Luke 4:1-13 "Temptation"
Have you ever been tempted to worship the devil? Forget all this God and Jesus stuff, make a deal with the devil for whatever you really want out of life. Like the blues guitar player who goes down to the crossroads and sells his soul to be a famous musician.
Or have you ever just thought to yourself, “Self, do you really believe all this Jesus stuff? That somehow a guy who lived 2,000 years ago has anything to do with anything anymore? Really?” Basic doubt temptations.
If God is who we say He is—all-powerful, all good—how on earth can He let people starve to death or suffer in such horrible ways.
What would you think of me, if I told you I was tempted to give up on NewChurch? Forget serving the Lord. Tempted to go over to the dark side and worship the devil instead?
You’d probably wonder what the heck I was doing being the pastor of a church, right? Why should anyone listen to anything I have to say?
I sent a text to my friend Pastor Matt asking him what he would think if I was tempted to worship the devil. He said, “I would say no. And I would then lead an exorcism.”
Then I told him not to worry, it was just my intro to this week’s sermon on Jesus in the wilderness.
Here’s a jarring thought: Jesus was tempted to worship the devil. He was tempted to doubt everything He knew about God, everything He knew about Himself, and not do what He came to earth to do.
But He didn’t give in to the temptation. He stood face to face with the devil and said “no.”
Luke chapter 4:
Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, where for forty days he was tempted by the devil. Luke 4:1-2
This is immediately after His baptism. His hair is still wet. There might be some feathers from the dove sticking to his robe. The words are still echoing in His ears, “You are my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.”
Beware of spiritual highs. That’s when the devil is gonna come after you.
Last week we talked about Jesus’ baptism. How He went into the water that was filled with all the sins of the people—He went in clean and came out dirty. In His baptism, Jesus became connected to all the baptisms of His people, all the sins of His people, all the sin He was going to be punished for on the cross.
In another Gospel, when John the Baptist sees Jesus walking up to be baptized he says, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” John 1:29
Lamb of God. Interesting name. Jesus, as the Lamb of God, is the once and for all final sacrifice to atone for all His people’s sin.
In Leviticus chapter 16 an annual event called the Day of Atonement is explained. Yom Kippur. The high priest would go into the Tabernacle with a young bull and a ram—he’d sacrifice them to atone for his own sin, so he could go into the Holy of Holies on behalf of all the people.
Then he was told to do something else. Take two goats to the entrance of the Tabernacle, cast lots (basically, flip a coin) to see which one would be for sacrifice and which one was to be the scapegoat—this is where the idea of a scapegoat comes from. The High Priest would lay both hands on the scapegoat and confess all the wickedness and rebellion of the people—put all their sins on the goat’s head—then send it to be released in the wilderness. Pretty weird, right? It gets even weirder though, Leviticus 16:8 actually says it like this,
“And Aaron shall cast lots over the two goats, one lot for the LORD and the other lot for Azazel.”
No one knows exactly who or what Azazel is, but most people think it’s the name of a demon or another name for the devil or Satan. This is also why the devil is depicted as a goat-looking demon sometimes.
You might be thinking, “What? That sounds crazy. You expect me to believe in a literal devil?”
In the Bible, the devil who’s also called Satan is the ruler of the countless demons who spend all their time encouraging people to sin—and then accusing them of being guilty of those sins. The Book of Job is a pretty good picture of what they’re all about. They figure out how to lure you into a trap and then they try to lock the door and drag you to hell with them.
Yes, the Bible speaks of a literal devil, actual demons—just like it speaks of angels, archangels, and other spiritual realities. Like the soul and spirit of each person. These are all real things created by God. To believe in Jesus is to believe His teaching about all this stuff.
So, this is what’s happening in Luke chapter 4: The Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world, straight from the spiritual high of His baptism, He’s led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness, carrying all the sins of His people with Him. The Lamb of God is the ultimate scapegoat.
Now, these days, when we talk about a scapegoat, we’re talking about someone who gets blamed for something they didn’t do—the scapegoat is held liable and punished so the guilty person can get away with it. We hate this idea, it doesn’t seem fair. And it’s not. But it’s exactly what Jesus signed up to do for us. This is what grace looks like. Grace isn’t fair. Jesus takes our sin and guilt so we can get away with it—so we can be forgiven. For the final Day of Atonement.
I’m just setting the scene: Jesus is in the wilderness. The desolate place. The place of darkness. Spooky. He’s getting ready to start His mission, the journey that will lead Him to the cross—and He comes face to face with the actual devil.
Verse 2:
He ate nothing during those days, and at the end of them he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’” Luke 4:2-4
If. IF you are the Son of God. God had just spoken from the heavens and said Jesus was His beloved Son. The devil says, “Meh. Maybe. If you’re really the Son of God—why would He let You go hungry? If God really loved you, why would He lead you out here to starve? Why don’t You make yourself something to eat. Use magic. Shouldn’t be a problem if you’re the Son of God.”
