Tension, Temptation, and Trust (Luke 4:1-14; Mark 1:12-13; Matthew 4:1-11; Hebrews 4:14-16)

The Humanity of Christ and Hebrews 4:14-16

All right now it's 9 30. Now we can officially start, right? You guys are the the few and the faithful here on a Sunday morning before Thanksgiving week. It's a little lighter today, which is good. It means I can call on people individually and ask them questions.

So brace yourselves. All right, let's get started this morning. We're going to open in a word of prayer and then we'll dive into our text here. Let's pray. Father, as we gather to study your word this morning, we give you the adoration and the praise that you alone deserve.

You are infinite in wisdom and holiness and great in compassion, mighty in love, faithful to us when we are not faithful to you. We confess our sins before you. Pray that you would grant us repentant hearts that have been transformed by the renewing of our minds through your son, Jesus Christ.

It's in his name we pray. Amen. Well, open up your Bibles to Hebrews chapter four. This morning is our seventh lesson in the series Walk by the Spirit. And my family in our Bible reading calendar is in the middle of the book of Ezekiel.

And every time I read Ezekiel, I am humbled by how hard it was for Ezekiel personally to be a prophet of God. Just think for me for just a second. Ezekiel prophesies from Babylon. He's one of those who has already been deported from Israel before the final destruction in 586 BC.

But he has the privilege, if you can call it that, of prophesying to the people in one of the most miserable times in their entire history. The time frame that's leading up to the final conquering and siege of the city of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and his forces.

So if that was not enough, Ezekiel has the unenviable task of prophesying further judgment against the nation and then living it out in various pictures before the people. He's told in chapter three that the people are stubborn and will not listen to him and then warn that if he doesn't prophesy to them, he will be judged.

In chapter four, he's instructed to lie on his side, the same position next to a brick for 390 days as a picture of the impending siege against the city. In chapter five, he has to shave his head and his beard.

And no, that's not with respect to any recent election that he has to do that. In chapter 12, he has to go dig through a wall as a picture of the nation seeking to flee the city. And finally, my least favorite, in chapter 24, God takes his wife's life.

She's described as the desire of your eyes and then commands Ezekiel not to weep or mourn. For the death of his wife is a picture to the people of Israel of God's intention to take from them their stronghold, the joy of their pride, the desire of their eyes and their heart's delight, their sons and their daughters.

So if you're tempted to think that your trials are the worst, remember it could always be worse. You could be Ezekiel.

But this is the good news.

It's in Ezekiel that we also find the hope for all who are suffering and in great need. You don't need to turn there, but just listen briefly as I read from you a little bit of the hope that is in Ezekiel 34 for the nation of Israel and by extension for all the people of God.

It says in verse 11,. For thus says the Lord God,. Behold, I myself will search for my sheep and seek them out as a shepherd cares for his herd in the day when he is among his scattered sheep. So I will care for my sheep and will deliver them from all the places to which they were scattered on a cloudy and gloomy day.

I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries and bring them to their own land. I will feed them on the mountains of Israel by the streams and in all the inhabited places of the land.

I will feed them in a good pasture and their grazing ground will be on the mountain heights of Israel. There they will lie down on good grazing ground and feed in rich pasture on the mountains of Israel.

I will feed my flock and I will lead them to rest declares the Lord God. I will seek up the lost, bring back the scattered, bind up the broken and strengthen the sick. But the fat and strong I will destroy.

I will feed them with judgment. And then over in verse 23, he says,. Then I will set over them one shepherd, my servant David, and he will feed them. He will feed them himself and be their shepherd. And I, the Lord, will be their God.

And my servant David will be prince among them. I, the Lord, have spoken. So in Ezekiel, in the bleakest of moments in the history of the nation of Israel, God provides a picture of the coming shepherd, the one who will feed them with himself and be that prince, that king and the one they could come to in times of great need.

This morning's lesson is titled Tension, Temptation, and Trust. And we will delight this morning in the reality that Jesus is the son of God, our great high priest and coming king, and the one that we turn to anytime we are in great need.

