Lon Solomon Ministries
People Jesus Met Part 3
Temptation. Even the word sounds a little ominous. What is temptation means? Well, it means being enticed to do something that you know is wrong, that you know you shouldn't do. It means being enticed to do something that you know you're going to regret in the morning. For me, I have to be honest and tell you my greatest temptation in life every day is overeating. You see, I grew up in a very dysfunctional home and I learned that the way to deal with my pain growing up was to eat it away. And so often I end the day feeling like the lady I saw on a Weight Watchers commercial a while back. And she said, she said, I have a lot of willpower when it comes to food. It's just that currently I'm not using any of it. That's how my day often ends. Well, listen, whether it's food or alcohol or pornography or drugs or sex or lust or gossip or spending too much money shopping, whatever, every one of us is in mortal combat with our own personal set of temptations each and every day. And if we're really honest, we would have to admit most of us would that in this battle that we're in daily, most of us lose this battle a lot more than we win it. Well, this is what we want to talk about today. We want to talk about temptation and about the weapons that God has given us as followers of Christ to fight against those temptations so that we win the battle a lot more than we lose it. Remember, we're in a series entitled People Jesus Met. And today we're going to look at Jesus' personal meeting with Satan himself as Satan tries to tempt the Lord Jesus into sin. Here we go. Matthew chapter 4, the Bible says then, that is after Jesus had been baptized by John the Baptist, then Jesus was led by the Spirit. Don't miss that. By the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. Now, those of you who've been to Israel with me, you know where this area is that the Bible is talking about. It's called the Judean wilderness. It's that arid parched jagged desert that lies between the Dead Sea and Jerusalem. This is the area where David for example hid for seven years from King Saul. And the Bible says that the Holy Spirit led Jesus out into this wilderness to go without food for 40 days and 40 nights and to be tempted by the devil himself. Now, we should stop now and ask the question why? That is, why was the devil trying to tempt the Lord Jesus Christ into sinning? And the answer is that if Satan could get the Lord Jesus to commit even one sin, he knew that he could extinguish God's plan of salvation for the human race once and for all. Let me explain. Friends, you see, God's plan of salvation for the human race is based on the principle of substitutionary atonement. You say, well, now, there's an SAT word. All right, listen. The substitutionary atonement simply means that God is willing to let a substitute a tone for your sin and my sin and the sin of the world. But the one condition here that is non-negotiable is that this substitute has to be blemishless, has to be perfect, has to be sinless. And the reason for that is because God's justice cannot allow someone to pay our death penalty for sin if that person owes their very own death penalty for sin. And therefore the only way that a person could be our substitute is to own no death penalty and the only way to own no death penalty for sin is to have never sinned in your life ever. And so if Jesus was to be our atoning substitute, if he was to bear our sins on the cross and pay for them on the cross, it is absolutely essential that he had to have no sin, that he had to be sinless and perfect. This is why 1 Peter chapter 1 says that you were not redeemed from your empty way of life by perishable things like silver or gold, but by the precious blood of Christ. Watch now a lamb without blemish or defect. One sin on Jesus' part and the entire plan of salvation for the human race goes up in smoke and the devil knew it. Verse 2, "After fasting forty days and forty nights, Jesus was hungry." I'd say that's an understatement, wouldn't you? Yeah. Then the tempter came to him and said, "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." The first temptation that the devil challenged Jesus with was he challenged him to do a miracle and turn the stones out in the desert into bread and to use that bread to satisfy his physical hunger. Now folks, there's nothing wrong with making bread and there's nothing wrong with using it to satisfy our physical hunger, but you see there was much more going on here than just that. Remember the Bible says Jesus had been led out into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit. In other words, it was God's will that Jesus was going without food at this point in his life and therefore what the devil was really tempting Jesus to do was to take matters into his own hands and to assert his own independent will for his life in opposition to God's will for his life. Now this is one of the most common ways in which Satan tempts us as human beings even today. I mean, look, we all have the natural desire for intimacy and sex and money and material things and human success and folks, there's nothing wrong with these desires so long as we satisfy them within the confines of God's will for our life. But what Satan was tempting Jesus to do and what he often tempts us to do was to satisfy our physical desires for Jesus to satisfy his physical desires