus wants us to think about in this story here, concluding the last point most of all that Israel failed for lack of faith because they were faithless. But Jesus is building what? He's building a new spiritual nation, a spiritual people based on faith. As we know from Hebrews, without faith, it is impossible to please Him.

So we have to be a people of faith there. I might also point out that Jesus Himself does this as well as the Gospel writers and other writers of the New Testament continually tie Jesus to images and events from the 40 years of wandering in the desert.

Continually. Happens all the time. You see it again and again and again. This 40 years was a defining event in the history of Israel there, and it also tells us a great deal about Jesus Christ's role in our Exodus, if you will, on our journey to our Promised Land. I'll list a few of these just briefly, and then we'll go through and talk about them in a little more detail. These are some of the wilderness images that we find in the writings of the New Testament connecting Jesus with the Exodus. First of all, as we talked about, Jesus was a prophet like Moses. Second, He is our high priest. The priesthood was established during the wilderness wandering there. He is the light of the world. John calls Him that number of times in his Gospel. That's one of the big themes of John. Light versus dark, the light that is Jesus Christ versus the darkness that is Satan in the world.

There are two great lights talked about heavily in the Exodus story. One is the menorah and the tabernacle, and the other, of course, is the pillar of fire there that led the Israelites or watched over them by night. There's the bronze serpent, which we'll talk about more in just a moment here. There's the rock from which the water flowed in the wilderness. There's the Passover lamb that Jesus is likened to. There's the sacrificial system that foreshadowed. You might say it was a rim as looking forward to Jesus Christ's role and ministry there. And last but not least, there is manna. So let's go back and look at all of these. We'll cover them very, very quickly here for lack of time, but I'll show you the scriptural backup for why I mention these. First of all, I say we already talked about this, but let me bring this up. Then He would be a prophet like Moses. We mentioned this a minute ago, Deuteronomy 18, verses 17 and 18. Moses, speaking of the Eternal, said to me, I will raise up for them a prophet like you from among their brethren.

And here's a couple of references from the New Testament, John 6, verse 14, 7, and 40, where the people see some of the miracles Jesus performs. And they say, truly, this is THE prophet.

What prophet? Not a prophet, but THE prophet. Well, it's THE prophet like Moses. People recognize this during Jesus' ministry there. Second, he is our high priest. There, as we know, from Hebrews 4 and verse 14, mentioned many times in the book of Hebrews, seeing then that we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our confession. Also, I mentioned John repeatedly refers to Jesus as the light of the world, two major symbols there from the Exodus story, the menorah there in the tabernacle, as well as the pillar of fire there, in this case depicted at the foot of Mount Sinai there with the tabernacle there in the middle and the Israelites encamped around this. We won't cover a lot of scriptures here again. You can just do a search for light in the Gospel of John. You'll find a number of references. Here's just one. This is in John, the first chapter, verse 9, where John says, Jesus Christ was the true light which gives light to every man coming into the world. And, of course, later Jesus says himself, I am the light of the world. There's a different context for that we'll talk about when we get to that point.

There's also the story of the bronze serpent. And if you remember, there were snakes among the Israelites that were killing people, and God told Moses and Aaron to make a brass snake, a bronze snake, erected on a pole. And if the people looked at it, they would be spared from being killed by the serpent there. And there's an analogy there. Well, let's turn there, John 3, verse 14, where Jesus says, And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up, referring to his crucifixion. He's comparing that because Moses raised the bronze serpent on the pole, and the people were saved.

Jesus is lifted up and crucified, and people are saved. Same analogy that's used there.

Another one, Jesus is depicted as the rock from which the water flowed there in the wilderness.

And we find that in 1 Corinthians 10, verse 4, where Paul says, For they drank of that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. Elsewhere, Jesus says a couple of times, he's the source of living water, of life-giving water there in the spiritual desert that mankind lives in. Another one, that Jesus is the Passover lamb, or the fulfillment of the Passover lamb. And of course, that started the Exodus story with the Passover and the firstborn of the Israelites being spared by the blood on the doorpost, and the Egyptian firstborn being killed there. And Pharaoh is saying, Okay, I've had enough. Get out of here. Leave my country. So that starts the Exodus story, and it starts our journey to salvation as well, by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, the true Passover. And we read about that in John 1, verse 29.

