5-8-2 The Wilderness Temptations: A Window Into The Mind Of Jesus

We have shown that our Lord's experiences were similar to those of Israel in the wilderness, and that they revealed his great degree of assimilation of the word, as well as the nature of his relationship with the Angels. The following are additional comments which give greater insight into our Lord's temptations:

- The Lord realized he was in a similar position to Israel in another wilderness, and therefore personalized Scripture in Deuteronomy concerning their experience there to apply to himself. A similar example is in his quoting Mal. 3:1 " He shall prepare the way before me" as " My messenger...which shall prepare thy way before thee" (Mt. 11:10).

- The personification of the sinful tendencies in the Lord's heart as a person called 'the devil' shows how clearly his mind was divided between flesh and spirit- without the hazy overlap so characteristic of our semi-spirituality. It was probably with this in mind that he deftly broke the bread representing his body into two at the Communion- to show that clear division within himself (Mt. 26:26). 1 Cor. 1:13 highlights the division into flesh and spirit which was so manifest on the cross by paralleling the ideas of division and crucifixion: " Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you?" .

- His quotation of Dt. 6:13 " Thou shalt fear the Lord thy God (alone)" was probably made with Dt. 6:14 in mind " Ye shall not go after other gods" , implying that he interpreted the pagan idols as the evil thoughts of his heart. Earlier Dt. 6:7,8 had warned that not repeating the Law would result in idol worship- and Christ saw that his neglect of the word would result in his serving his evil desires. Thus the purpose of the temptations was to prove whether Christ would really keep and apply the word in his heart (Dt. 8:2), as it was for Israel in their wilderness.

- God alone has the power to give the Kingdom (Dan. 4:32). That Jesus was tempted to take if for himself (Mt. 4:9) indicates he was tempted to make himself equal to God. Phil. 2:6 comments on this, that although he had the same perfect mind as God, he did not consider equality with Him a thing to be even considered. This shows (again) how conscious Christ was of his sinless mind, and how this tempted him to proudly assume equality with God. This was probably in the back of his mind as he argued in Jn. 10:34-36 that men in the Old Testament had been called God, but he was not taking that title to himself as he could have done, but only calling himself the Son of God. His appreciation of the many passages which called him Yahweh would have tempted him to use the name in his own right because of his ultimate manifestation of God. Christ reflected that to whomsoever he wanted he could give the Kingdom (Lk. 4:6)- and he thought of giving it to himself. But later he promised to give the cities of the Kingdom to us, implying his awareness of his own righteousness tempted him not to share the Kingdom with us sinners.

- The same temptation underlies his fleshly mind quoting Ps. 91:11,12 to him (Mt. 4:6) :" He shall give His Angels charge over thee" . This psalm has primary reference to Joshua being protected by the Angel during the wilderness wanderings when the apostate Israelites were consumed by the destroyer Angel. The specific reason for this protection is given in Ps. 91:1; because he had remained in the tabernacle, no doubt from the motive of wanting to hear as much as possible of God's word spoken by the Angel to his master Moses (Ex. 33:11). Our Lord was in a similar position- dedicated to the word, the rest of Israel apostate. It would have been tempting to abuse the subsequent Angelic power which his spirituality had made available to him.

- There is the implication that it took the Lord 40 days to overcome the devil, at which point the devil departed. This is more easily understandable in terms of an internal battle, than a literal struggle against a supernatural being. And the fact it took 40 days shows how hard was the struggle for the Lord.

- The Lord standing on a high mountain beholding the coming Kingdom of God (1) points forward to an identical scene in Rev. 21:10. There are other connections with Revelation- " The kingdoms of the world" = Rev. 11:15; v.9,10= Rev. 22:8,9; v.5= Rev. 21:2. It is almost as if our Lord in giving Revelation was looking back to his wilderness trials, rejoicing that what he had been tempted to have then was now his and ours legitimately. The wilderness temptation was to take the Kingdom and rule it for himself rather than for God; i.e. not to manifest God, even if externally there would not be any evident difference between whether he was manifesting God in an acceptable spirit or not. For these temptations to be real, it must have been possible that God would have allowed Christ to take the Kingdom; as He would have allowed the Lord to use the Angels to rescue him from his ordeal in the garden. That God was willing to accept a second best, to allow His plan for salvation to go as far as Christ's freewill effort allowed it to, would have been a tremendous temptation and yet stimulation to Jesus. Hence God's supreme delight inn the totality of Christ's effort and victory, as described, e.g., in Is. 49:5-9.

- There can be little doubt that standing on a mountain looking out over God's Kingdom would have reminded Christ of Moses on Nebo, who for one slip was denied it all. And that must have sobered him (Dt. 34:1). And having quoted Dt. 8:3 to himself about living on the bread/word of God, his mind would have gone on to Dt. 8:9 with its description of eating bread without scarceness in the Kingdom- i.e. feeding fully on spiritual things, in the allegory.

- The Lord was tempted to believe that He would be miraculously preserved from dashing His foot against a stone. This is an allusion to Prov. 3:23, which promises that the Father will keep the Son in whom He delights from 'stumbling in the way'. Prov. 3:4 is specifically applied to the Lord Jesus in Lk. 2:52. But 'stumbling in the way' in the context of Prov. 3 refers to sinning, and the need to not stumble by the hard effort of applying Divine wisdom in daily life. Do we get another window here into the mind of the Lord? Is not the implication of all this that He was tempted to think that as God's Son, somehow God would preserve Him from sinning, and so He could do as He wished? Thank God, and Him, that He put that thought so far behind Him.

