As we have seen earlier in this article, many people have faced temptations in their walk with God. Therefore, temptation is nothing new, not a personal vendetta against you, nor is it a punishment for some "hidden" sin you may have committed. Temptation is a normal part of everyday life. Therefore, in order to begin the battle to conquer and defeat temptation, one must now begin to realize that temptation will never go away and we will never eliminate the temptation. The same thing goes with Satan, we will not eliminate Satan until the day as foretold in Revelation that Jesus finally conquers Satan and sets up the New Jerusalem. If you get this point and realize this concept, then you are on the pathway to learning how to be a stronger person in Christ. If you remember in Genesis 2:9, the forbidden tree and their forbidden fruit was located in the middle of the garden along with the tree of life. Why were these two particular trees in the middle of the garden? Very simple, the term "middle" is a symbolic representation of the center of life and the center of one's daily activities. In our lives, in our jobs, in our walk with God, or whatever else is in the center of your life, there will always be a point of testing where a external force of sin will (or hopefully, attempt to and fail to) influence an internal choice. As the bad tree was always there in Eden, the bad things to do are always in front of us. What we internally choose to do or not to do with those external forces wanting us to transgress by performing a taboo will determine whether we head down the wide pathway to totem or the narrow pathway to a pure temple where the Holy Spirit dwells within.
Therefore, how do we deal with this temptation, Jesus shows us the way to handle temptation in Matthew 4:1-11. Here, Jesus was alone and fasting for forty days and he became hungry. Usually temptation comes when we are at our weakest, most vulnerable, and loneliest places in life. These external forces influencing internal choices usually come in our lives in times of loneliness, stress, emptiness, mental anguish and duress, facing big decisions, etc. The tempter, wanting Jesus to break his fast and disobey the leading of the Spirit, questioned the authority and power of Jesus by challenging Jesus to turn the stones into bread. Jesus replied with the phraze "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God". The words Jesus said in response to the first test by the tempter is actually Scripture found in Deuteronomy 8:3. We now see that Jesus used the Word to overcome the first phaze of the temptation. When tempted, the Word of God is a powerful weapon to use to battle temptation. When the temptation comes and you know it is sin, fight the temptation by using the Word of God.
The second phaze of the temptation involved questioning the authority of Jesus. Here Satan asks Jesus to "cast himself down". However, in the latter part of verse six, Satan attempts to twist the Scripture found in Psalms 91:11-12 to mean something different than the original meaning. If one reads Psalm 91:11-12, this verse is a promise to one who decides to make the Lord Most High, their dwelling and their refuge. You see, this is a conditional promise. "Make the Lord Most High, their dwelling and their refuge and no harm will befall you, no disaster will come near your tent, For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways; they will lift you up in their hands so that you will not strike your foot against a stone...". However, Satan told Jesus to cast himself down from his place of authority contrary to those scriptures instead of fulfilling the scriptures by making the Lord Most High their dwelling and refuge. Therefore, like the serpent did in Genesis 3:1-7, Satan will attempt to twist the words of God to mean something different from the original meaning to tempt you. Therefore, when this happens, confusion is now at work as an additional external force to influence an internal choice. Jesus replied back to Satan by quoting the Word of God found in Deuteronomy 6:16 by stating "Do not put the Lord your God to the test". Jesus again fought back with the Word of God. In fact, what Jesus did was to show us how to conquer confusion. Speak the Truth. When the truth is spoken, the confusion becomes disspiated and no more since truth has been spoken.
The last phaze of this temptation involved the allure of lust. Here Satan promises to give Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor if he would bow down and worship Satan. In other words a lie. One day, this was going to be totally dominated by God anyhow. Some temptation actually involves someone else trying to give you a fake version of something God has already promised you that you will receive. There have been some people who are called into evangelism and missionary work and jumped at the first opportunity to perform those evangelism and missions works without truly discerning if this work is the correct work God wanted them to do. Sometimes the first thing that appears is the thing God wanted and sometimes, the first thing is not what God wanted. Proper discernment is needed to see where the true source of a "blessing" comes from. Jesus, using his authority, quoted the Scriptures back to Satan again by actually rebuking Satan and quoting Deuteronomy 6:3 by saying "Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only". We see afterwards that the angels of the Lord and ministered unto the needs of Jesus. Jesus conquered the temptation and received the blessings afterwards.
Therefore, if we look again at the previous paragraphs, we see numerous things. The first thing we see is that Jesus knew the Scriptures and used these Scriptures as a weapon to defeat the enemy. Proper knowledge of the Scriptures and quoting these Scriptures within their proper applications is an excellent way to defeat the enemy. We also see that Jesus knew his authority. If we do not know our authority, then we do not know that we can defeat the enemy. Jesus knew his authority but the key thing here is that Jesus properly knew how to use his authority. Many Christians today have authority because of their walk in Jesus, but through pure ignorance and overemotionalism, abused their authority similar to the way some police officers used excessive force to capture and arrest a suspect. Many have thought that if a person does not see everything their way, then that person is demon possessed and begin un-needed warfare on that person leading to more hurt and in the long run, more aversion to Christianity in general. Another weapon Jesus used was the gift of discernment. Jesus knew who the real enemy was and also knew that the person conversing with him in Matthew 4:1-11 was not of God. Knowing that the person conversing with him (Satan) was not of God, Jesus knew that the fulfillment of the promise Satan offered him (which was the same promise God the Father told Jesus would be his when Jesus completed his work on Earth) was not the read deal. Therefore, proper discernment is a needed weapon to have when dealing with temptation.
In a nutshell, here is what happened in Matthew 4:1-11. An external force named Satan tried to influence Jesus to make a personal internal choice to surrender his Lordship and the will of the father and the Holy Spirit leading to a lifestyle of temple for a lifestyle of totem, taboo, and transgression. Jesus, using his knowledge of the Scriptures, his Authority, and his discernment, made an internal choice by deciding not to yield to the desires offered to him by the external forces of temptation. What Jesus did here was to reverse the flow of this attack. Through his decision not to yield to the temptation. Jesus made an internal choice by deciding to use his authority to be the stronger external force and order Satan to flee. Therefore, when those external forces attempt to influence our internal choices to do wrong in God's eyes, we then can use our God given authority by making the internal choice to ask for the external forces of God in the name of Jesus to drive Satan away.
Click here for part five of Temptation to Temple.
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