This is around the time of Jesus' baptism. The next day, John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

Again, drawing the analogy, the comparison of the Passover lamb.

Jesus was also the fulfillment of the sacrificial system. There, all of those sacrifices pointed to him, his role in our salvation. And several verses here in one passage, Hebrews 10, verses 11-14.

And every high priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices which can never take away sins. This is talking about the sacrifices that were still being offered in the Jerusalem Temple at that time, because the temple hasn't been destroyed yet. But this man, Jesus, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down at the right hand of God, from that time waiting till his enemies are made his footstool. For by one offering, he has perfected forever those who are being sanctified. So this is telling us that Jesus has fulfilled the sacrificial system by his own offering one time. And that perfects forever those who are being sanctified, made holy by that. One other, the manna from heaven here. If you remember the story, they were brought out into the desert. They were hungry.

And God sent for 40 years a manna from heaven to provide for and sustain the people.

And notice what Jesus says in John 6, verses 31-33. And this is the people speaking first, Our fathers ate the manna in the desert. As it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat.

Then Jesus said to them, Most assuredly I say to you, Moses did not give you the bread from heaven, but my father gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world. So Jesus is saying, I am the true manna from heaven, the true bread that gives life. It sustains people there. So there's a number of different points there. I think that's eight or nine there. By the way, some of you men who are looking for sermonette topics, here's a whole bunch right there for you. So any of these could be expanded on, talked about. I've just hit them very quickly with a little bit of scriptural support. Yes, Dave?

Is there something significant about the Bible?

Well, it's understood in biblical terminology of trying and testing. Basically, that's the context in which we find it. The trying and testing of the Israelites 40 years in the wilderness of Moses and Elijah and Jesus fasting for 40 days and 40 nights. That's the most obvious symbolism of the number 40 there. There you go. I better not get into that. Jesus does things by the numbers on a number of occasions. I could really give a whole sermon on that. The number 12, the number 7, the number 70, the number 40. They show up at different times in the Gospels, again, to send a specific message because they're all examples of Rimmaz. He's sending a message. He wants his audience to think about what those numbers mean and how those numbers are used elsewhere in the Bible. It's just a major, major subject there. And you see those numbers repeating. The book of Revelation is just full of seven seals, seven trumpets, seven eras, seven churches, these types of things. Yes, God definitely works with patterns of numbers there. We see this quite a few times in the Gospels too as well. Don't have time to go into that now. Basically, all of this we've talked about here is wrapped up in the symbolism of Jesus fasting for 40 days in the wilderness. And again, there might be others that I didn't think of here, other pictures that tie Jesus in with the story of the Exodus. And again, he could have fasted any number of days, could have fasted 39, could have fasted 41. But no, he fasted for 40 days to send a specific message. And where he fasted is significant. He wants people to think about the number 40 in the wilderness to remind them of Moses, of Elijah, and of the Israelite, a sojourn there in the wilderness. And he does things like this again and again and again, as we'll see going through the Gospels here. And again, if you don't know the story, the backstory, you miss the point. You miss the message. You miss the connections and the lessons that aren't stated but that they clearly want us to think about here because the connections are obvious once you realize that's what's going on. So that was a fairly long detour here about the number 40 in wilderness, but it's important because it sets the stage for what follows here.

So we'll go back now to Matthew 4 and verse 3 and pick up the story.

Now, when the tempter came to Jesus, he said, if you are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.

Is Satan asking if Jesus is the Son of God? If you are the Son of God, no. Satan knows he's the Son of God. That's why he's here. That's the whole point is to deceive him and tempt him and disrupt him from carrying out his work as the Son of God. So Satan knows he is. Jesus Christ certainly knows he is. So the point is just Satan is just needling Jesus here. If you are the Son of God, prove it.