" Tempted in all points"

If this were true of our Lord, it follows that in every way each of us are tempted, so was our Lord; so that each of us personally can look to and imagine his example for encouragement. This means a vast variety of temptations. A nice example is in Ps. 71:9,18, where Christ on the cross is described as feeling worn out, despised and old. This should more than console the lonely old brother who wonders how his Lord knows what he feels like, seeing Christ died at only 33. Previously we have commented on the implications that Christ was particularly tempted to have an illicit relationship with Mary Magdalene. This becomes all the more likely once it is realized that Christ must have had a weakness for women, if he suffered from all the temptations his brethren do.

Waving To The Crowds

The incessant pressure of the crowds must have been another factor- impatience, especially with their 'loaves and fishes' mentality, resentfulness, a desire to put personal physical and spiritual needs above their clamour for teaching, would all have built up. But his love for humanity prevailed- although he converted so few to the extent of feeling that his mission had failed (Is. 49:6), yet he never ceased to be moved by the crowds; despite their evidently questionable motives. Contrast this with our quick despair at our audiences today, be they open air crowds, mass replies to adverts in African newspapers, or people reached by leaflet distribution. So often we delight in probing their motives- which our Lord could not have done, given his supreme enthusiasm for preaching. The single word " But when he saw the multitude, he was moved with compassion" (Mt. 9:36) speaks volumes. The context gives no reason for the " but" - the reader is left to imagine the tiredness, the teeming temptations to walk away from that crowd. So many times he was tempted to turn his back on his responsibilities, be they to preaching or suffering: thus at the end of his life he could triumphantly meditate " The Lord God (Angels? Yahweh Elohim) hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away back" (Is. 50:5), implying he had been sore tempted to do so.

His relationship with the Jews must have been a major stumbling block to the Lord. His love of all things Jewish would have tempted him to establish the Kingdom immediately and rid the people of Roman domination; although his own perfection and grasp of the spirit of the Law would have tempted him to flout its letter. Thus Is. 56:2 encourages " the son of man (Jesus) to keep the sabbath" , even though he was Lord of it. To come down from the cross to prove that he really was their King (Mt. 27:42), to do mighty miracles in Nazareth and before his own dear brothers (Jn. 7:5) would have been real temptations, seeing it appeared superficially that such signs might lead to genuine conversion. His feelings towards the Jews are clearly expressed in Ps. 109:4 " For my love they are my adversaries: but I give myself unto prayer" - for their repentance? Yet his even greater zeal for God's glory would have tempted him to give way to bitterness with the Jews beyond righteous anger. His full blooded denunciation of the Pharisees in Lk. 11:42-52 would no doubt have got his adrenaline really pumping- and it was only his totality of self control that enabled him to overcome the Jews' subsequent urging " him vehemently, and to provoke him to speak of many things: laying wait for him, and seeking to catch something out of his mouth" (Lk. 11:53,54). His earlier exasperated exclamation " How long shall I be with you, and suffer you?" (Lk. 9:41) may well imply 'How long before you make me spiritually slip up through exasperation by your slowness to perceive?'.

One of the Lord's greatest temptations, conscious as he was that just one slip would deny the world salvation, would have been to put his own personal spiritual protection above the needs of those around him. We almost feel he would have been justified in staying in Nazareth concentrating on the perfection of his own character, and then to have gone up to his death at Jerusalem at the end, and thus avoid all the additional pressures of the three year public ministry. But he willingly took that extra risk because of his compelling love for his fellow man that constantly welled up within him. Reflection on some of the unspoken details of the Lord's parables often reveal extra meaning that he surely intended to be teased out. Thus the good Samaritan put himself at far greater personal risk as he walked rather than rode the dangerous road, and with his vulnerable burden making attack the more likely. The good, despised Samaritan who did for stricken man what the Law (the Priest, Levite etc.) was unable to do was clearly Christ. Or think of the shepherd going off alone through the night in search of the lost sheep, climbing onto the loneliest, most isolated crags in his search, at great risk of breaking a leg, with all the natural fear of the dark upon him, chosen by him in preference to a well earned rest by the fireside with the obedient sheep that night.

In similar vein to this is Jn. 10:12 " An hireling...seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth" because he is not the good shepherd. There is an element of unreality in this parable, as in many others, which highlights meaning. A shepherd would not flee because of a mere wolf (why didn't Christ use the more obvious figure of a lion?). But the sly characteristics of the wolf invite comparison with the devil of human nature, from which our Lord was tempted to flee to personal safety, leaving us to our fate.

Finally, the purpose of our Lord enduring temptation must not be missed. Heb. 2:17 says that Christ was made like us by his enduring temptation. The passage implies he was in one form and then became like us, which obviously does not refer to his nature. Heb. 2:18 stresses that it was by reason of his temptations rather than just technically sharing our nature that he is a suitable High Priest. This being made like his brethren by temptation began in earnest with the onset of his public ministry.

Footnotes

(1) Christ seeing " all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time" (Lk. 4:5) surely refers to the Kingdom- all the kingdoms as they would be in the future (cp. Rev. 11:15).