If one person shouts a slogan, the whole crowd shouts back. Events in this period of include his baptism performed by John the Baptist and forty days of temptation by Satan in the Judean wilderness. Can you tell the difference between the two? Similarly, in the spirit­ual life, it is not enough just to be “born again,” which many preachers depict as a finished event in the sense that once you are born again, you will be fine forever after that. There is a right way of exercising your authority and a wrong way. Know the enemy’s tactics and how he works on the flesh. But some Bibles have “bow down before me” or “do homage to me” for Luke 4:7. So I don’t want to give you the impression that by the time we have concluded our study of the temptation of Jesus, we will have understood it fully. Acknowledge my kingship and pay me homage!”. But be careful about seek­ing a spiritual uplift. This is precisely where Satan begins to work on you. I have said to myself just as you may have said to your­self, “I can get a good job and serve God at the same time.” If you can do that, why can’t I do that as a preacher? What fast­ing does for your intellectual capacity is remarkable, assuming that you can survive a few days. Satan’s attacks on the newly baptized creates deep an­xieties in me and many other pastors, and this could be one of the reasons that many downplay the importance of baptism. I have always been willing to let God do with me as He wished. That is most fright­ening! We can imagine a discussion between Satan and Jesus. Water alone is not enough, baptism alone is not enough, for one must be born of water and the Spirit before he can enter the kingdom of God. It is hard to bring down a man of God who has the flesh under control. We won’t fight anymore. In the third trial (in Luke's order), the devil tries to get Jesus to put God … The temptation of Christ is a biblical narrative detailed in the gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. I chose to preach the gospel and ended up with second class hon­ors. Immediately after his baptism, Jesus was led into the wilderness to be tempted and to face intense spiritual conflict. That is precisely what Satan would have us think. In His care for you, God may allow you to get your arms twisted a bit in order to be trained in spiritual warfare, but He won’t let you get destroyed. That kind of temptation is very potent, and its aim is to make the flesh dom­inate the spirit such that it becomes the main motivat­ion in all that you do. In your heart you say to him, “Friend, you’re not looking after yourself. We can picture Satan pointing to a particular stone and say­ing, “Command this stone to become bread.” His temptations are concrete and appeal to the eye: “Jesus, Son of God, you are hungry. when God has no work for me to do? Baptism: Death, Burial, and the New Life, 3. Why shouldn’t I get a job too? The same word proskyneō is used in Matthew 2:2 of the magi or wise men who pay homage to the infant Jesus, honoring him not as God but as the king of the Jews. “No time was spent basking in the glory of the heavenly voice or the presence of the heavenly dove. A king who is anointed receives the authority from God to rule. In England, I faced this tempt­ation in the form of a university teach­ing job post which was exactly in line with my training. Quarantana, is probably a good guess. If you confront a man of God, you will soon find out that God’s power is more than enough to deal with you. You cannot afford the luxury of disobed­ience. Baptism and Temptation of Jesus Matthew 3:1-17 4:1-11 Mark 1:9-13 Luke 3:21-22 4:1-13 John 1:19-34 When John became a man, God led him into the wilderness. The Son of God knew what it was to discipline the flesh, so he prevailed in spiritual warfare with Satan. You and I won’t have to fight, and you won’t have to go to the cross. Satan is saying to Jesus, “Since you acknowledge that I am the ruler of this world, all I am asking of you is to kneel and bow before me, and honor me as king. I will collect my thesis from the shelf, blow off the dust, and run straight to the university: “Here is my doctoral thesis!”. It is not to worship Satan as God, for Jesus would never do that. Acknowledge me as the one who gave it all to you, In Luke 4:6-7, Satan offers to give Jesus “all this authority and their glory,” but under one condition: “If you will worship me, it shall all be yours.”