Make these stones into bread. So again, just needling Jesus there the way he sometimes does us, trying to get under our skin, trying to get us to react in a wrong way.

Now, if there's one thing that this wilderness of Judea has a lot of, it's stones. Stones and gravel is just covered with them there. Just very rock and barren. Looks like the surface of Mars that we're seeing from the recent spacecraft up there. Surface of the moon or something is just incredibly desolate. You don't even see a blade of grass out here in this area here. This is what the area looks like close up that we saw broader photos of earlier there. How would you like to spend 40 days and 40 nights fasting in an area like this with 100 degree temperature there and incredible humidity? Very, very miserable. So what does this temptation have to do with here? We're saying, says, if you're the Son of God, hey, there's rocks all around. Just turn one into bread and fill your stomach there. Basically, this is a temptation relating to self-preservation, which is one of our basic human drives to preserve ourselves, to keep us alive, keep us going here. So Satan is essentially saying to Jesus, you know, Jesus, you have to eat. Surely God wouldn't want you to die here. After all, you've got important things ahead. God wouldn't want you to die. So just use your power and turn one of these rocks into a loaf of bread and eat. You know, what could be the harm in that? You could just see Satan reasoning and trying to tempt Jesus there. I'm sure it was a much more serious temptation than just the words that we read here in the Gospels. And this, of course, is one of the main ways that Satan tempts us as well. Maybe we'll be put in a position which happens every year. People will ask off to time off to go up for the feast, for the feast of tabernacles. And every year some members are told, yeah, you can go, but you won't have your job when you get back. Or you ask for, you know, the winter months coming on and sundown coming earlier and earlier. And you tell your boss, hey, I need to be off by 4.30 on Fridays. And, well, I'm sorry, I can't allow that. If I did it for you, I'd have to let everybody off early. So, yeah, you can take off, but you'll lose your job. And, you know, Satan uses that temptation a lot. And he would try to rationalize with us or get us to rationalize with ourselves that, well, surely God wouldn't want me to starve. So, you know, it really won't be that bad if I sundowns at 4.30 and I go ahead and work till 5 on the Sabbath there. Surely God doesn't want me to starve. He wants me to provide for my family. Well, that's not the way Jesus would have approached that. This is, again, a temptation for self-preservation. And we would try to rationalize our way around that and try to think of excuses around that if we're not spiritually strong there. If we don't have a mind focused on God's law and God's commands here. And as we see from this lesson here, you fight temptation with Scripture, as Jesus Christ did here. Each time Satan would present him a temptation, Jesus would respond with Scripture. And again, if you don't know the Scripture, I was just reading an interesting article in this morning's paper, actually on the Internet, that it's talking about how few Christians read their Bible. That only less than 20% of Christians, professing Christians, read their Bible once a day. I think the numbers were 40% read it about once a week, and probably at church. And the rest basically never read it.

And they call themselves Christians. Can't you be a Christian if you're not filling your mind with God's Word? That's the whole point of the series on the Gospels, because rooted and grounded in the life of our Savior, the Son of God, our elder brother, our Savior, our coming King of kings, and Lord of lords. It's one of the reasons we're going into this in so much depth and detail here to help us see and understand and develop a hunger and thirst as Jesus Christ was hungering and thirsting for food here, to hunger and thirst for God's righteousness and God's Word, and understanding that. Yes, Dave? There's something really significant.

You touched on it, but this number 40, and the reason why they went through the two pioneer Deuteronomy 8 starting in verse 2, and it says, and you shall remember that the Lord your God led you all the way in the wilderness. And this is important, I think it relates more to Jesus's humble and intense, to know what was in your heart. Exactly. So God knows what is in Jesus's heart, whether he's going through this, whether he would eat his commandments or not, all of those commandments. They might make you to know that man shall not live by bread alone. That's why man lives every word that receives from the mouth of the Lord.

