Sermon 115
Sermon by John Mash at Wonersh
on Sunday 10th Fbruary 2008
THE
TEMPTATIONS OF JESUS
Introduction
The other day Mike Woodhouse told me that he looked forward to my
opening joke or pleasantry, at the start of my sermons. Well, since it’s lent, I’m going to make him
fast, so no joke. But actually this
brings me straight into the gospel we have had read to us this morning, about
fasting and temptation. It’s a familiar
enough story, so what I would like to share with you
is one or two thoughts arising from it.
The Temptations Themselves
Immediately after Jesus’ baptism in the
So Satan plays his second card:
he takes Jesus up to the highest point of the temple and says to
him: “If you are the Son of God, throw
yourself down….” Here the devil is
trying to make Jesus misuse his divine powers to make himself a celebrity, to
achieve fame instantly – much more quickly than by the tough ministry he knew
was ahead of him over the following two years.
Again Jesus refutes him using words of scripture: “It is written, do not put the Lord your God
to the test.”
Then the devil plays his trump card, a powerful one indeed. He takes Jesus up into a high mountain from
which he could see all the kingdoms of the world, and says to him: “All this I will give you, if you will bow
down and worship me.” A
forerunner of Faust several hundred years later. And for the third time Jesus stands firm,
answering his tempter from scripture:
“Away from me, Satan. For it is written, worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.”
Those were the three temptations, very familiar to us all. But I believe there was a fourth temptation,
implicit in all three of the explicit ones.
It is this: not only was Jesus at
a low ebb, but this all took place right at the start
of his ministry. We read of no miracles
recorded before his baptism and temptation.
Notice how the devil starts his tempting: “If you are the Son of God…..” Was he working on Jesus self-doubt? How did he know he had such powers, if he had
never used them? What a temptation to
give in to just one of Satan’s suggestions, to prove to himself that he did
indeed have these powers. He was
challenging Jesus: “If you think you’re
really the Son of God……” The temptation
to prove to himself that he did indeed have these
divine powers must have been a powerful one.
After this Satan left him for a while.
Of course we know when he returned, big-time. It was in the
Incidentally, both the periods of temptations have something in common,
not often dwelt on. After the devil left
Jesus in the desert, we are told, “Angels came and ministered to him.” My guess is that they had been there all
along. For when he was praying and
sweating blood in the
The importance of the
Temptations
This takes us direct to today’s epistle.
The wonderful words of Romans 5:19:
“for just as through the disobedience of one man (Adam) the many were
made sinners, so also through the obedience of the one man the many will be
made righteous.” The core of the gospel
is here. Sin brings death, and all men
are condemned to die through their sin.
If Jesus had not held out against temptation, if he had sinned, he would
have had to die on his own account as a sinner, and could not die for us.
Satan knew how vital it was to the cause of evil that Jesus should
fall, either during his fast in the wilderness, or near the end, in the
That is why we can come to the throne of grace as forgiven children of
God. Jesus died on the cross on our
behalf, and could do so because he never fell to temptation. That is why Lent is celebrated as a vital part
of our Christian year: it reminds us of
the cost of Jesus’ self-denial, and encourages us to undergo some similar sort
of self-denial as a preparation for the great day of victory, Easter Sunday.
Lessons of the Temptations
Finally, what lessons here to help us in our 21st century
lives? I think there are three.
The first is this. Jesus has just
spent forty days in the desert, without food.
He has been entirely on his own for the whole of that time. And it is there, and then, when he is at his
lowest ebb, that the devil tempts him.
My own experience tells me that it is when we are at a
low ebb, physically or emotionally, that we are most likely to give in
to temptation. So perhaps we should be
more self-aware, more conscious of when we’re tired, or hungry, or depressed,
or lonely.
The second is this: do you
remember how Jesus refuted Satan? Every
time, he quoted from the scriptures. He
had no Bible with him; he must have known most of it by heart. And I know it is the experience of lots of
Christians that in a day when they start by reading the Bible, they are less likely
to fall. It doesn’t hurt to pray daily
too, of course. Have you ever seen, on
those wonderful David Attenborough nature programmes, flocks of starlings
flying in close formation, or herds of wildebeest walking on the African
plains? They keep close to each other,
and the centre of the flock or herd.
They know that to lose touch with their fellows is to risk being picked
off by predators. I have heard someone
say: “I can be a good Christian without
going to church.” True, he can. But it will be much harder, and he will be
much more likely to be picked off by Satan if he remains on his own. The closer we try and live to God, and the
closer we keep in fellowship with other Christians, the more likely we are to
keep our faith and lives intact.
And the third lesson is this: do
you remember I said earlier how both during the fasting in the wilderness and
in the
So as we come to communion today, let’s give thanks to God that Jesus
resisted temptation for our sakes, and resolve to live closer to him in our own
daily lives. We shall fail, of course –
but that’s where forgiveness kicks in.
But we certainly don’t have time to cover that today. Amen.