Audio recording (sorry about the quality)
Sermon manuscript:
In both our Old Testament reading and our Gospel reading
this morning we heard about temptations. In the Old Testament reading we heard
about Adam and Eve being tempted in the Garden. In the Gospel reading we heard
about Jesus being tempted in the wilderness. It is important to understand that
with both of these temptations we are dealing with a different situation than
what happens when we are tempted. The reason why the situation is different
with both Adam and Eve as well as Christ is that we are dealing with people who
were not “sold under sin,” as Paul puts it. Adam and Eve had not yet fallen.
Christ was sinless and would remain sinless. But with both instances the people
involved were free.
This means that they were able to react differently to
temptation than the way that we are able to react to temptation. After the fall
into sin human beings couldn’t get back up on their own. The minds of Adam and
Eve and all their children down to each one of us were darkened. We became
turned in on ourselves, caring only about ourselves, and so we no longer could
do anything other than sin. Even if it should appear that people are able to
resist temptation, you can be sure that they are doing it for selfish reasons,
unless they are being moved by the Holy Spirit. After the fall into sin, human
beings lost the ability to defeat temptation. Temptation results in either the
course sin, to which the person is being tempted, or it will result in a more
refined sin like lying, pride, or self-righteousness.
The only correct and godly way for a person to deal with
temptation would for that person to burn with love for God, and that that love
for god would be the sole reason for a person’s actions. The greatest
commandment is that we should love the Lord our God with all our heart, soul,
strength, and mind. So if we are not reacting to temptation with this love as
what motivates us, then obviously we are sinning—even breaking the greatest
commandment.
So if you are skeptical about the Bible’s claim that no
sinner has reacted correctly to temptation, simply examine your own life.
Perhaps you have been able to resist something that you knew to be wrong. Was
the reason why you did this because you burned with love for God in every fiber
of your being? I don’t think so. What probably prevented you was that you
didn’t want to lose face in the community, or even you did not want to lose
esteem for yourself. Probably the best that could be mustered up within
ourselves would be a terror at the thought of God casting you into hell. That might
be as close as sinners can get to reacting rightly. What you can be sure didn’t
happen, is that you joined your will with God’s will because you love him so
much. With the fall into sin we simply aren’t wired that way anymore. Instead,
we are under the slavery of the devil.
So both of the temptations that we heard about were received
by people who are so different than us that we can’t understand what it was
like. Adam and Eve were sinless up to that point. Jesus was sinless. But there
is an obvious difference in how these two temptations turned out. When Adam and
Eve were tested they failed. When Jesus was tested he succeeded. This is not a
mere factoid, but has the broadest of implications. It also is not just
something that has to do with Jesus, but is also applicable to us. The fact
that Jesus met and defeated temptation is good news for us sinners, for whom
there is no hope otherwise.
The reason why this is good news is because the Law of God
had to be fulfilled. What we’ve been talking about so far today is the way that
we have not kept the Law and cannot keep the Law. Every time we are tempted, if
left to our own devices, we cannot help but fail
to love the Lord our God with our whole being. If the Law of God were not
fulfilled so far as we are concerned, then we are damned and bound for hell.
That’s where evil creatures are supposed to go, and the Law of God, which we
have not kept, is proof positive that we are evil.
But Jesus did not sin. He kept the Law. He continued to love
the Lord his God even though he was tempted to do otherwise by the devil. Where
we have all failed, he prevailed. He lived the life of righteousness that we
have not lived. This righteousness of his is credited to us when we believe in
him as Paul says in Romans chapter three. When we are baptized into him, and
thereby joined to him, all that is his becomes ours. That means that his
righteous life becomes ours through faith, even though we have not lived
righteous lives ourselves. Even though we have fallen into temptation and sin,
Jesus’s steadfastness, his love for God, and his defeat of temptation is given
to us and to all who believe. Jesus’s wonderful victory is our victory.
