Lent: Fighting Temptation with Gospel Identity

Well, we are breaking from our study of 1st and 2 Samuel for the season of Lent, which just began.

Lent's the season of the 40 days, heading toward Good Friday into Easter.

It's just a season to remember Jesus' life, death, resurrection.

Yet each Sunday is set aside for a particular topic.

This Sunday, the first Sunday, is about temptation.

So we're going to be looking at Matthew 4 and the temptation of Jesus.

Now, I've been giving you puppy updates every week, but I want to tell you about my first dog.

The first dog that we owned as our first child was Thomas.

He was a big, lovable, beautiful, lovable golden retriever.

And he was sweet and compliant.

So about a year and a half into Thomas's life, we began to leave him out of the crate when we would go off on a date night.

And so we started to do this.

And he was always, when we come back in, asleep on the rug at the foot of the couch.

Every time, come in, he'd hear the door, he'd open his eyes, he'd wake up and walk toward us for a snuggle.

Now, this one particular Thursday night, we open the door, we walk in.

There again, he's asleep at the foot of the couch because he's not allowed on the couch.

And so he's asleep on the foot of the couch, like a good puppy dog.

I walk over, he didn't wake up, and I'm like, oh wow, he's really asleep.

This dog's really, really asleep.

So I walk over and I sit on the couch, and when I sit down, I feel the cushions are warm.

And that little booger had been snoozing on the couch.

I mean, let's just think this through.

He hears the car.

He hears probably the car, because by the time we open the door, he's already on the floor.

And then he fakes like he's asleep.

Right?

Like the temptation of the couch was just too much over time.

Alright, so this hit home from me last week, uh two weeks ago.

We had some leftover nothing bunt cake, chocolate chocolate chip with cream cheese icing.

It's unbelievable.

It's so good.

I might be driving straight there afterward, I'm not sure.

We had some leftover from a birthday party, and then a retreat, and so, you know, I have some for breakfast.

That's like a donut, that's no big deal.

And then lunch, and then after two pieces, that's when you say, no, that's enough.

Like that's enough for today.

Two pieces of cake, that is already enough.

And so after the lunch piece, you know, you're like, that's enough.

Nope, you know, that we gotta draw a line somewhere.

But then you get home from work and you're a little tired and you just need a little happy, you know, and and so you eat a third piece and a fourth, right?

Like the temptation, right?

I can make you happy.

I can make you happy.

It's what the couch was saying to Thomas, it's what the cake was saying to me.

I can make you happy, I can do this for you.

And when we get into this passage, because we all know temptation, whether it's cake or couch, or something much worse, and in this passage, the metaphor is a stone.

You know, make the stone bread.

I can make you happy.

I can make you.

Puritan pastor in the 1600s, John Owen, in the book Mortification of Sin.

So 400 years ago, he says this about temptation.

Temptation is the entangling of the affections with some object suited to corrupt them.

Right?

Chocolate, chocolate chipcake with cream cheese icing is never going to be good for me.

Four pieces in a day will definitely never be good for me.

A stone, trying to eat a stone, will never be good for you.

So it's a misalignment, a misdirecting of the affection.

St.

Augustine, 400 A.D., so 1600 years ago, he taught this.

This is a paraphrase of his teaching about temptation.

The soul commits adultery when it turns from God to seek what it thinks it loves outside of God.

Right?

It's misdirecting the affection from bread to stone, and then asking the stone to be something it could never be.

So to summarize this, we could say it this way: temptation works by redirecting our loves from God to lesser things, fastening our disordered desires to what appears good, right?

We start to trick ourselves, believe that it is something it's not, until the heart's entangled, and then our will consents to sin.

That's how it works.

Let's listen how the devil, the liar, tries to tempt Jesus.

Matthew 4, 1 and 2.

Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And devil here, the word means liar.

After fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry.

The Spirit of God leads Jesus into the desert, hasn't eaten forty days, super hungry.

The devil shows up, begins to tempt him.

Verse 3, and the tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.

But he answered, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

So this passage is about the temptation to self-nourish.

The temptation of self-nourishment.

And the point is, point number one, our souls are created for wholeness and satisfaction in God alone.

Self-nourishment is we say, oh, my soul can't be nourished just by God.

I need to nourish my soul by going to lesser things.

That's the burden of self-nourishment.

I have to find a source of relief outside of God.

I need to find that source and money or acceptance or lust, that other person, not my spouse, because things are getting hard and difficult, and we need to go to counseling and all that feels really hard, but this other person, that could be, I could nourish my soul there.