outside of God's will for his life which is disobedience to God and which is sin. And Jesus answered verse four and said, it is written, Deuteronomy chapter eight, "Man shall not live by bread alone Satan, but by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God." Look how Jesus counteracted Satan's attack, Satan's temptation, he said, it is written. He threw scripture at Satan, he threw scripture at the devil's temptation, and he said, you know what, Satan, it is better to be hungry in the will of God than it is to be satisfied outside of the will of God. Man, forty days without food, goodness gracious, I finish lunch, I'm thinking about dinner. I mean forty days without food, what a temptation, and yet the Lord Jesus fought it off how he fought it off by using the word of God, it is written. Verse five, then the devil took Jesus to the holy city, that is Jerusalem, and had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple and he said to him, if you are the son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written. Stop, would you notice Satan knows the Bible? Would you notice that? Would you notice Satan knows how to quote the Bible? He always quotes the Bible correctly, except that he always applies it wrong, he always distorts it in its application, watch. He quotes Psalm 91 and says, he will give his angels charge over you, this is what's written, and they will bear you up on their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone. Now this second temptation that Satan throws at the Lord Jesus is one that appeals to Jesus' pride. He takes Jesus to the temple in Jerusalem, puts him up on the southeast corner of the temple mount, commonly called the pinnacle of the temple, walking down at the Kidron Valley 450 feet below, and he says, all right, Jesus, here's the deal. If you were to jump off of the pinnacle of the temple, and if you were to float down to the ground and just touch down easily and nicely, you know what? The people would see this, they'd all hail you as the Messiah, I mean you'd be the biggest story in town, you'd be front page news and hey, you're the Son of God, Jesus, you deserve this kind of attention, you deserve this kind of recognition, you deserve this kind of spotlight on you. And Jesus answered and said, verse 7, no Jesus says, it is also written. He said, yeah, you quoted the scripture Satan, but you distorted its application. So let me quote a verse back to you that balances it out and gives the correct interpretation. It is also written, Deuteronomy 6, you shall not tempt the Lord your God. Hey, once again, Satan hits Jesus in an area where we're all vulnerable, our pride, our ego, our desire for attention and preeminence. Hey, and in this town, Washington DC, we see this human weakness on display in this town every single day, don't we, the almost irresistible aphrodisiac of power and influence and big shot status. But once again, the Lord Jesus fought that off by using the same weapon, the word of God, it is written. And he said to Satan, yes, you're right, you quoted the verse right, Satan, but you got the application wrong, God does promise to protect us, but not when we plunge ourselves into sensational, foolish situations aimed only at inflating our own pride and our own ego that is tempting the Lord and that we are not to do. Finally, verse 8, the devil took Jesus to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said to him, all these things I will give you if you will bow down and worship me. This time in the third temptation, Satan appeals to Jesus's human desire to avoid pain and suffering and hardship. You say, Lana, I don't see that here. How does that come out of this? Well, remember, God had already promised that he was going to give the throne of all the kingdoms to the world, to the Lord Jesus, Psalm 2, verse 7, he that is God the Father said to me that is the Lord Jesus, you are my son. Ask of me and I will surely give you the nations as your inheritance and the ends of the earth as your possession. See, Jesus was already promised the thrones of all the earth. It's just that the way to the throne for Jesus in God's will was by way of the cross. You understand? The way to get to the throne is Jesus had to go by way of the cross and we know from the Garden of Gethsemane that Jesus was not looking forward to the physical pain and the spiritual pain of the cross. Luke 22, Father Jesus said in the Garden of Gethsemane, if there's any way this cup, meaning the cross, can pass from me, let it pass. So here comes Satan now with a tempting offer. He says, hey Jesus, how about if I get you to the same bottom line that God said He'd get you to? I'll get you to the throne of every kingdom on the earth, but I can do it without the cross. I can do it without the suffering. I can do it without the pain. I mean we can skip the cross, we can skip the plan of salvation and I can get you to the bottom line just the same. Now look as human beings we all want to go around pain in life. We all want to detour around suffering in life, but when we want to do this so badly that we will reject God's plan for our life in order to do it, well that's a problem because that's sin and that's what Satan was offering Jesus. Verse 10, then Jesus said to him, be gone Satan, for it is written, Deuteronomy 6, you shall worship the Lord your God and you shall serve Him alone. Again Jesus counteracted