. Why should I be the one? At the Bible Institute in Scotland, every academic year we would set aside one day for prayer. The definition of prosky­neō in these two lexicons is given in Appendix 2 of the present book, and both lexicons have “worship” only as a secondary definition. It is ludi­crous to think that Jesus would worship Satan. Are you willing to let Him decide? This woman had lots of resources, lots of money, lots of houses. Can you dismantle its logic? Jesus as the Son of God, and 2. Chronologically, the temptation of our Lord immediately follows His baptism. The words could be better translated, “Since you are the Son of God,” a rendering that brings out the basis of Satan’s proposal to Jesus. My own health is not that good, yet fasting has never done me any harm but a lot of good. Jesus removes himself from the world and invests time in prayer and fasting. So watch for Satan’s attacks!” And we didn’t have to wait long. Matthew connects the two events by the word, ‘then,’ Mark and Luke ‘and.’ Logically, the two events are inseparable. Wherever I preach the gospel, I will be introduced as Dr. Eric Chang whereas now I am only Mr. Eric Chang.” I was so ambitious that I wrote my doctoral thesis, some 330 or 340 pages, even before heading off. Who cares if Jesus gets his feet washed so long as I get mine washed—by Jesus no less! You remember that after Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River by John the Baptist and the spirit of God came upon him in the form of a dove and the father said, "This is my beloved son and whom I'm well pleased." She changed her tactic and tried to buy me with money: “Let’s be friends. But remember what James says: “Resist the devil and he will flee from you” (James 4:7). Learn to bring your flesh under control. If I had disobeyed God and gone for a doctorate, I would have Th.D. Satan goes on to say to Jesus, “Command this stone to become bread” (Luke 4:3). All along I have had authority over all the kingdoms of the world. You are not just a body but also a spirit. I have seen many undiscerning Christians swallow it lock, stock and barrel, lacking the spiritual insight to see through its satanic logic. Jesus’ time in the wilderness is a time of preparation for the ministry he is called to do. See also James D.G. The quick answer is: Choose the easiest way out, the path of least resistance! Last week we saw that the first type of temptation is simply a crude appeal to our physical needs and desires, even legitimate needs. “Since you are the Son of God, turn this stone into bread!” Satan is working along a legitimate line. There may be here a picture of the “scapegoat” that symbolically carried the nation’s sins into the wilderness (Lev. It is clear from Scripture that you need both baptisms to enter the kingdom of God. You can have five doc­torates yet be useless to God. When God puts you aside, you are finished. I looked at the salary and said, “Hey, I could use that salary! They are absolutely useless to God, and I am not exaggerating. When you read a Bible passage, ask yourself, “Does my life con­form to it? Before I could even pick up my pen, the convict­ing of the Holy Spirit came, saying, “Eric, what are you doing?”, “I guess it is like … the flesh dominating the spirit.”. They will even pay for my Bible college expenses.” But don’t shout hallelujah too fast, for you have just walked into a trap. Rather, stay close to God, and quiet your spirit before Him. Approach every spiritual experience with caution, especially if offers an instant uplift. The fierceness of spiritual warfare is well known to those who like Elisha have served God. Second, that Saul may be filled with the Holy Spirit. Jesus doesn’t deny that Satan is the king of the world, yet he also says, “I serve no one but God.”, In closing, let us keep in mind Satan’s basic tactic: “Who cares what God said? What does it mean to feed on God’s Word? It is Satan’s subtle temptation to let the flesh govern your actions. The point of being a Christ­ian is not only that you look after yourself, but God looks after you. How then do we apply this principle? The vision that Isaiah saw is a vision of God, not a vision of the glories of the world that will only lead you astray. I am not saying that the person who is not preaching the gospel is materialistic. (Mt.4:4). Jesus having refused each temptation, Satan then departed and Jesus returned to Galilee to begin his ministry. If you are totally committed, you will do His will. The consequence is, that a viper of the Cainite heresy, lately conversant in this quarter, h… The mass effect is very powerful. I could not pinpoint the cause until he told me he had not been baptized. You will face temptation right after your baptism as was the case with Jesus for whom intense tempta­tion came after, not before, his baptism. The temptation is not obvious, and this is what makes it dangerous. Either