Mm-hmm. Yeah, good point. Yeah, that passage really sums up this whole episode here, to know what is in your heart, whether or not you will obey God. There's the same lesson of the Exodus story there, same exact one. Again, that's why Jesus wants people to think about the Exodus story. The whole point of the Exodus story was God testing them for 40 years in the wilderness to see what was in their heart, to see whether they would pass the test, to see whether they would act on faith and believe in Him and trust Him.

Jesus, again, passes the test and the Israelites fail there. So, yeah, that really sums up this whole episode incredibly well there. So, yeah, good point. Thanks for bringing that out.

So, let's see. Where was I? I got off on a sidetrack here. Yeah, here we go. We'll talk about this briefly here next. Jesus' response to Satan when he says, Command these stones become bread. But Jesus answered and said, verse 4, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. And as I mentioned earlier, He gives His responses all three times from the book of Deuteronomy to, again, remind people of the lessons of Deuteronomy.

Yeah, actually, Dave read verse 2 of chapter 8. Here's verse 3. So He humbled you, this is Moses speaking for God to the Israelites, so He humbled you, allowed you to hunger, and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that He might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Eternal.

So this, again, parallels the first big test that the Israelites had in the wilderness, which was food. They've come out of Egypt, they've brought their children, their flocks, their herds, and all of this. They're out there in the desert wilderness, and their food runs out, and what do we do now? What do we do now? And, of course, God provides. God provides manna for forty years for them. And the point of this is that you can be hungry even in a place as desolate and as barren as these photos we've seen of the Judean wilderness here, or the Sinai Desert, but none of that matters to God, because God can and does provide for His people. He provided it for forty years for the Israelites. And then as soon as they crossed over the Jordan into the Promised Land, the manna didn't show up anymore after forty years. So the important thing is, as Dave pointed out, as Jesus responds here, to learn the lesson that it's more important to live by every word of God, that you be obedient, that you look to Him and face to supply your needs, and that obeying God is more important than making sure your belly is full all the time to be blunt, because we can go without meals at times if we have to.

But we're not going to spiritually survive if we're not filling ourselves with every word that comes out of the mouth of God. That's the important spiritual lesson and takeaway for us here.

Continuing on here in Matthew 4 and verse 5, Then the devil took him up into the holy city, Jerusalem, said Jesus on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, If you are the son of God, again, needling him a little bit, throw yourself down, jump off. For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over you, and in their hands they shall bear you up, lest you dash your foot against a stone.

One of the study questions that was sent out last night was, How does Satan misquote scripture in this account? This is an example of it here. He's quoting, Satan is, from Psalm 91, verses 11 and 12. Here they are so you can compare them. Notice what Satan leaves out.

We see that the phrase that Satan leaves out is, To keep you in all your ways.

So Satan leaves out the part that, yes, the angels will watch over you, they will protect you.

Why? To keep you in all your ways. So long as you are following God, so long as you are following God's laws, God's ways, God's way of life, then, yes, his angels will keep you.

But if you are not doing that, all bets are off there. And of course, Satan leaves that little phrase out because he's trying to tempt Jesus and deceive him into doing the opposite, into abandoning God's ways here. So he selectively misquotes Scripture.

Somewhat ironically, too, because we just read that Jesus' response to the earlier temptation was, Man shall live by every word of God. And Satan comes around and quotes Scripture, leading out part of the words of God, to try to deceive Satan there. So it's an interesting, justic position there between the two. Now let's visualize this episode a little bit better, maybe toss in a little bit of biblical archaeology here, and maybe help us understand and visualize these events a little bit better. In the back, if you turn inside the last couple of pages, with inside the back cover of your harmony, you'll find this particular illustration in there.

It's in black and white, but you can get the point here. So if everybody would turn to that, I think it's the third page from the back, if I remember correctly.

So find that. There are three main theories about what this phrase that we read, the pinnacle of the temple, mean, or what that's referring to here. One is that it's talking about the top of the temple itself. If you look on your diagram, you'll see this tall building here, right in the middle of this rectangle that is the temple mount. That's the temple itself right there. So one of the ideas is this pinnacle of the temple is referring to the temple itself. And I should mention that in the Gospels, temple can be used several ways. It can refer just to this building, or it can refer to this entire temple complex that is called the temple mount. Sometimes it's not clear, as in this case, but that helps us understand why there's some debate or discussion among scholars about what this is talking about. So this temple looks pretty tiny in your illustration here, but it's actually about 150 feet high. It's about the height of a 15-story building.