This should remind us of when the children of Israel were led around the desert for 40 years after being set free from Egypt. God led them into the wilderness, He said it was to test their faithfulness. Test their faithfulness, not tempt them to sin—there is a difference. But when their bellies started to growl, they started to grumble, they doubted God, they wanted to go back to Egypt. Didn’t exactly ace the test.
So now Jesus is Israel reduced to one man. He’s been led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil, and He’s going to succeed where the children of Israel failed. But the devil wants Him to feel the ache in His empty stomach and start doubting. He tempts Jesus to turn stones into bread to satisfy His hunger. “God has abandoned You, He doesn’t care about You! He brought you out here to die. Take some advice from me, God helps those who help themselves.” The devil has a million ways to trick people into ignoring what God has told them. A million ways to make people doubt what God has promised them.
But Jesus remembers the Father’s words—”You are my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” He’s going to let those words be His life and sustenance.
At the end of the 40 years in the wilderness, Moses wrote the Book of Deuteronomy for the children of Israel—the generation that would go into the Promised Land. Jesus is at the end of His 40 days in the wilderness, and He quotes from Deuteronomy chapter 8:3 applying the words to Himself, this is the full text:
“He humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, which neither you nor your ancestors had known, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the LORD.”
Obviously, we need bread to live. Food. Jesus will teach us to pray that the Father gives us our daily bread. But we don’t live on bread alone. Bread without hope is an empty life. We have to trust what God tells us—that’s where real life comes from. Our life is hidden with Christ in God. He’ll provide bread when we need bread, but His Word is the Bread of Life. Hope. Salvation. Blessing. We’re His beloved children. It doesn’t matter how hungry we get, we don’t have to fall for the tricks of the devil and doubt what God has told us.
Remember the song “We Are The World?” Willie Nelson sang the line “As God has shown us by turning stones to bread…” Nope. Sorry, Willie. That never happened.
At the end of chapter 3, we just got done reading a genealogy that ended with “Adam, the Son of God.” Jesus is the second Adam, the second man to walk on the earth without sin. The first temptation in the wilderness was a lot like the first temptation in the Garden of Eden. The devil uses food to create distrust of God and His Word—this time to create doubt that He was actually God’s Son. But the temptation that succeeded with Adam who had everything he could ever want in the beautiful garden of plenty, failed on Jesus in the miserable hunger of the desert. And not because Jesus was God, either. Jesus was tempted as a man to use His powers to make Himself more comfortable. In His flesh, He was tempted, and as a man, He didn’t fall for it.
Would it have been a sin for Jesus to use His supernatural power to make bread? He’s going to feed the five thousand by doing a very similar miracle. What’s the difference?
A couple things: first, Doing what the devil tells us to do is always a bad idea. Anything the devil tempts us to do is sin. He’s not going to tempt anyone to do good things. Second, when Jesus fed the five thousand, He was doing something for other people—not Himself. Jesus didn’t use His divine powers and privileges for Himself. He didn’t come to be served but to serve and give His life as a ransom for others.
Which leads us to the next temptation:
The devil led him up to a high place and showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world. And he said to him,
“I will give you all their authority and splendor; it has been given to me, and I can give it to anyone I want to. If you worship me, it will all be yours.” Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’” Luke 4:5-8
The devil leads Jesus up to where He can see the whole world. He does some sort of supernatural multimedia presentation and shows Jesus all the kingdoms in an instant. The devil says they’re his to give away if he wants. Were they really his to give? Was he lying? Maybe, he is called The Father of Lies. He’s also called a thief and a robber—so maybe he stole the kingdoms somehow. I don’t know. Remember in Daniel, Jesus had conflict with the devil—called him the Prince of Persia. I tend to think in some way the kingdoms of the world were actually the devil’s to give—it’s a real offer, but at a really steep price.
This is where Jesus is tempted to worship the devil.
It’s one thing to be tempted to make bread because you’re hungry but it sounds a lot more sinister to be tempted to worship the devil. And when we’re talking about Jesus, that just sounds wrong.
But there are two kinds of temptation.
One is a sin and one is not. The first kind of temptation is the original kind, like from back in the garden—it’s only a sin if you give into it. The temptation comes from the outside. The devil or someone or something entices you into doing something you know is wrong. Eat the forbidden fruit. Do the forbidden thing. It’s out of the blue. They offer you drugs, or sex, or attack you in some way that tempts you to sin. This kind of temptation wasn’t your idea to start with, and it’s not a sin if you don’t do it.
The second kind of temptation is very different, it’s a byproduct of the fall—of our sinful nature. This is when we tempt ourselves. We make up our own temptations. We lead ourselves into temptation. We go to places we know we shouldn’t go, we’re looking for ways to sin. We have a thought and we keep thinking it. Play it out in our minds. Savor it. This kind is a sin in itself—whether we go ahead and do it or not. We do the devil’s job for him. We’re the tempter.
Jesus covered this in the Lord’s Prayer, too. “Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.”