And then what happens?

Well, eventually the stone's a stone, and all that's left over is destruction.

The good news is in the grace of God, you're relieved of having to self-nourish, of trying to make stones bread.

And that's why Jesus replies temptation.

He says, I have a source of nourishment outside of this world.

The more we tap into that, the more we can say no to temptation.

Because we know there's a nourishment for the inside of ourselves that's not in the world.

Verse 5.

Then the devil took him to the holy city, set him 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, lest you strike your foot against a stone.

Jesus said to him, Again it is written, You shall not put your Lord your God to the test.

This part of the passage is about the temptation of self-importance.

The temptation of self-importance.

I need to be important.

The point is that our souls are created for humility, not arrogance or deletism.

In fact, the arrogant person is almost always the most insecure person, and the only person who doesn't know it is the arrogant person.

Everybody around them is very clear on who's insecure.

We just weren't created to be high on a pinnacle.

Constantly having to make yourself seem more important.

It's just quite exhausting.

It's a horrible way to live.

And we don't have to live that way.

Because in the gospel, you are declared fully worthy, apart from your achievements, your resume, your record, which means that you are equipped with humility.

You're equipped with the humility of the self, but also a security.

So you can be humble and secure, which allows you to have this kind of self-assurance because in the gospel you already know you're somebody.

It means you don't have to be the most important one in the room.

It means that you can think about and love other people and help them become important.

It's gospel humility.

Verse 8.

Third temptation.

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.

He said to him, All these I will give you if you will fall down and worship me.

Then Jesus said to him, Be gone, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and him only shall you serve.

Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.

So this part of the passage is about the temptation of self-determination or control.

I need to control all the kingdoms.

And point number three is that our souls are created to be the creation, not the creator.

We were never created to have control over everything.

Now, our family loves to watch American Idol.

I love, I still love American Idol.

I have loved it from Kelly Clarkson to today.

I have always loved it.

I think it's wonderful.

The most likely moment of the week for me to cry is during American Idol.

And when we watch American Idol, I like to hold the remote.

Now, I don't have to hold the remote all the time.

My girls are much faster at navigating and switching from Netflix over to Hulu and back.

They're faster than I'm not very slow at that, but I have unbelievable fast forward instincts.

Or at least I you know I think I have great fast-forward instincts.

And you need to fast forward an American Idol because there's all this extra fluff and you just need to push through it and get to the good stuff.

So while I have the remote, they are dying.

Right?

While they have the remote, I am dying.

Right?

Because we both want to be in control.

Have you ever watched reels with somebody else and they are the one?

It's horrible.

It's horrible.

We all want control.

We want temptation.

That's the temptation of control.

I need to have control of this.

I need to have control of all these kingdoms.

It's the burden to have everything planned, control.

But see, as a child of the sovereign loving God, not just loving God, but sovereign.

It means that you and I, we can live out in wisdom and also not be in control of every single thing.

And what I hear, I'm not good at it, but I've read about it, is that this means you can release your concerns over to God and you can live in a non-anxious spirit.

Again, I read about it once and got there.

I'll let you know if I get there.

Okay, two last points, point four and point five, about temptation.

Point number four, we may be imperfect, but we are not helpless before temptation.

Let's talk about the doctrine of the two atoms.

So, two atoms doctrine begins back in Genesis 3.

In Genesis 3, Adam was a man, but also he was a representative of us, or me and of you, and this is called federal headship.

Theologically, it's what's called federal headship.

That word federal means covenantal.

So if we think about the federal government, the federal government is the covenantal role of representing us.

Federal means covenantal.

So Adam is our federal headship.

He represents us, and when he disobeyed, we disobeyed, just because we would have made the same decision.

So we have sin, condemnation, death, exile, separation from God.

This is in Genesis 3.

But also we get this promise of a serpent-crushing seed in Genesis 3.15.

He shall bruise your head.

It's speaking about Christ, and you shall bruise his heel.

So the seed of the woman points forward to a coming deliverer.

The heel wounds suggest suffering.

The head crushed suggests a decisive victory.

It's talking about Jesus.

Romans 5.

Paul begins to make sense of this federal headship.

Adam, Jesus, representing us.

Romans 5, 12.

Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, federal headship, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.

For sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law.

Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come.

All right, so we have representation in Adam.

Where's our hope?

Well, we need a second Adam, Christ, also our federal headship, covenantal representation.

But in Jesus we have representation for complete forgiveness, complete righteousness.

Now listen for the two Adams, these two representatives that you have, beginning in verse 15.