This morning, we're going to ask and answer three questions about the temptations of Jesus so that we will learn how to trust God in times of great need. We're going to look at three questions that come from Hebrews and the gospel accounts about the temptations of Jesus and seek to answer them so that we will learn how to trust God in times of great need.

So we'll look at Hebrews chapter four. If you're not already there, Hebrews 4 verses 14 through 16 is our starting point for today's lesson. Hebrews 4, 14 through 16. And our first question that we'll ask and answer is, can Jesus really sympathize with us in our human weaknesses?

Can he really sympathize with us in all our human weaknesses?

Is that really true?

Let me read the passage for you.

It says,.

Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the son of God, let us hold fast our confession. For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.

Therefore, let us draw near with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in times of need. Let us hold fast with confidence. This passage is just undergirded by this tremendous confident assurance in our truth that sustains all believers who have ever read it.

What is the confidence? Jesus is our great high priest. And he can sympathize with us in all our weaknesses. We don't have to doubt that. The writer of Hebrews declares it to us. He is. Now, recall that we spent some time three weeks ago, back on November 3rd in Hebrews 2.

And there's a thread here that goes through Hebrews 2. I want you to look back at it. Just look back at verses 17 and 18. When we looked at Hebrews 2 three weeks ago, we talked about four incentives for us to persist in our sanctification that are provided to us by the humanity of Christ.

And the final incentive was that in his perfect priesthood, Jesus encourages us in the face of temptation. Listen to Hebrews 2 .17 and 18.

It says,.

Therefore, he had to be made like his brethren in all things so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since he himself was tempted in that which he has suffered, he is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted.

That statement in verse 17, that challenges me. He had to be made like his brethren in some things. No, he had to be made like his brethren in all things. Does that author under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit really mean all things?

Yes, I think he does. And if so, how do we understand what the all things means here? So here we encounter again the same challenge that we've had all seven weeks of this series. There is a tension here between multiple truths regarding the incarnation of Jesus Christ.

And we should not shy away from this tension. It should not scare us. It should not confuse us. It should not cause us to give up the challenge. We should lean into it, strain into the mystery. How can Jesus be God and man at the same time?

Now it's often easier, I'm going to suggest for us to embrace the fact that Jesus was like us in his physical nature. It's all over the gospels, right? He was a baby, he ate, he drank, he slept, he got tired, he walked multiple places.

He is fully God, right? He is infinite and omnipresent. And yet he's a man, and I'll use the term, I'm just quoting it, monopresent, right? He's only in one spot at one time. We could get our minds around that.

That's okay. Jesus is fully like us in his physical humanity. We can also get behind the secondary reality that he is also like us in his emotional humanity. He was happy.

He was sad.

He grew distressed and even angry. And there were situations where he had to speak truth to his own heart. Listen to Luke 12 verse 50. It says, but I have a baptism to undergo and how distressed I am until it is accomplished.

So we're okay when you start talking about Jesus' physical humanity. He's God and man. He's emotional humanity. He's God and man. But where I think we really start to get stretched and we start to create a dichotomy in our own thinking is when we talk about his mental humanity, how he thought and his spiritual humanity, how he relates to God, the father.

Those are the two hardest areas for us to accept that Jesus was like us in all things. Remember what Hebrews 2 says. He had to be made like us in all things. Otherwise, he cannot be our great high priest.

Jesus had to withstand real temptation, real testing. And it is here when we struggle with that truth that we have to go back to the source of truth, God's word and hold the truth that we see there in the tension in which they are presented to us in the scriptures.

Jesus is the son of God. Hebrews 4 says that. Look back at Hebrews 4 verse 14. Jesus, the son of God. He is absolutely fully God and yet fully man, just as he is infinite, omnipresent. In this sense, he is confined to a human weakness.