And if you look carefully at your diagram, you can see these little dots scattered around. Those are people drawn to scale. They're so tiny there, they just look like dots. But that gives you some idea. This is an enormous building about the height of a 15-story building there. So this is one of the ideas that the pinnacle of the temple would have been referring just to Satan placing Jesus up on the top of this 15-story building. They're the temple.

Another idea, and this was the scholarly belief for a number of years, is that the pinnacle of the temple was referring to this corner down here closest to you. And again, temple referring to this entire temple enclosure that's about 30 acres in size. They're enormous. And the reason I think this was the pinnacle of the temple is because it's about 150-170 feet from top to bottom here.

But what you don't see is this is the Kidron Valley down here. So the total drop-off from here down to the bottom of the valley is about 300 feet. And thinking pinnacle, well, that must mean the high place, so therefore this is about a 300-feet drop-off. Therefore, the pinnacle of the temple must be this corner here, and that Satan brought Jesus and put him on here and said, jump off, and God will provide his angels to protect you. So that idea was very popular for a number of years, that this is what the pinnacle of the temple is. And then, about 20 years ago, 20-30 years ago, archaeologists were excavating around this other corner of the temple here.

And to orient you, this is the southeastern corner. This is a southwestern corner here.

So, yeah, archaeologists are excavating over here. And, incidentally, this is the area where the college did the excavations for a number of years in this area around that corner. And up here, the western wall, the Wailing Wall, is right up in this area in here. So to orient you, they were digging here about 20-30 years ago, and they came across an odd-shaped piece of stone with some very clear Hebrew writing on it. And this is what it looks like. I'll show you this here.

This is the inscription, and it was oddly shaped. It was clearly the part of a...

they actually found it in two pieces. There was a larger piece about this big, and this is the upper part with a little inscription here. And there's a niche carved out below it. And this is about roughly waist-high, this stone. And it reads in Hebrew, the place of trumpeting, and then the rest of the inscription is broken off, the place of trumpeting.

And Josephus says that, describing the ceremonies and rituals and so on at the temple, says that there was a particular place on the temple mount where a priest would go and blow a trumpet, blow a shofar, to announce the beginning and end of the Sabbath and the Holy Days.

So archaeologists found this inscription talking about the place of trumpeting, and they thought, huh, that's probably what Josephus is talking about. This would have been the place where the priest would have blown the trumpet to announce the beginning and ending of the Sabbath and the Holy Days. And that's a common theory, and I think it's probably correct.

And where they found this, this is an illustration of what that area below that, actually let me back up, you see this corner right here. That's what we're looking at in this illustration up here. And that stone would have been up here on this corner. And this is what that corner of the temple would have looked like in Jesus Christ's day. It's about 120 feet high from street level down here, and they've excavated all the way down to the streets. They found this piece of stone down here buried in 20 or 30 feet of rubble covering this first century street, because when the Romans destroyed the temple in 70 AB, they basically took from about here everything above this. They essentially bulldozed off and shoved off the sides of the temple mount. So this particular stone, which was up here, was found buried under many feet of rubble down here at the bottom. And this would have been a logical place to blow the trumpet, because that corner of the temple mount was the closest one to most of the city of Jerusalem. The city of Jerusalem lay off to the west and to the south of this. So a priest blowing a shofar up there could have been heard, because it overlooked the entirety of the city of Jerusalem. It could have been heard, that shofar anywhere in the city of Jerusalem. And also, for many were in the city of Jerusalem, you could see this part or this corner of the temple platform there. So it's the archaeologist, after finding that, kind of concluded, well, maybe this is the pinnacle of the temple that Jesus would have been talked about here in the Gospel accounts, because that would have been the most prominent part of the temple. The temple is so big that the people of Jerusalem couldn't see the whole temple itself, but they would have seen this big corner of the temple complex platform. So the general consensus now among scholars is that this is actually the pinnacle of the temple that was being referred to here. And there's no way to prove it one way or the other. I lean in this direction myself. I think that probably makes the most sense.