But the free gift is not like the trespass.

For if many died through one man's trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man, Jesus Christ, abounding for many.

And the free gift is not like the results of that one man's sin.

For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brought justification.

For if, because of one man's trespass, death reigned through that one man, much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.

So in Adam, one trespass, condemnation for all, yet the gospel in Jesus through the cross, one act of righteousness, justification for all believers.

Paul summarizes it, 1 Corinthians 15, 21 and 22.

For as by a man came death, by a man has also come also the resurrection of the dead, for as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive.

So how do we how do we live?

How do we walk as Christians?

What's a paradoxical walk?

It's an understanding of an old Adam and a new Adam inside of me.

I have my flesh and my spirit, and I need to admit that I need help.

That's the paradox.

That I have to admit that there's this tension in me, there's a war in me.

There's an old Adam and a new Adam.

There's a flesh and there's a spirit.

And the way forward is to be asking the Holy Spirit, Holy Spirit, help me.

Help me to align with that new Adam with Christ.

Two questions for the heart.

The first is, Abba Father, where do I have misdirected love in my heart and life?

Because that'll show you where temptation is, where sin is in your life, where possible destruction is.

Where do I have misdirected love?

Second question, Abba Father, what is an influential lie?

What's a lie in my heart?

It doesn't need to be there.

It just keeps influencing me.

And then a prayer would begin.

Heavenly Father, help me see a stone as a stone.

Like, help me see that.

Holy Spirit, I need your help.

That I would see stones as stone and bread as bread.

And then, Holy Spirit, give me the strength to live.

That stones are stone and bread is bread.

Point number five, last point.

Temptation is always a conditional statement, but the gospel is a promise.

Did you notice in our passage every temptation is a condition?

If you, if you, if you, Paul Walker, a priest in Christ Church, Charlottesville, he explains this passage this way when he preached through it.

Who doesn't know the power of this devilish temptation?

What is it for you?

Money, sex, and power, the usual suspects.

I'm not immune to that trying, but a few years ago I preached a sermon saying that if we just had crown molding in our living room, I would be happy.

Fulfilled homeowner in person.

Well, wouldn't you know it?

We put crown molding in the living room.

And gosh darn it, it looks really good.

And it made me happy for a month or two.

Now, if we could just figure out a way to put in a master bathroom adjoining our bedroom, then I'd really be happy.

Some of the more sering conditional sentences are if you were lovable, then you would be loved.

Or if you had worth, then you would show your worth.

If you were a better parent, your children would be happy and successful.

The list goes on and on and on and on.

If the sentence structure of Satan is conditional, then the grammar of God is declarative.

Jesus responds to each of the devil's temptations with a declarative statement from Scripture.

It is written, he says three times over.

One doesn't live by bread alone, worship God only, don't put God to the test.

To each of the devil's slippery slopes, Jesus answers back with a solid rock.

Right?

Holy Spirit, help me see rocks as rocks, stones as stones.

Now I don't know your mistakes, I don't know your temptations, I don't know where that failing has been small or big or huge destruction, but I know you need a power.

I know you need a power of forgiveness outside of yourselves, as we only find in Jesus.

Full forgiveness.

I know you need a power outside of yourselves for righteousness.

No matter how good you are, you're just always going to be falling a little bit short.

And I know you need a power in the Christian life to say, help me.

Help me see this rightly, help me make the right choice.

And that is God's grace to you.

Hear this psalm as a closing prayer, Psalm 133 through 7.

If you, our Lord, should mark iniquities, O Lord, who could stand?

Right?

And say, none of us.

None of us can stand.

But with you there is forgiveness, that you may be feared.

I wait for the Lord, my soul waits, and in his word I hope.

My soul waits for the Lord more than watchmen for the morning, more than watchmen for the morning.

O Israel, hope in the Lord.

For with the Lord there is steadfast love, and with him there is plentiful redemption.

If you have any questions about this sermon, I'd love to talk to you afterward.

I'll be down front.

Always welcome to pray with you as well.

Let's pray together.

Heavenly Father, so thankful for the gift of Jesus that finds us in our temptation, even finds us in our sin.

And that you know us, every bit of us, every insecure thought, every sinful thought, every sinful action.

And you love us.

And that in Jesus there is more than enough grace for all of our sin.

There's more than enough grace for all of our failings and our shortcomings.

And in your Holy Spirit, would you help us to walk in the identity we have as your sons and your daughters?

Help us to see.

Holy Spirit, help us to see stones as stones and bread as bread.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.