Satan's temptation the same way, it is written. And then the devil left him, verse 11, and behold the angels came and ministered to Jesus. Now that's as far as we want to go in our passage today with the encounter of Satan and Jesus together, because what we want to do now is stop and ask our most important question and you know what our question is. So come on now, here we go, give me some verve, give me some enthusiasm, one, two, three. Yeah, you say a lot and so what say, all right, I appreciate they said, by the way, Lon, do you actually believe there really is a devil? Of course, you don't? What's wrong with you? Of course there is. The Bible is clear about that, that there's a personal being called Satan and he and Jesus were in mortal combat right here. Of course I believe that. You say, okay, so that's a wonderful story we just had in incident, but what difference when I walk out of my house and I face the daily temptations that I face every single day, I mean what difference does this really make to helping me overcome my daily temptations, huh? Well, I'm happy to tell you about that. The Bible says James chapter 4 verse 7, "Resist the devil and he will flee from you." So the question is, how did Jesus resist the devil so that the devil did indeed flee from him? Well, the answer is Jesus threw scripture in his face. To be more specific, when faced with temptation, the Lord Jesus found a verse of scripture that applied to that specific temptation and then he quoted that verse to himself and to the devil and to the temptation, he said, "It is written, it is written, it is written." The point is that as followers of Christ folks and fighting our temptation so often, we try to use the wrong weapons. We try to use our own human willpower and our own human grit and our own human determination and our own human gutting it out. You know, when we walk out of the house in the morning and we say, "I will not lust, I will not lie, I will not cheat, I will not," listen, and we get absolutely murdered out there. Why? Because these are not the weapons, human grit, human determination, human willpower, these are not the weapons that God has given us as followers of Christ to fight temptation with us. Folks, listen to me, the energy of the flesh cannot defeat the power of the flesh. Let me repeat that. The energy of the flesh, human willpower, human grit, human determination cannot defeat the power of the flesh. You try that, you'll lose every single time. Nor can it defeat the temptations of the devil. But Jesus didn't try to use these weapons against the devil. He used different weapons. The great news of the Bible is that God has given us weapons that will work against both the power of the flesh and the temptations of the devil. And right here in Matthew chapter 4, the Lord Jesus illustrates what those weapons are and how to use them. I love what the early church father, Origen, said about this passage. He said, and I quote, "Jesus routed the tempter with a weapon we can all use the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God." We must learn, he said, from this passage, the power of Scripture and the impotence of Satan against it. End of quote. This is why the Bible says Ephesians 6, 11, "Put on the full armor of God that you may be able to withstand." Ooh, look here, ooh, look. The temptations of the devil and what are these weapons? Well, Paul lists them, but the only offensive weapon in the entire list verse 17 of Ephesians 6 is the sword of the Spirit which is the word of God. Scripture. This is why Hebrews chapter 4 says verse 12, "For the word of God is living." And what's the next word? Powerful, powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword. And this is why finally, I love what the apostle Paul said, 2 Corinthians 10. He said, verse 3, "For though we live in the flesh, we as followers of Christ do not wage war according to the flesh for the weapons we have to fight with are not weapons of the flesh." Human grit, human determination, human willpower. On the contrary, he says, our weapons have divine power. The bottom line friends of what I'm trying to say to you today is that when you and I as followers of Christ resist temptation in our life, the way the Lord Jesus resisted it in his life here in Matthew 4, not with human grit, human determination, human willpower, but with it is written, it is written, it is written, that's when we'll end up with the same result that he ended up with. And that's when we'll be able to fight off temptation like he did. You say, all right, I got what you're saying. I understand the point. But can you make this practical for me? I mean, how do I actually do this, huh, in everyday life? Well, we do it just like the Lord Jesus did it. We figure out the areas of our life where we're facing the greatest temptations in life and then we go to the Bible and we find verses in the Bible that speak to those specific areas of temptation and then we memorize those verses. And finally, when we're tempted in those areas, we pull those verses out and we quote them at the temptation, we quote them to ourselves, we quote them at the devil and we say, no, it is written, it is written, it is written. Listen, you will be amazed at the kind of power you'll have to fight off your worst temptations when you will fight them with the spiritual weapons that God has given us to fight with, namely the