Pastor Tom Johnson, February 13, 2016
Jesus directly goes from baptism in water and the Holy Spirit into a baptism of temptation and the devil. Devil means “slanderer,” “adversary,” or “accuser.” The adversary wants to increase sin in our life. He uses lies and deception to lure us into destructive behavior. The voice of the adversary promotes fabrications to keep us in bondage to sin. In this case, his target is on Jesus, the Word made flesh. He wants to derail Jesus’ mission. The accuser asks the eternal Son of God to bow down and worship the devil who is a mere creature. He tries to tear the Holy Trinity apart—Father, Son, and Spirit—in order to prevent the world’s redemption. The slanderer knows the Bible. But he perverts and twists the Scriptures in subtle ways. His misleading question in the Garden of Eden is “Did God actually say?” The adversary quotes Scripture, but he does so deceptively and out of context.
I believe it is critical to remember that, on his own, Jesus would never have been tempted. God the Father does not tempt anyone. Jesus has no inner voice to beat himself down. His conscience is clear of guilt, regret, and low self-esteem. It is the adversary who alone supplies this negative voice to Jesus. This confrontation is a reminder that there is palpable evil in the world. Peter says, “Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8).
But unlike Jesus, we are mere creatures. We are broken and sinful people. And as humans, we hardly need the devil’s help. We are hard enough on ourselves. We are prone enough on our own to stumble into destructive thoughts and behaviors. We are helpless and without the strength to break the bonds of sin that hold us captive.
Other people can be the adversarial voice that beats us down. This is the voice that does not build up but accuses and tears us down. You and I can be the messengers of the adversary when we violate the eighth commandment: “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” “We should fear and love God,” Martin Luther says, “So that we do not tell lies about our neighbor, betray him, slander him, or hurt his reputation, but defend him, speak well of him, and explain everything in the kindest way.”
This is why Scripture calls on believers to speak about our Adversary, the Devil, soberly and with humility. We are sinners. We dare not try to win these battles by our own strength. Apart from the shield of Christ’s protection we are no match to him. In the letter of Jude, he warns, “But when the archangel Michael, contended with the devil...he did not presume to pronounce a blasphemous judgment, but said, ‘The Lord rebuke you’” (Jude 9). Even the highest-ranking angel of God—the archangel Michael does not try to take on Satan himself but relies on the Lord’s strength. Who are we but mere flesh and blood to think that we can outsmart or contend with the powers and principalities—theses forces that battle against our souls from outside and within? Even the Lord Jesus himself does not lock horns with Satan or play according to his rules. He disengages from the game. He refuses to take the bait. His way out is through the objective truth found in the Bible. There is no doubt that Jesus could have prevented the whole temptation from even happening. He could have silenced and destroyed Satan with a breath from his mouth. But Jesus allows his temptation for our sake. And he uses the same arsenal that we have at our disposal to defeat our enemy. That weapon is the Word of God.
Three times Jesus says, “It is written,” “It is written,” “It is said [in Scripture].” This is what it means to be “led by the Holy Spirit” as Jesus is—to have the Word of God in our hearts and on our lips. It is why it is so important to be students of the Bible. Jesus is full of the Holy Spirit and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness forty days. The Spirit and the Word of God are inseparable. The Word is the sword of the Spirit. The Word preserves and protects our Lord against the temptations of the enemy. How much more so will the Word of God carry us through the desert?
How much more will Scripture preserve us through the oppressive heat, thirst, and hunger of the wilderness of this world and the cunning attacks of the adversarial voice? If the Bible is useful to Jesus, then how much more so to us? We too are led by the Holy Spirit into wilderness. Like Jesus, we are still walking forward as the baptized. “I am a child of God,” we say. God has not created junk. You and I are fearfully and wonderfully made in the wombs of our mothers. We are not tainted goods but fearfully and wonderfully re-made in our baptism. You and I are forgiven. Our future is secure. The Word of God calls us to look outside ourselves to God. In the Scriptures, we find objective truth—no matter how we feel. It is the way out of trouble. Again and again God calls us to enter this mighty fortress of his kingdom through the Word. Jesus quotes this beautiful Scripture: “One does not live by bread alone but every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord” (Deut 8:3). The Word of God is the bread of heaven that fills us, sustains us, and nourishes us. The Word made flesh is all we need to carry us through the wilderness of this world to our eternal home.
Through devils all the world should fill,
All eager to devour us,
We tremble not, we fear no ill;
They shall not overpow’r us.
This world’s prince may still
Scoul fierce as he will,
He can harm us none,
He’s judged; the deed is done;
One little word can fell him.
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