And therefore, we have to ask that question we started with. Can he really sympathize with us in our human weaknesses, particularly human temptation or testing against sin? Again, the author of Hebrews is 100 certain that Jesus has passed every test in his qualification to be our great high priest.

Look at Hebrews 5 verses 7 through 9, just the next chapter here. It says in Hebrews 5, 7, in the days of his flesh, he offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to the one able to save him from death.

And he was heard because of his piety. Although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered. And having been made perfect, he became to all those who obey him the source of eternal salvation.

If Jesus were not fully human in the days of his flesh and had not been made like us in all things, he would be lesser, less than one of the Jewish high priests to which he is being compared in this passage.

And that can't happen.

Where the Jewish high priest could identify with the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual difficulties of full humanity, Jesus must also meet that qualification. Look back at verse 4, 14, excuse me, of chapter 4.

Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the son of God, let us hold fast. This is this verb here. We need to hold on to this truth. We need to possess this truth.

We need to grab hold of it and keep our hold on it. We have to hold on to this truth when we don't yet fully understand it. We have to hold on to this truth when we're tempted to not believe it. And we have to hold on to this truth when we face trials that would pull us away from Jesus.

Hold fast to whom? Your high priest, who is Jesus, the son of God, the greatest of high priests. The one who has passed through the heavens. The one who makes it possible for you to hold fast to your confession to him.

The one who can and does genuinely, compassionately sympathize with you in your weaknesses. The one who has been tempted in all things as we are yet without sin. One of the great truths proclaimed in Hebrews is that Jesus has accomplished his mission by dying and being resurrected and has now returned to the Father and now eternally fulfills his role as our great high priest.

This truth helps sustain us in living out the faith that we profess, that we confess. When we say we trust in him, we get tested. We encounter various trials and temptations in our human weakness. And when we do, the test is, will we look to him?

Will we look to our great high priest? Now, it is true that Jesus is no longer here on earth. That's what the passage says. He has temporarily left the earth. He's passed through the heavens and moved back to a place that's not here on earth.

But yet, while he is not here, he remains a man. He is still a man, a human being, and one who can provide genuine sympathy to us in our weakness. Now, look at verse 15. It says, we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize.

The Greek word there is actually very close to sympathize, sympatheo. It means to feel compassion, to commiserate, to have a genuine sympathy towards someone in their trials and weaknesses. How is that true for Jesus?

Because he experienced the full essence of our humanity. Weaknesses literally means feebleness. He's feeble. Now, he's all powerful, but he's feeble. By implication, he was subject to the normal aspects of human frailty.

We don't have recorded any sense of where he ever experienced a human disease, but I don't think we could rule out the possibility that he could have gotten sick or had disease in his body. Listen to Isaiah 53, verses two through five.

It says, for he grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of a parched ground. He has no stately form or majesty that we should look on him, nor appearance that we should be attracted to him.

He was despised and forsaken of men, a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. And like one from whom men hide their face, he was despised. And we did not esteem him. Surely our griefs he himself bore and our sorrows he carried.

Yet we ourselves esteemed him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted. But he was pierced through for our transgressions. He was crushed for our iniquities. The chastening for our well-being fell upon him.

And by his scourging, we are healed. I think when you read Isaiah 53, you see a man who experienced the fullness of our humanity, every aspect of it. So we have to focus in on verse 15 again. This is one who has been tempted in all things as we are.

Now, when you think temptation here, you need to be very precise. The word means to objectively test, to scrutinize, to entice, discipline, assay, examine. The question is, is Jesus' obedience, is his faith, is his commitment to God the Father going to pass the test?

No matter what human weakness comes at him. And that's why the phrase, in all things as we are, is so important. It's not just in one area or two, but it's in all areas. With the subtle exception of he does not have an indwelling sin nature.

Jesus' testing is comprehensive in that he has experienced the full essence of our frailty. Now, 1 John chapter 3 verse 4 provides a helpful little concept here, right? Sin is lawlessness. Sin is trying to do things outside of God's law.

