The Power Over Sin

Matthew 4:3-10 New King James Version (NKJV) 3 Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” 4 But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’” 5 Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down. For it is written: ‘He shall give His angels charge over you,’ and, ‘In their hands they shall bear you up, Lest you dash your foot against a stone.’” 7 Jesus said to him, “It is written again, ‘You shall not tempt the Lord your God.’” 8 Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. 9 And he said to Him, “All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me.” 10 Then Jesus said to him, “Away with you, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only you shall serve.’” 

The Devil has fashioned weapons of deceit and temptation to turn us away from the Lord. The temptations come in three ways, the lust of the flesh, the pride of life and the lust of the eyes. From the time of Adam to now, this is how the enemy operates. 

 At the lowest level is the lust of the flesh. At this level, Satan tempts our flesh. The Devil tempted Jesus after forty days and nights of fasting with food to sustain His flesh. How did Jesus respond? He pointed us to our spirit. The flesh is perishing but the spirit is eternal. When we are saved, we are reborn spiritually by God. Our spirit is predisposed to the obedience of of God and through that obedience we have power to resist the flesh. The spirit of God needs nourishment and that nourishment is the word of God that builds us up spiritually.

As you have grown spiritually by nourishing your spirit with the word of God, the Devil will now appeal to your vanity, the pride of life. The Devil negated the rightful position of Jesus as the Son of God. He tempted Him by using the word of God to try and push Jesus into trying to prove who He was. By trying to prove who He was, Jesus would have demonstrated His unbelief in God who had earlier at His baptism in the Jordan announced to the world that He was His Son. How did the Lord overcome this? He overcame this being grounded in reality, knowing who He was, the Son of God. He did not succumb to the dare of the Devil to prove Himself. 

Christians enjoy salvation in Christ Jesus, clothed in the righteousness of God in Him and being joint heirs with Christ of the promises of God, eternal life in His presence. The Devil comes to us with the same accusation to try and prove our claim that we are Christians. We try to prove our claim through miraculous signs and wonders and since God is not with us because we are putting Him to the test and sinning, we either fail or worse still are led by the Deceiver to use deception and we fake our miracles displaying our own unbelief in God. We need to be secure in our position in God and not try to prove to the world that we are indeed Christians. For God looks at the heart and as faithfully live in obedience, the Spirit of God will transform you into the image of our Lord and and just like at Antioch, the world will call you a Christian instead of you proclaiming it yourself as you go about doing good and working miraculous signs and wonders for the kingdom of God.

Now if you are a mature Christian and know your position in Christ, Satan will use the last temptation on you, the lust of the eyes. The Devil offered to give Jesus all that had been promised Him by God with the added advantage of not tasting the bitter trial of the cross. You see at the cross, Jesus would for the first time be separated from His Father since the beginning of time and then all sin of the world would have been put on Him and the fury of God's wrath would have been meted out on Him as punishment of sin. Remember, Jesus hates sin. This looked like a very good offer but it also meant that Jesus would deviate from the original will of God for His life. It meant that He would be disobeying God. Our Lord defeated the Devil by finding strength in living a life of obedience to God. We are called to worship God alone and to live in obedience to Hid decree. The Devil tempts us by promising to give what the Lord has promised to give us without having to face the trials that lie along its path. But what we forget is that we in turn get to sell our soul to the Devil. We need to remember and heed the warning of our Lord who asks us, what does it profit a man to gain the whole world but loose his soul.

We need to die to the flesh and live in obedience to the spirit to please God, to know our position in Christ and be secure even when our circumstance point to the contrary so that we do not lose hope and tempt our God in sin, and to live a life of total obedience to God and submission to His will for our life even when it means that we shall pass through many trials, for God uses these trials to build up our faith. 

May Our Lord bless and keep you to stand and fight the good fight of faith