After Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist,
suddenly a voice came from heaven,
"This is My beloved Son,
in whom I am well pleased."
Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit
into the wilderness to be temped by the devil.
And when He had fasted 40 days and nights,
afterward He was hungry.
MATTHEW 3:16-17, 4:1-2
My previous Rest Stop (May 19th) testified of profound biblical truths about how each child of God is always "being conformed to the death Christ" (Philippians 3:10b). Our loving, sovereign Father is using all things in our lives to conform us to Christ (Romans 5:28-29).
We are being conformed to Jesus' humility and to His total dependence on His, and our, Father. Our greatest privilege is to learn obedience to our Father just as Jesus did on His way to His death for us on a cross.
How did Jesus learn obedience? The answer may break your heart. Hear by faith, not by logic, the answer:
Though He (Jesus) was a Son,
He learned obedience by the things He suffered.
HEBREWS 5:8
Are we above our Master not to learn obedience accordingly?
The remainder of this Rest Stop is a meditation of the temptations of Jesus related to our lives. Be blessed.
TEMPTED TO PROVE YOUR IDENTITY
Before Jesus was led into the wilderness, the Father echoed through the halls of eternity to every corner of the universe: "This is My beloved Son! I love Him so much!" (Matthew 3:17)
Because of our union with Christ in His death, burial, and resurrection (Romans 6:1-8), we are now sons and daughters of the Father just as He promised!
"I will be a Father to you,
and you shall be My sons and daughters,"
says the LORD Almighty.
2 CORINTHIANS 6:18
Have you confessed to (agreed with) your Father about your true identity as His son or His daughter?
Jesus did.
And then Jesus was led into the wilderness by His Father through the Holy Spirit for the Son to suffer. And the sufferings came only when He was most vulnerable in weakness after starving for 40 days.
Do you doubt your Father's love for you when you enter into sufferings in your most vulnerable times?
Jesus didn't.
And in the first two of three temptations Jesus suffered by the devil went right to the heart of His identity:
"If You are the Son of God...
...command that these stones become bread...
(and)
...throw Yourself down from the top of this temple."
MATTHEW 4:3, 6
Our temptations, too, will always be attempts by the devil to get our eyes off of the origin of our true identity -- the cross of Christ.
The devil always tries to deceive us into doing something to prove our identity. For example, "If you really are a good Christian, you would ________" and "If you really are a good husband, you would ______." And on and on. Fill in the blanks for how you are uniquely tempted.
This is a dastardly distraction from what Christ already has done once and forever for us and in us through His cross and resurrection.
Jesus kept hearing His Father call Him Son and He kept hearing the Father revealing truths through the Spirit to Him, all because Jesus was indeed His Father's Son.
Jesus simply responded confidently as His Father's Son to the devil with truths He heard from His Father through Psalms 91 and Deuteronomy 8.
This, too, is our calling as sons and daughters of God our Father.
TEMPTED TO PROVE YOUR INDEPENDENCE
Also before Jesus was led into the wilderness, the Father echoed through the halls of eternity to every corner of the universe: "This is My Son in whom I am well pleased!" (Matthew 3:17)
This is a staggering statement to me because Jesus had not yet done anything obvious to us that would make His Father proud. Perhaps the Father was pleased with Jesus' obedience to humble Himself as He identified with mankind in His baptism in the Jordan River.
Perhaps. However, I believe the greater underlying truth is that the Father was perfectly pleased with His Son based on who Jesus was, not based on what Jesus did. Oh, this is such a vital distinction!
Do you know this unconditional acceptance of your Father? Hear His heart for you in the following verse:
To the praise of the glory of His (Father's) grace,
He made us accepted in His Beloved (Son).
EPHESIANS 1:6
During His temptations, Jesus knew He was unconditionally accepted by His Father. He knew He belonged to the Father. Indeed, He knew He was in union with the Father. As a result, He chose to be totally dependent on the Father so that He did not have to prove His independence to the devil.
Listen to His prayer for you and me below:
"I pray as You, Father, are in Me and I in You,
that they also may be one with Us."
JOHN 17:21
During your sufferings, do you fall for the devil's lie that you are all by yourself and that it is up to you to work your way out of the suffering independently of God?
If so, are you willing to, by faith, to believe the truth, indeed to hear from your Father, that you are in united with Christ, and that He is living in you through the suffering? This is your fellowship with Christ in His suffering (Philippians 3:10).
In every situation, God the Father calls each of us His children to simply depend on Christ as our very life, just as a branch is dependent on the life of tree (John 15:5).
As a branch, we don't independently produce fruit of the tree. We don't independently work up hope (aka, hope for the best), we dependently bear the very hope of Christ Himself!
CLOSING
After Jesus stood firm in His identity as the Son of His Father during the devil's three temptations, two amazing things resulted:
The devil left Him,
and behold,
angels came and ministered to Him.
MATTHEW 4:11
May this become our growing experience of Christ!
I wept as I wrote this Rest Stop in a public library this past Friday. I knew I was not writing on my own. These are truths too profound to be shared only intellectually. I knew they could only come spiritually from the Father. I wrote as a son.
Someone remarked that these truths are too deep for most people to grasp. This remark assumes that some people are better equipped and are more spiritually elite than others to know these biblical truths.
The truth is that ALL biblical truths are too deep for ALL of us! They can only be revealed by a loving, sovereign Father and received by His humble sons and daughters!