To declare yourself independent, exempt outside of the rules from what God has given you. Now, this is hopefully something that you've heard before, but if not, I'm going to repeat some things that Jim has taught as he's gone through the same passage here.

The reason that Jesus could not sin is that he is the divine son of God. God cannot sin and the unified God-man could not sin. He is, to use the technical term, impeccable. The divine son of God cannot sin.

But the reason he did not sin is different. Not because he is the son of God, but because he obeyed God's laws perfectly in his humanity through his reliance on the Holy Spirit. The reason he did not sin is he utilized all of the resources that God gave to him in his humanity.

Therefore, Jesus understood the nature of our temptation enough to come to the aid of all of us. Anyone who has been tempted. Look back at verse 16. Because of this truth, we can do something amazing.

We can come to God through him.

Look at it.

It says, therefore, let us draw near. We can come directly into the presence of a holy God with confidence to the throne of grace so that we may receive the mercy and find the grace to help us in our time of need.

When you are in a time of great need, God is not pushing you away from himself. He's beckoning you to come to him through the man, Christ Jesus, in your salvation. Because of Jesus, we can draw near to God.

We can come with confidence. Note that the context of this little brief statement of theological truth that we've just tried to parse out, that Jesus is God and man tempted in all things as we are. The context is sanctification.

The context is how do you live? How do you hold fast to this confession when things get hard? Are you tempted to turn back? The gospel is what we must meditate on as we walk forward with all of our believers and friends and family, as we maintain our collective pursuit of holiness through Jesus grace and mercy.

So here's a couple of implications for you briefly as we button up the answer to this first question. It was necessary from God's perspective that Jesus had to be fully like us. It's necessary. And therefore, it is necessary that we believe that truth and hold it in tension with the complementary truths about his deity.

We can't shy away from his humanity. It's right there in Hebrews. It's necessary. In his humanity, Jesus experienced real, authentic, comprehensive testing in his weakness. Therefore, we can find comfort in our relationship with him because he can sympathize with us in all our weaknesses.

My third implication for you here is that Jesus' humanity is the pathway, how we approach and trust God the Father to receive the grace that we need. Let me pause and see if you have questions or comments at this point.

Peter?

Yeah.

He's greater.

Yes.

Yeah.

The question, if you didn't hear it or for the recording, is it true to say that Jesus' temptation is not just equal to ours, but greater than ours because he was directly tempted by Satan? And the answer is yes.

We're going to look at that in the next passage here. Perfect segue. Did you get paid for that?

Okay.

All right.

There'll be time for more questions later. If it's still simmering in your mind, write it down, make a mental note. But let me just ask you some questions that will hopefully apply this text to your life this week.

First is, have you meditated on the reality that Jesus actually experienced the fullness of your human frailty? Or is this a new process for you to think to yourself, Jesus is like me in more ways than I might have previously thought?

Second, when you experience the times of trial and testing that I know many of you have gone through and are going through at this very moment, do you see them as God's gift to you, as a means to draw you closer to himself through Jesus Christ?

I know I struggle with that. Do you see them as God's good, kind gift to his children? And finally, do you believe, do you really believe that Jesus has genuine compassion on you? In your trials, do you turn to him because of that belief?

The Wilderness Testing of Jesus

So the first question we've looked at so far is, can Jesus really sympathize with us in our weaknesses? And the answer is a full-hearted, yes, he can. The second question, and for this, I'm going to turn you to the book of Matthew chapter four.

The second question we will ask and answer this morning with regard to Jesus' temptations is, why was Jesus tempted in the wilderness? And for this, we're going to read a couple of sections of the gospel in Matthew, Mark, and Luke, just like we did last week when we looked at his baptism.

So get ready to turn here. We'll settle on Luke when we get there and work our way through this account. But we're going to start in Matthew, go to Mark, and then land in Luke. Matthew chapter four, verse one through two says, then Jesus was led up by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And after he had fasted 40 days and 40 nights, he then became hungry. Flip to Mark chapter one. When I write, I aspire to be like Mark. He is so concise. He takes what Matthew and Luke have to spend 11 verses and he does it in two.