living, powerful, eternal Word of God. So let's take a couple examples. Let's say lust is one of your besetting problems and temptations. Well, how about 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, verse 3? The Bible says it is God's will that each of us should know how to control our own body in a way that is holy and honorable for God did not call us to be impure but to live a holy life. Now you memorize that verse of Scripture and then you try quoting it at pay per view 10 times in a row before you order that movie or you try quoting it at your computer 10 times in a row before you go to that website and I promise you after 10 times through that verse of Scripture, you will be far less likely to order that movie or go that place on your computer. How about fear? Let's say fear is a real problem for us. Well, Isaiah 43 says, God says, do not fear. When you pass through the deep waters, I will be with you. They will not overflow you and when you walk through the fire, you will not be burned nor will the flame scorch you for I am the Lord your God and you are precious in my sight. You know, when God sent Jill, my disabled daughter into our life 17 years ago, this was the verse of Scripture that he gave Brenda and me and so many days over these last 17 years, when we've looked forward and had fear about what the future holds or even fear about what the present holds, we have pulled this verse out and we have said this verse and quoted this verse and held on to this verse and you know what? Fear melts away when you say it is written, do not fear. Good gossip and speaking ill of people. Well, I would recommend you memorize Ephesians chapter four verse 29, let no unwholesome word proceed out of your mouth, but only what is good for building people up so that what you say may impart grace to others. Try saying that five times over before you say what you were thinking about saying and I'll bet you you probably won't say it about that other person or laziness. You hate your job. You're tempted to cut corners at work, Colossians 3, 23, whatever you do. Do your work heartily as unto the Lord and not unto men for it is the Lord Christ, not men that you serve. Boy, that'll make your work ethic change a little bit, quote, that during the day. How about scheming? Welcome to Washington. How about Luke chapter 12? Jesus said there is nothing covered up that will not be revealed. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight and what you have whispered in the inner rooms of the capital will be proclaimed from the rooftops. Well, there. Man, you think about trying to scheme and pull something over. You remind yourself of that that one day they're going to blast it from the rooftop and I'll bet you're going to be a lot less likely to get involved in that thing. You say, Belon, I understand what you're saying, but what if I can't find a verse of scripture for the particular sin that I'm struggling with? Well, then I've got a generic verse for everyone. This works for everyone. I don't care what you're tempted with. 2 Corinthians 5, 10, for we must all appear at the judgment seat of Christ as followers of Christ that each of us may receive what is due us for the things done in our bodies, whether good or bad. The Bible says here that we're going to have a performance review when we get to heaven as followers of Christ. Now, what you did before you came to Christ is under the blood. You're not going to see that again. But what you and I have done since we've come to Christ, the Lord Jesus is going to rewind our tape back to the day we came to Christ when we get to heaven and we're going to watch it together with him. I hope this is a private meeting just to him and me. We're going to watch it together with him again. The whole thing, you know what, if you're standing there thinking about doing something you know you shouldn't ought to do, you try reminding yourself of this verse, you quote this verse and remind yourself that whatever it is you're about to do, don't forget you're going to see this again, standing next to the living Christ. All of a sudden, I'll tell you a lot of those things that you're thinking about doing, I'm thinking about doing lose their thrill real quick if we realize we're going to see this again. Friends, the point is this is how we fight temptation and we win. You say, I don't know, Lon. It all sounds way too simple. I mean this sounds infantile. I mean to stand there when I'm facing major temptation and go, it is written, it is written, it is written. You really think that's good. I mean this sounds like this is crazy. This is too simple. Well, it's simple. I agree, but it works. It's God's way. It's what the Lord Jesus used and if the Lord Jesus used it to fight off Satan himself and it worked, he's leaving us an example and telling us how to fight. So you've got two choices. You can continue to use your complicated plan and keep getting whooped or you can use God's simple plan and you can have success. It's up to you, but friends, please don't be educated beyond your spiritual intelligence, okay? God's plan is meant to be simple because he means even little children to be able to use it. Don't reject it just because it's simple. What difference does it make if it's simple? What matters is does it work and it works because you're using the weapons God has given us the weapon of the living powerful word of God. And that's what