“The Temptation of Jesus”
Main point: In the ways humanity has rebelled against God’s will, Jesus has surrendered to God’s will and in so doing has shown us the path to salvation.
INTRODUCTION:
Contentment
Freedom in doing the will of the Father
No need for power, though he could have claimed it.
No need for safety of the body, though
No need even for food, as healthy and common as it may be.
All of these things he would sacrifice and gladly turn over as though they were nothing. All for the sake of doing the will of the Father.
To help himself in his need.
To assert usurp? the father
To deliver his brethren
Sustenance
These are good things - the temptation is to divert one’s attention away from the will of the Father
For Jesus’ own gain - To do something for himself separate from the provision of the Father
This is a chosen lack to remind himself of his dependence on the Father.
The things Jesus is tempted with are good things.
Good goals must be accomplished through good means.
Otherwise they're corrupted, unstable, and cycle back downward to their original state (or worse) because the corruption rots the movement from the inside out.
Consider the house built on the sand.
The ends do not justify the means.
Otherwise, the body will hunger again and Jesus will be put in the position to reply on his own divergent power to supply his own needs.
Otherwise, the kingdoms of the world will return to their old ways of division and wearing as soon as they are turned over to their own devises.
Otherwise
The integrity of our good works is based upon the Union we share with the Father.
Enter Into the Story
Observations to get us into the story:
We find Jesus alone in the desert, but Luke is telling the story. Usually, the stories we receive about the life of Jesus come from eyewitnesses who either write them down themselves or tell the story to someone who writes it down. But for this one, there are no eyewitnesses. This means Jesus either went into the desert, experienced these things, and told others what happened. Or, this is a parable Jesus told to communicate a meaning beyond the story itself. Or both.
The devil is not so diluted as to think that he could get God to sin. He did not tempt Jesus with sin, he tempted him with good. But it was good on his own terms - in discontinuity with the will of the Father. It's a wedge. To introduce a slight difference which would be the unraveling of everything.