So concise, I love it. Mark chapter one, verses 12 and 13. Immediately, the spirit impelled him or drove him to go out into the wilderness. He was in the wilderness 40 days being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild beasts and the angels were ministering to him.

And then all the way over to Luke chapter four. So Matthew four and Luke four. And just look at the first two verses for this question. Luke four, verses one through two. Jesus full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was led around by the spirit in the wilderness for 40 days being tempted by the devil.

And he ate nothing during those days. And when they had ended, he became hungry. Now, recall contextually, this comes right after Jesus' baptism where the spirit dwells upon him. And it says in verse one, Jesus goes out into the wilderness full of the spirit, having just been filled in Luke three, Matthew three, and in Mark one, we saw that filling.

And then at Luke four, 14, it says that Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the spirit. So at the end of this, he's going to go forward into Galilee for his ministry in the power of the spirit. The spirit is at work here in Jesus' life.

We talked about this last week, that from this point forward, you never see Jesus in his humanity separated from the spirit and his power. So question, why does this time of temptation immediately follow Jesus' baptism and come before he goes out into his ministry?

Why does it not happen later? Why is it right now? And a second question, did Jesus know what was coming? And did he choose this path? Did he go out into the wilderness seeking to engage the devil in battle?

Look back at chapter four, verse one. It says, Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around or up by the spirit. Led up, led around. In other words, the spirit is the one who leads him into the wilderness.

Well, is it just because Jesus didn't know the way and the spirit had to tell him, look, it's over there? No, recall what Mark one, 12 said. It said immediately the spirit impelled him, drove him into the wilderness.

In his humanity, be careful here, in his humanity, not in his deity, this was not his choice. This was the spirit's choice. This was God, the father's choice for him through the spirit. And even the verb led can mean to bring or to drive.

So it's not that the gospel writers just used the wrong word here. When the spirit is leading him, this is God. This is God, the spirit, the one who is acting. And Jesus is acting independently in his humanity by choosing to submit in obedience to the spirit's leading.

But note here, the devil is not in charge. This is God in charge. The devil is seeking opportunity, maybe with God's permission like Job. But here's some questions that I won't have time to speculate on and you can think through them.

The questions that I wrote down as I was studying this and I don't think we can answer these. So I'm just giving them to you so you can meditate on them. Why was the devil allowed by God to test Jesus at this point in time?

I don't know. Was this the first time that Jesus had experienced temptation or testing? I think not, but I don't know. There's nothing that we have to prove or disprove that hypothesis. Third, had the devil previously planned or attempted in the past to tempt Jesus prior to this occasion?

Again, no way of knowing. So the question then becomes, why did Jesus go out into the wilderness at this time? And if we look at all three of the gospel accounts, we get a simple purpose from all four of them.

Matthew 4, to be tempted by the devil. Mark 1, being tempted by Satan. Luke 4, being tempted by the devil. Clearly, there is a purpose to this temptation and it stems from the relationship of Jesus to Satan.

Now, James 1 .3, let's be reminded of this says, let no one say when he is tempted, I am being tempted by God. So Jesus could not say here, I am being tempted by God, or God cannot be tempted by evil and he himself does not tempt anyone.

But we know that while God does not himself tempt anyone to sin, he is sovereign over all circumstances, including those in which his children, including this one here, in which Jesus is tempted. This is not an accidental temptation.

They didn't just stumble upon the devil in the wilderness and go, oh, hey, you're here too. No, God, the father, through his spirit, took Jesus into the wilderness and allowed him to be tempted by Satan.

It's also true that we are not studying this passage so that we can learn how to overcome these temptations. You will not be tempted to turn bread into stone or stone into bread. You will not be tempted to throw yourself off of the temple and see if God will rescue you.

That's not the point here. The point is not to say, this is how that you respond to this temptation. These are messianic temptations that are, as Peter pointed out, greater than anything we will ever experience.

