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“Into
Temptation”
a sermon by
Thomas L. Jenkins
Text: Luke 4:1-13
“It is said, ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
In this season of Lent, one of the first parts of our Christian faith
that we think about, and try to apply to our lives, is repentance.
To repent means to turn around 180 degrees, changing certain
things in our lives. Repentance
is highlighted during this time of year because the resurrection of
Easter is the greatest revelation from God that gives us real hope.
We want to prepare ourselves to receive it.
And just as we have our confession of sin before we enter our
time in the Word and Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, during Lent we
seek repentance in order to prepare ourselves for being ready to receive
God showing Himself closer to us than we have ever realized.
We do not have to repent in order to be forgiven.
In fact, once we truly believe that we are forgiven in Jesus
Christ, then spiritually, we begin to repent, to turn around and do
things totally different than we did before.
In the Lord’s Prayer, the final petition is “Lead us not into
temptation, but deliver us from evil.”
And from today’s gospel reading we have a wonderful lesson
pertaining to how to follow God, in His answering our prayer for Him not
to lead us not into temptation.
Much of what I studied this past week, as I looked at how many other
ministers taught this passage, was their teaching about the nature of
the devil. That is
important. However, this
morning I would rather highlight what we may learn from Jesus in His
resisting the temptations of the devil.
Evil is real and present in our lives.
But that does not mean that we believe in the devil the way we
believe in God. We trust in God. God
is personal. The devil is
not personal. God is about
life. The devil is the
power of evil in this world that is trying to drain us of real life.
But, it never totally does.
Jesus is always victor. Evil
never wins.
We do experience very much what the Apostle Paul did in his life.
In Romans 7:14ff he wrote: “For we know that the law
is spiritual; but I am of the flesh, sold into slavery under sin.
I do not understand my own actions.
For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.
Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good.
But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells
within me. For I know that
nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh.”
Nothing good dwells in the aspect of who we are that is under the
effect of the power of sin, evil, the devil in this world.
We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
But, we have all, also, been reconciled to God in Jesus Christ.
There are two truths about each of us.
There is the power of sin in our lives in the part of who we were
before we were brought into the faith of Jesus Christ.
And there is even a deeper truth within us than the sin that
dwells within us. We have
been converted, saved, changed, made new in Jesus Christ.
There is a new you and a new me, for real, in Jesus Christ.
And this new person, whom we have been converted into, is deep
within in our hearts, in the person of Jesus Christ.
And, it is here that we are spoken to.
Jesus, in how he dealt with the temptations of the devil, in his
experience of 40 days of focused trial on this earth, shows us how we
can find repentance and help from our new selves in him to deal with
evil’s temptations in our lives. We may learn from this passage, how to repent, in the sense
of turning away from the temptations—God answering our prayer to lead
us not into temptation—but, to lead us to His Word already within us.
All three times that Jesus’ dealt with the devil’s temptations, He
quoted Scriptures. Twice He
used the words, “It is written.”
The third time Jesus used the words, “It is said.”
This third response is the one teaching us at a deepest level.
The Word is not merely written down for us to remember certain rules for
our lives; the Word is spoken to us in our hearts, directly to us.
We learn to handle the temptations of sin within us by learning
to take in and hear the Word of God in our hearts.
It is good to read the Bible, to possibly remember the names and places
of the books, stories and characters within them.
Still, what is even more important for us is to read the Bible in
such way that we seek to hear it speak to us in a manner that is not
merely interpreted, but actually says something to us that we need to
hear.
We may be reading the book of Acts and see Jesus telling His disciples
to stay in Jerusalem until they receive the Holy Spirit.
And as we read that, God may very well use those words to say to
us, “Stay where you are.” That
has nothing to do with the interpretation, but God uses the words to
tell us something we need to hear.
God speaks to us.
This is a way in which we should be reading the Bible devotionally.
There are great blessing that come from reading certain books
completely and interpreting what is the major message.
But, there are other times when we simply need to read scriptures
in a spirit where we are seeking to hear God speak to us, in a method
that may very well lead us out of temptation.
Seek to get yourself in the Spirit of hearing God speak to you.
Take devotional time. Pray
and communicate to God that you want to hear His word to you.
Pray. Then, maybe,
even read something other than the Bible for a few minutes; a spiritual
book or magazine that has to do with faith, one that interests you.
That will help you get your mind and heart focused on God.
Then when you feel like you are in the right Spirit.
Open God’s Bible to where ever He leads you, and read slowly
and carefully, taking in each word, until God speaks to you. Next, stop
and meditate up it. Re-read
it, and you will find God speaking to you at the deepest level within
your heart.
God will give you these words as a way to lead you out of temptation.
For, some time soon, when the devil is tempting you, God’s Word
that you have heard spoken recently, in your heart, will give you what
to say to the devil and find the proper way to repent.
Let us pray…
Amen
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