Shepherd of the Springs
Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod

And the tempter came and said to him, "If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread." But he answered, " Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God."

It is sometimes very difficult to understand a God who is always introducing the destructive designs of Satan into his plans. After creating his masterpiece here on earth and placing our first parents into an actual paradise, He allows Satan to come and do what he can to wreck his destruction on God’s design, especially His design for us. And we know from how things went that Satan is a very formidable adversary. We proved quite well that if it was all a test for us, we certainly were not up to it. The beguiling of Satan with his half-truths, lies, and enticements was more than our first parents could handle. God’s design of creation was frustrated and all born of Adam have had to suffer the consequences.

Nevertheless, our text for this morning of Jesus temptation in the wilderness reveals a God of great consistency in His mystery. If Jesus is to become for us, not only our Redeemer and Champion, but also a Second Adam from which we might get a fresh start and a much better inheritance, He will have to square off with the same adversary that was our first parents downfall. Notice, however the contrasts: Adam and Eve faced the temptations of the Devil in the context of a life of plenty in paradise. Jesus is taken by the Spirit of God into a wilderness and given nothing to eat for 40 days. Only when experiencing great hunger is He given to face the testing of the Devil. Eve was tempted by lies of the Devil. The forbidden fruit of the tree would be the death of her; it would not make her like God. She had neither the power nor the prerogative to take God’s place in her life. How different things were for Jesus. Jesus was God in human flesh. He had both the power and the prerogative to turn the stones into bread and to command the angels to do his bidding. And whereas Adam and Eve were trying to take God’s place at the behest of Satan, Jesus engaged his life of obedience to the Father, a life that would lead him to a cross in order to take our place.

From this point on, Jesus would also face all of the temptations that are common to all of us, not once, but again and again. In order to become the Second Adam in whom we might receive not the inheritance of death, but the inheritance of life through his death; He would have to walk a road to the cross, facing trials, tribulations, and temptations that our first parents could never have dreamed of. Spiritual warfare was the crucial element in creation that led to our downfall . . . but now, also spiritual warfare will be the main feature of the life and death of Jesus and this will be the battle that God is determined to win for our sakes. Jesus has two great tasks in order to be our Champion and Savior. He must place himself under God’s Law for us and, facing the temptations of the Devil all the way in the midst of a fallen world, He must keep that Law perfectly. He must do this not for His own sake, for He is God and not under the Law, but is its Lord . . . but He must do this for our sake, fulfilling it in our stead that we might be delivered from it curse. For cursed is everyone, says St. Paul, who does not do everything that the Law requires (Galatians 3:10). And then, as the perfect, innocent One, He must endure the suffering and death that we deserve as the just punishment and penalty for our guilt. For again as St. Paul teaches, the wages of sin is death. Spiritual warfare will take Jesus to the cross, and it will be his fare on that cross as the devil is determined to make that cross, not a victory for Jesus, but a defeat. Again, God is such a mystery to us. For it is the designs of Satan, that God will use to achieve His victory over all the powers of darkness. He will use Satan to accomplish the Devil’s own defeat. For in the death of Jesus, death will be conquered. In his dying to sin, sin will be overcome. And in his innocent suffering, the adversary will be silenced, and the whole world justified, reconciled, and forgiven.

But now this Lenten season, you have been invited to again make that journey to the cross with your Lord Jesus. In your baptism you have been united with Him in his death. His cross has become yours; and this means, in part, that you have joined the life of spiritual warfare that Satan is waging against Jesus and all that belong to Him. It was Luther who especially understood this dimension of what it means to live in the cross of Christ. Spiritual distress is not simply the lot of marginal Christians and occasional crazy monks in monasteries - it is the common inheritance of all believers. Luther’s discovery that the just shall live by faith alone included the recognition that faith will not be left alone in the Christian life. As with Jesus, it will be assaulted by attacks and tribulations of the Unholy Spirit. Christian life is found in the cross of Christ and that means we shall also be living with one of our own. Cross life for the New Creation that emerges from baptism not only has us contending with the Old Adam and a fallen world, it also brings us turmoil and affliction from the powers and principalities of the Prince of Darkness. Peace with God brings conflict and adversity with the world, the flesh, and the Devil.

This new evaluation of spiritual distress by Luther leads to twin conclusions both of which are rather unsettling: 1.) tribulations are not a disease, so there is no cure for them. And 2.), only firm faith in God’s unalterable promise enables spiritual crises to be withstood - not overcome. The Devil is on a relentless campaign to overturn the Joyous Exchange of the cross and replace it with the demands of the Law for morality, godliness and good works. Yet only at this point it becomes clear that the mercy of God in the divine foolishness of the Gospel is our only refuge. Nevertheless, a new life in Christ transforms the sinner’s life into a battleground with the unholy triad - the world, the flesh, and the Devil (Rom. 8:38-39, Gal. Eph. 6:10-12).

While it is certainly true that the inheritance of glory and an exalted life with God have been given to each of us in our baptism, this inheritance is lived with in this fallen age only by faith. Our hope is placed in a future experience of glory. Life in Christ through baptism has joined the believer to Christ the crucified. (Rom. 6) Christian life is cross life. This means that for now we live in a fallen creation ruled by the Evil One who is on a campaign to separate us from our baptismal inheritance. He is cunning, powerful, and a consummate liar. Experiencing him as he would prowl the Church militant to promote casualties is standard provisional Christian living. Temptation is ordinary run-of-the-mill Christian experience.

Jesus has emerged from His wilderness temptations as our Champion - to walk the road of the cross at the front lines of warfare with the world, death, and the Devil. Jesus is tempted by the devil . . . and he lived under the Law for each of us - tempted in every way, as you and I yet without sin. Jesus overcomes the powers of darkness in our behalf, and fulfills God’s Law as our champion doing for us what we cannot do for ourselves...keep it perfectly. In Christ, we are tempted, but not defeated. Yes, we sin daily, but in our Savior’s victory over sin, He brings us forgiveness. And though the Devil threatens us with death as the wages to be paid for our transgressions and those of our first parents . . . Jesus has paid for them, once for all. So now we go again this Lenten Season from the wilderness temptations of Jesus to the cross to behold that decisive victory once again. This time, Devil . . . you loose and we win . . . in Christ.

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. A-men.