you're fighting with the sword of the spirit. So let's conclude. What have we learned today? Well, we've learned that if we will fight off our temptations with the sword of the spirit, with the word of God, with a steady stream of it is written, it is written, it is written, we'll do a whole lot better job of resisting temptation than trying to fight it off in the energy of the flesh. And this is why here at McLean Bible Church, we are constantly urging you to be in the scriptures, to read the scriptures, to study the scriptures, to meditate on the scriptures. And most importantly, to memorize the scripture because friends, you can't quote scripture and throw scripture at a temptation that you don't know. You got to know it and you don't have time in the middle of the fight to go say, Oh, I know that's somewhere in the Bible. Where is that? Oh, somebody get me a concordance. I need your, your history. You're done. You got to know it and have it in your heart, on your heart so you can use it at that moment. This is why Psalm 119 says your word, David says, I have hidden in my heart. I've memorized why that I might not sin against them. Would you notice out there in the wilderness? The Lord Jesus quoted at Satan, Deuteronomy eight once and Deuteronomy six twice. The Lord Jesus was not walking around in the wilderness for 40 days admiring the scenery. He was out there meditating on and memorizing the book of Deuteronomy so that he had those verses and the word of God available when he needed it. And so here's my challenge to you. My challenge to you is to start memorizing scripture. You know, when I came to Christ out of a very rough background, my life changed so dramatically in such a short period of time that I often had people ask me, how did that happen? How did it change how did your life flip so dramatically? And you want to know the answer? The man who led me to Christ, Bob Eckhart, he challenged me and taught me to memorize scripture. By the time I was six months old in the Lord, I had memorized 600 verses of scripture. I would read the Bible. I'd take little three by five index cards. And if I came across a verse that spoke to me, I'd write the verse on one side. I'd flip it over and write the reference on the other side. I'd carry eight or ten of them with me everywhere I went. And every moment I got, I pulled out my cards and memorized scripture. You want to know why my life changed so dramatically? I'll tell you why. It's because I hid a bunch of it in my heart. So I'm 119. And friends, if you want your Christian experience to be transformational the way the Bible says that it should be, let me tell you how to speed that process up. You start memorizing scripture and putting it into your heart. And that process will speed up by manifold times. It will. You say, Well, I understand, but I can't memorize. I'm sorry. I just, I can't, I can't do it. I can't memorize. Really. I don't buy that. Sorry. Hey, you remember phone numbers, don't you? And you memorize email addresses, don't you? And you memorize recipes, don't you? And you memorize your four digit pins, don't you? I mean, unless you're unable to go to the bank and remember your four digit pin to get money out of your ATM, you can memorize. I'm sorry. You can do it. It's not a question of whether you and I can do it. It's whether it's a question of whether you and I want to do it. Whether we want to do it. So here's my challenge. And I'm done. I'd like to challenge every one of us here to memorize one verse of the Bible a week for this year. 50 verses. Well, we're a little behind 48, whatever. One verse a week, particularly those that start with the temptations you're facing so that you've got them on your fingertips when you need them. One verse a week. Get yourself some index cards. And on the Metro, at the office, over lunch, wherever, tell me you can't do this, friends. You can. I can if we want to. And if we want to speed up the transformation of our Christian lives, this is how we do it. Let's pray together. With our heads bowed and our eyes closed, I'd like to ask you if you were willing to take me up on this commitment, this challenge and with God's help start memorizing a verse of scripture a week, then with no one looking around, I'd simply like you to raise your hand and say, yes, on, but the Lord's help, I'm going to do this. Anybody else? Okay, let me pray for you. Lord Jesus, thanks for the folks who raised their hands. And I want to pray you would give them special facility and discipline and enablement to hide the Word of God in their hearts. And Father, I pray you would challenge all of us to understand the importance of memorizing scripture, hiding God's Word in our heart that we might not sin against you. Lord Jesus, thank you for the Word of God that is living and active and powerful. Help us use it as the weapon that you created it to be to resist temptation. Help us fight every day, Lord, with a steady stream of it is written, it is written, it is written. And thank you, Father, when we do that, you've told us the power the Lord Jesus had against Satan will be power that we will find welling up inside of us when we fight with the right weapons. Lord, change our lives because we were here today and fortify us for the fight we have every day to live for Christ and honor you with our lives. And we pray these things in Jesus' name. And God's people said, Amen. Amen.