way, it did not matter to me in the slightest. I dumped the forms into the garbage bin! God is there to serve you, not you to serve God. Can you tell Satan’s way from God’s way? Jesus fasted forty days in the wilderness to fight off Satan’s temptat­ions. (Romans 8:9, ESV) [1]. Here “serve” is parallel to “worship”. The whole point is to learn to anticipate what your opponent is going to do in a certain situation. Don’t get me wrong. If he had tried to get Jesus to worship him as God, it would not even be a temptation for Jesus. Where does the Bible say that Eric Chang is limited to preaching the gospel? That is not the point. But what was I doing? What does it have to do with us Christians, disciples of the Lord Jesus? Bear in mind the second principle of temptation: take the easy road. Don’t seek superficial spiritual experiences. It made no differ­ence to me because I only wanted to do God’s will. Unless you are born of water and the Spirit, you will not enter the kingdom. In China I used to carry a flag for our secondary school in a marching band. In this early period he preaches around Galilee and recruits his first disciples who begin to travel with him and eventually form the core of the early Church [1] [6] as it is believed that the Apostles dispersed from Jerusalem to found the apostolic sees . So beware of Satan’s soft approach. Soon after his baptism Jesus was led by the Spirit into the wild, uncultivated wilderness. Understand the nature of spiritual warfare. Fasting is not something that is understood in the weak, woolly, and undisciplined church today. Last week we looked at verses 1 to 4 of Luke chapter 4. And I would still be serving God. God has in some small ways used me in healing. I say to you who have been baptized: God might lead you to do a Master’s or a doctorate, or He might not. We!oftenneglecttoprepareChristiansforafterbaptism:thecomingtest/temptation.Jesus! Soon after that powerful experience, I said to the brothers and sisters in the church, “We have been granted a signal blessing. Acts records three instances of Paul giving a testimony of his dramatic encounter with the Lord Jesus. If you don’t look after yourself, why would you expect God to look after you?”. He lived a low-key life in relative obscurity until he was anointed by the Spirit for the task to which he had been called. Given the state of affairs in the church today, it is not surprising that here was someone who was preparing himself to serve God, yet was not even baptized. In Luke 4:3 but also in 4:9, Satan says to Jesus, “If you are the Son of God …” The word if does not mean that Satan does not know that Jesus is the Son of God. Satan lifts you up only to bring you down. To withstand the kind of temptation you and I fall prey to daily, that His perfect obedience might be considered ours through … If you stand firm, Satan can do nothing to you. Even young Christ­ians would never think that a religious Jew, especially Jesus, would worship Satan as God. So we would like to pay for your studies at the Bible college.”. I say to you who have just been baptized: conform your life to what is taught in God’s Word. In any case, Satan would not ask you to do something you would never do. What was Christ’s first act? This way of thinking is what underpins the famous saying, “God takes care of those who take care of themselves.” Never has there been a more Satanic statement hatched out of hell. I am not asking for much, just that you honor me as king.”, One can acknowledge that a person is a king without honoring him as king. Today he is serving as a pastor in the German state church with deep devotion to God. It is faith that makes baptism meaningful and efficacious, for without faith, baptism would be an empty ceremony that is little more than taking a bath. Moody lacked primary school education, yet wherever he went to preach the Word of God, the people broke down. I was actually doing my doctorate as an undergraduate in my spare time! faced!it.Ournewly!baptised!Believers!willtoo.! He wore clothes made of camel hair, and he ate locusts and wild honey. Don’t envy Pastor so-and-so with multiple degrees after his name. Tradition points out the fords opposite Jericho. Don’t give Satan an inch, for you are a child of God. It is wonderful to be born spirit­ually, but if you are going to survive spirit­ually, you will have to feed on God’s Word: “Like newborn babies, long for the pure spiritual milk” (1Peter 2:2), which is the Word of God. It is impressive and exciting! If you cannot manage a day, skip a meal. God doesn’t want a church full of spiritual babes. 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