In the context here, that even though there are other parts that are higher, this was the most prominent part of the temple there that everybody in Jerusalem would have seen every day, going about their daily lives there in Jerusalem. So I think this is probably the explanation that Satan brought Jesus up and put him up there, right up here overlooking the entire city of Jerusalem, spread out before him, and said, Hey, jump off! God will save you. He will send his angels to protect you there. So I think this helps us visualize how this might have transpired here. So again, Satan is here misusing Scripture to try to convince Jesus that the Father would divinely protect him even if he did something stupid, like jumping off the temple, the pinnacle there. So Jesus responds, continuing the story here, in verse 7 down here. Jesus said to Satan, it is written again, You shall not tempt the Eternal your God. And here, once again, he's quoting from Deuteronomy 6 and verse 16, You shall not tempt the Eternal your God as you tempted him in Massah. Jesus says in quote the details of that. So what happened at Massah?

Well, this is another of the great lessons of the Exodus story here. That's where the Israelites, we've already talked about how the Israelites went into the desert, they ran out of food, so God provides manna. Now they're camped in an area where there's no water. So they cry out to Moses, Why did you leave us out here in the wilderness to die of thirst? Is God really here or not? Is He going to give us water? Are we all going to die out here in the wilderness of thirst?

So God tells Moses, Strike the rock and I'll provide water for the people. And that's what happens.

Ben, we talked about we saw the scripture from 1 Corinthians earlier that Christ was the rock who provided the water there in the desert. So this is another of the great lessons of the Exodus story here. That God provides by telling Moses to strike the rock and He would show that, yes, He is there. He has not abandoned them. They're not going to die of hunger or thirst in the desert, but God is going to provide water for them. So Jesus is pointing to anybody who reads this story, and even pointing to Satan himself here, to the Exodus story of a rebellious and unfaithful people who are tempting God, testing God. Are you really there, God, when God doesn't need to be tested? To be blunt. God is there. He's already provided the man of error. So Jesus' point in quoting this is that God was faithful and God is faithful. And God is there regardless of whether He's going to intervene when you do something stupid like this or not. Whether He's intervening at that particular moment or not, God is still there. He's there all the time. That is the lesson there. That's one of the great lessons of faith that Israel did not get and did not learn and did not grasp there. But it is an important lesson that we need to understand and that you don't put God to the test by doing something stupid and expecting Him to bail you out. So continuing now back in Matthew's story, verse 8, the third temptation, again, the devil took him up on an exceedingly high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. And he said to him, All these things I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.

So what is Satan doing now to attempt Jesus? Well, basically, if you think about it, he's offering Jesus a shortcut. Satan knows prophecy. He knows that Jesus is going to return to rule over the entire world, and the entire rulership of the earth will be given to Jesus. But there's just one little catch. Because to do that, Jesus, what's going to happen? You're going to be beaten, you're going to be tortured, you're going to be scourged, you're going to be crucified.

Before, you can gain ownership of all the kingdoms. But you know what?

I can give it to you now. All you got to do is just bow down and worship me. What's the harm in that? You can have it all now. You don't have to go through all of that. And, of course, that's something Satan tempts us with all the time. Shortcuts. Shortcut to salvation. You can have it all. You can have a great life. You can have fancy cars, nice homes, money, prestige, all this kind of thing. You don't have to wait for God's kingdom. You can have it now. All you got to do is just worship me. What's the harm in that? So we see commonalities in these temptations with the experiences we go through in life as well. Well, let's first ask, and I'll cover this quite quickly, is this a legitimate offer? Could Satan indeed offer all of this to Jesus if he would bow down and worship him? I'll just cover a few scriptures very quickly here. John 12, verse 31, John 14, 30, and John 16, 11, where Jesus calls Satan the ruler of this world.