You will not encounter Satan personally, statistically speaking. He's one being. He cannot be everywhere and tempt us all at the same time. So what are we looking for here? Why was Jesus taken into the wilderness?

Well, recall what Hebrews 5, 8 said. It says, although he was a son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered. His mission and status, I'm quoting for you here from Joel Greene. It says his mission and status are spelled out in relation to God and with reference to his purpose as expressed in the scripture, as with God's servant and son, who fulfills his mission of redemption and establishes peace with justice and ways that flow out of his uncompromising obedience to God.

It is this notion of the boundaries determined by obedience to God's purpose that the devil will test in this time. Now, I think it's important for us to see here that there's another bigger picture context thing that we saw last week in the baptism that carries forward into this passage.

Last week, we saw that Jesus was baptized as an expression of his obedience to the call of John as part of national Israel. The entire nation was being called to repent together and Jesus picked up that obedience and said, I will go too, even though he had no personal sin to confess as part of his baptism.

Here, I think that we see Jesus' wilderness paralleling the testing of the nation of Israel in the wilderness. You see it in several similes or comparisons here, right? They're both led out into the wilderness by God.

We see that in Deuteronomy 8, 2, the nation is led out and here in Luke 4, the spirit leads him out. There's 40 years in the wilderness for the nation of Israel, there's 40 days. Israel is God's son. Jesus is God's son.

They are both tested to see whether they will obey him. And in contrast to Jesus and his obedience, Israel rebelled and grieved him in the wilderness. So if Jesus is to fulfill his purpose as the greater son of God, the national Israel who would not obey, he must be able to continue his obedience to God's will in God's way.

God's will, God's way, not his own way. Jesus has just demonstrated that his desire to be baptized was to fulfill all righteousness. He knows that righteousness is on the line, but can he and will he obey?

That's the question that Luke 4 and Matthew 4 and Mark 1 are asking. So this testing in the wilderness was not his choice, but the one to which he submitted. How often do we have to battle with circumstances that we did not choose?

And when this happens to you and I, how do we respond? Do we submit and desire obedience or do we push back? Jesus recognized that his temptation in the wilderness is a further way for him to fulfill his calling, his ministry as the suffering servant, the Messiah who redeems Israel by obeying where Israel did not obey their God.

Now, in what ways is God giving you currently the opportunity to obey in an arena where it is difficult? Think to yourself right now in this moment, this year that you find yourself in in life, where is the most difficult spot of obedience?

The one that you struggle the most to accept. And how are you responding? Are you choosing to submit to God's leading you into that difficult area of obedience or are you fighting against it? Another question for you, do you believe that while God does not tempt anyone to sin, he does allow temptation in the lives of his children to bring about his sovereign purpose in their lives?

Do you believe that truth, that hard truth? So the first two questions we've asked and answered are, can Jesus really sympathize with us in our human weaknesses? Yes, he can. And secondly, why was he tempted in the wilderness to test his obedience to God the Father through the spirit?

Jesus' Victory Over Temptation and Our Response

Third, we're going to read just from Matthew and Luke here. I'll read Matthew four rather than make you go back. So stay in Luke four. The third question we'll ask and answer is why or what does Jesus successful defense against temptation teach us?

What does his successful defense against temptation teach us? So here's Matthew's account of it. It says in verse three, and the tempter came to him and said to him, if you are the son of God, command that these stones become bread.

But he answered and said, it is written, man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Then the devil took him into the holy city and had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, if you are the son of God, throw yourself down for it is written, he will command his angels concerning you and on their hands, they will bear you up so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.

Jesus said to him, on the other hand, it is written, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

And he said to him, all these things I will give to you if you fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, go Satan, for it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only. Then the devil left him and behold, angels came and began to minister to him.

Now you can look in your Bibles at Luke four, verses three through 14 at the same account. Subtle variations here, it says in verse three, and he ate nothing during those days. And when they had ended, he became hungry.