Jesus was tempted in the first way—the temptation that comes from the outside. He was not tempted in the second. He didn’t tempt Himself. He didn’t even for a second entertain the idea. He was never going to worship the devil. He had no desire to worship the devil. It was never going to happen, but He was tempted. He was tempted but He didn’t sin.
“You can have all the kingdoms of the world. You don’t even have to do whatever else God sent you down here to do. Just worship me.”
Jesus’ answer is from Deuteronomy again. ‘It is written: Worship the Lord your God and serve him only.’”
It’s a straight-up rebuke. What the devil offers is a direct violation of the First Commandment. He’s offering a shortcut that bypasses the suffering and pain of the cross. He’s offering instant gratification. Instant glory.
It worked on Adam and Eve. “Eat this and you’ll be like God!”
It worked on the children of Israel—over and over. From the Golden Calf to every time they bowed down and worshiped the false gods of the pagan nations.
It didn’t work on Jesus.
Third temptation:
The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple.
“If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down from here. For it is written: “ ‘He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.’” Jesus answered, “It is said: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’” When the devil had finished all this tempting, he left him until an opportune time. Luke 4:9-13
This is a tricky one. The devil is like, “Okay, you like to throw Bible verses around, how about this one? If you’re really the Son of God, then God has promised to protect you from any harm.” He takes Him up to the highest point of the Temple and says, “Jump! You’ll be fine. All the people will see the angels catch you—it’ll be awesome!”
It’s always a demonic trick of the devil to try and make the Bible say things it’s not saying. To use one Scripture to undermine another. In this case, the devil is saying, “Since God promised to protect you, you should take advantage of it—jump off the Temple, step in front of a bus, join the circus and catch bullets with your teeth! Show them your Superman”
Jesus answers from Deuteronomy again. Instead of setting Scriptures against each other, He uses Scripture to interpret and understand Scripture. Deuteronomy 6:16 says,
“Do not put the LORD your God to the test as you did at Massah.”
What happened at Massah? In Exodus 17:7 it says,
“The Israelites quarreled and because they tested the LORD saying, “Is the LORD among us or not?”
So, it’s the same deal. The devil says, “If God is with you, jump from the Temple—if He is, you’ll be fine.” Jesus answers him, “Don’t you remember Massah? What kind of idiot are you? I’m not going to test God like that.”
The order of the temptations are different in Luke than they are in Matthew. In Matthew, he gives the chronological order: First bread, then jumping from the Temple, and the kingdoms of the world if He’ll worship the devil last. We know that’s the chronological order because after the devil asks Jesus to bow down before him in Matthew, Jesus commands him to go away. Hardly anything happens in Matthew unless Jesus says so.
Instead of Chronologically, Luke tells the story geographically—maybe even theologically—they lead up to Jesus being at the Temple. The Gospel of Luke is going to follow the ministry of Jesus from the desert to the Temple in Jerusalem, where just outside the city, the Lamb of God will die for His people.
The devil goes away. For now. There will be more temptations before Jesus is finished—He won’t give into those either.
Here’s the question, though. What does this have to do with us and our temptations?
Are we supposed to be like Jesus and zing the devil with the perfect Bible verse when we’re tempted? The devil tempts us to break a Commandment and we rebuke him by quoting the Commandment out loud?
I mean, it’s not a bad idea. You’ll need to know the Scriptures to do that. Like Kemper always says, “read your freaking Bible.”
But there’s something else happening here that we need to pay attention to. The devil is tempting Jesus to doubt God’s promise to Him. What God said. Doubt who God said He is. Doubt that He’s a beloved Son of God.
I think that’s the biggest lie the devil tells us, too. He wants us to doubt God’s goodness. God’s mercy. His forgiveness. He wants to remind us of all the ways we’ve failed. All the ways we’re unfaithful. “You don’t really believe any of this Jesus stuff. You certainly don’t act like you do.”
The fight with the devil will continue all our lives.
We’re not on the sidelines watching Jesus fight with the devil. We’re in the fight. You’re not in the bleachers cheering Him on—you step into the ring with Him. You’re in Christ. You’re connected to Jesus through your baptism. Your life is hidden with Christ in God. Just like how in Adam all humanity fell through temptation into sin and death—in Christ you will rise through His obedience into righteousness and life. He passed those temptations for you. You win because He won. His victory is your victory.
But you know—just like with Jesus—the devil isn’t done. He will wait for an opportune time.
The devil. Satan. The accuser, the tempter, the slanderer, the enemy, the evil one.
James says to resist him and he will leave. And don’t let him plant ideas in your head so that you become your own devil. Resist those secret sins you keep burning into your soul.
Mostly, though, remember who you are. Remember what God has promised you. Remember that there is no condemnation for you because you are in Christ. When you’re tempted to doubt, tempted to sin—tempted give up, bow down, and give the devil what he wants, remember this:
You are a beloved child of God. With you, He is well pleased. Pray this every day: Father, lead me away from temptation, deliver me from the evil one, lead me to the One who conquered the Tempter for me, Jesus Christ the Lord. AMEN.