The ruler of this world. Another one, 2 Corinthians 4, verses 3 and 4.

Paul writes, But even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing, whose minds the God of this age has blinded, who do not believe, lest the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine on them. So we see Satan call the ruler of this world and the God of this age. Another one, Revelation 12, verse 9.

The great dragon was cast out, that serpent of all old, called the devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. He was cast to the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

One other one, 1 John 5, verse 19, where John tells us the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one. So we see here, Satan is called the ruler of this world, the God of this age, the one who deceives the whole world, and the one that the whole world lies under the sway of. So, was this a legitimate offer? Yeah, you'd have to say yes. Satan did have all of this. Obviously, his limits as to what God allows, but it was his to give. He could have given it to Jesus Christ there. Notice also, in Jesus' response, he says, don't try to snow me. It's not yours to give. Jesus doesn't respond. He doesn't dispute that aspect of it. And, of course, one of the most powerful things, one of the most powerful temptations that we see and experience in life is that Satan tempts people with power and with greed. There's a saying that if you want to know what a man is really made of or a woman, give him power and see how he deals with it.

And that's sad but true. You see it played out in the headlines every day of dictators like Bashar Assad in Syria, murdering how many thousands, 20,000, 30,000 of his citizens have been killed there? Omar Gaddafi, rulers of Cambodia, North Korea, people like that, living in luxury while their people are starving to death? This lust for power and greed plays out in politics all the time. It's disgusting to see all the lies, the slander, the corruption of all these people who are either wanting to get power or to maintain their power. It's a terribly corrupting thing in human nature. Even in the church it plays out that way. Over the years in the church I've seen power corrupt more people than just about anything else I can think of. Where they either want power or they have power and they're determined to hold on to it and they'll do all kinds of things to do that. Lie, cheat, steal, compromise their values, compromise everything they've ever been taught to try to get or hold on to power there. It's a terribly corrupting thing. Just be aware of that, that power and greed are two of the most destructive temptations known to man. And Satan tries to tempt Jesus here with those. So Jesus responds, verse 10 of Matthew 4, "'Away with you, Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Eternal your God, and him only shall you serve.'" And again, this is quoting from the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 6 and verse 13, "'You shall fear the Eternal your God and serve him.'" And again, the context of this is another of the great lessons of the Exodus story, because after all that the Israelites had gone through, and the book of Deuteronomy is recounting all of this 40 years of history, because they're about to enter into the Promised Land. And God through Moses is telling him, you know, you were tested all these times and you didn't learn your lesson, or your ancestors didn't learn the lesson because they died out by this time, that generation, and now he has a new generation ready to enter the Promised Land. And God tells him he's bringing into the Promised Land where he's going to give them everything they want, everything they need. He's going to give them cities that they didn't build. He's going to give them houses they didn't build, and wells that they didn't dig, and orchards and vineyards that they didn't plant. He's going to give all of this to them. All they've got to do is walk into the land in faith and take it. And it's a parallel to what? It's a parallel to all the kingdoms of the world that Satan offered Jesus. You don't have to work for it. All you've got to do is bow down and worship me. And God, through Moses, tells the Israelites, you just got to walk into the land and take it. Don't be faithless like your ancestors, your fathers and mothers, the generations that had to die off to bring you here. And don't forget God.

When you come in and I give you all of this, don't think you earned it. Don't think you deserved it. Don't think you did it on your own. I'm giving it to you. But when I give it to you, don't forget where it came from. And don't go off and worship other gods. Don't go off following them. That's the whole point. That's the third lesson of the Exodus story, that they were not to forget God when they came into the Promised Land. And what happened? Did they learn the lesson? No. Sadly, they didn't. And they went off chasing other gods and eventually were destroyed. Most of the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. So Jesus here tells Satan, Get out of here! Don't tempt me in this way. I'm going to worship the true God and Him alone.

I'm not going to bow down and worship you. So no matter what we're tempted, what temptations come our way, this is what we have to do. We have to worship and serve the true God, no matter what. A few quick scriptures to look at here. James 4 and verse 7. Let's read through these very quickly. This sums up this third temptation very well. Therefore submit to God, resist the devil and he will flee from you. And in a way, this summarizes again this whole story of the temptation here. Satan tempts and Jesus responds by submitting to God and doesn't give in. And in the end, Satan is forced to flee away. So the key to resisting temptation in Satan is to submit to God, following the perfect example of Jesus Christ. Another verse it ties in well here, Matthew 16 and verse 26. For what profit, this is the words of Jesus, for what profit is it to a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul? Jesus says this several years later in the story. What's he thinking about here? Is he thinking about this temptation where Satan offers them all the kingdoms of the world? I think he probably is.

He's the only human being who's ever been offered everything. You can have it all, all the kingdoms of the world, if you'll just bow down and worship me. But Jesus says, what's it worth if you lose your own soul? So again, there's no way that that was worth it to Jesus Christ. Another passage to look at. I'm just ripping through these fairly quickly because we're running behind on time. 1 John 2 verses 15 through 17. Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father, he's not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

And the world is passing away, and the lust of it. But he who does the will of God abides forever or lives forever, given eternal life. And that's the most important position of all, eternal life in the kingdom and the family of God. Nothing else comes remotely close to that. And then the story closes. Matthew 4 and verse 11.

Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and ministered to him.

Was this truly a temptation, what Jesus went through here? Well, I think we know from Hebrews 4 and verse 15, For we do not have a high priest, Jesus Christ, who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points, or in every way, tempted as we are, and yet without sin.

So yes, obviously this was a temptation, one of a number of temptations that Jesus went through. But I think also we see how great this temptation was in Matthew 4 and verse 11, that angels, this was so stressful, so draining on Jesus, that angels came and strengthened him.

Can you think of any other time when that happened in Jesus Christ's life?

Think about his last night before he died, when he's in Gethsemane and he's praying in agony, knowing what is coming. And as we read in Luke 22 verses 41 through 43, And he was withdrawn from them, about a stone's throw, and he knelt down and prayed, saying, Father, if it is your will, take this cup away from me. Nevertheless, not my will but yours be done.

Then an angel appeared to him from heaven, strengthening him.

So we see this at the beginning of Christ's ministry with the temptation, and here at the very end, that the stress and the strain on him was so great that God the Father sent angels to strengthen him. And in the case we've read here with the temptation, no doubt, just to physically bring him water and food and help restore him, help bring him back to peak health and peak condition as he's beginning his ministry there. And again, the stakes are enormously high in both of these instances, at the beginning of his ministry and at the end, because if he fails, it's all over. It's all over.

But he looks to God and humbly submits to God, and sets an example of perfect obedience.

And I'll close here in one final two verses here in Hebrews 12, verses 1 and 2.

This is right after the faith chapter of Hebrews 11.

And it says, Therefore, we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that has set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. Now, this is talking, obviously, about the crucifixion here specifically, but it also applies, if you think about it, equally well to what we've covered today in the temptation and testing, because had he failed those first tests, had he given in to Satan, it would have been over at that point. There would have been no other. There would not have been the crucifixion in those events, because they would have already failed and not needed to go through that. But what I want to focus in on, on this passage, is the motivation of both of these tests, at the beginning and at the end of Christ's ministry, because what was that motivation? We find it here in verse 2, "...who for the joy that was set before him endured these things." What does that mean?

Think about it. Why did he go through this? Why did he surrender his divinity to come to earth in the first place? Why did he give that up? Why did he go from God alongside the Father there to a human being made of dirt? Why did he do that? Why did he go through the suffering that he did, not just at the end, but in what we talked about today, the 40 days of temptation there in the wilderness, and at other times in his ministry as well, when he's almost killed a number of occasions.

Why did he do it? As we see here, it's for the joy that was set before him. What joy?

For the joy of us, of bringing many sons to glory. That's the joy. He did it for us.

That's the important lesson for today.