Here we see something about the gift of Christ and his
salvation that often gets overlooked. When we think about what Christ has done
for us we often think of the cross. At the cross we see the consequences of
breaking God’s Law. Jesus is punished for the sins that we have committed so
that they are atoned for by the shedding of his blood and forgiven. The record
of sins against us is blotted out. This is focusing on what we have done
against the Law.
It is easy to miss the requirement that the Law must also be
fulfilled. Not only do we need to be emptied of all our evil, but we also need
to be filled with righteousness in order to be justified. This was accomplished
by the life that Jesus lived that is credited to you. Jesus’s life of
righteousness is your life of righteousness. Your justification before God is
completely of Jesus. He has washed away your sins. He has given you his own
righteousness. The Father, therefore, looks upon you with the love and the approval
that he has for his beloved Son.
This teaching of Jesus’s righteous life that is credited to
you can seem like a minor thing. Forgiveness seems to be more the major thing.
But it is not a minor teaching. It prevents Christians from false beliefs that
we are prone to hold to because our reason likes them better.
So, for example, there are some who believe that the benefit
of Jesus is limited to undoing what we have done wrong. Then, after we have
been forgiven, it is up to us to be righteous. But what happens when a person can’t
live up to that righteous life that he or she is supposed to live? And this is
not a “what if,” some kind of hypothetical. There’s no way for a person to live
even a respectably righteous life so long as the devil, the world, and our
sinful flesh are still hanging about.
There are only two options for people who are taught that
after they have been forgiven they have to be perfect with their works. Either
they will fall into despair, believe that they are no Christian, and are damned
before God because of their failure to live righteously. Or (and this is the
road more often taken) they will lie to themselves and others. They will
pretend that they have been able not only to get rid of sin, but also to love
the Lord our God with all their heart, soul, strength, and mind. In this way
their faith in being justified before God ends up being based on their own
works, and not on Christ alone.
The gift of not only forgiveness, but also Christ’s life of
righteousness, given to you and to all who believe, means that you can be
certain that you are justified before God because it all depends on Jesus. It
doesn’t depend on you at all. The reason why you are justified is because God
has given you his Son as a gift. So when you look at yourself and do not like
what you see, you can look beyond appearances to your faith in Christ. When you
look within yourself you will only see sin, the failure to bear up under
temptation, and so on. But as the Scriptures say, “Faith is the substance of
things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” We are justified by
faith, faith in Christ, not in our works or the goodness we might see in ourselves.
We have a sure and certain hope that we are and will be acceptable before God
for Christ’s sake, and that we will receive the inheritance of eternal life.
These are not things we can see right now. They are things that we believe,
and, one day, will see with our own resurrected eyes.
So know this: Jesus’s righteous life is your life. Jesus’s
victory over temptation that we heard about is your victory over temptation.
You are not justified by your life. You are justified by faith in Jesus. This
is always true and will always be yours whenever you are told it or recall it
to your mind.
That said, at the end here, I need to speak to a couple
things could derail us from this saving truth. First of all, our sinful flesh
is liable to hear this message and draw this conclusion: “This is a pretty good
deal. God likes to forgive sin and pardon sinners. I like to sin. Therefore,
why don’t I sin all the more so that grace may abound?” This is a stupid, but
common thought among Christians. It’s stupid because it’s like we are somehow
outsmarting God, who knows all things. It’s common, though, because our fallen
flesh likes sin so much.
Paul addresses this issue in Romans chapter 6. By your
baptism into Christ’s death you have died to sin. If you want to remain a
Christian, you can’t go back to the life of sin that Christ has redeemed you
from. If you live according to the flesh, if you give yourself over to your
sinful desires, you will die. The Holy Spirit will forsake you and you will no
longer have a genuine faith in Christ. But if, by the Holy Spirit, you put to
death the deeds of the flesh, you will live.
This means that although you have been justified before God
for Jesus’s sake, and although you have been given the gift of faith so as to
receive this righteousness, you can nonetheless thwart Almighty God’s tireless
efforts to save you. Since faith is not a good work of your own, but is a gift
of the Holy Spirit, you are not in control over it. You might think that you
can sin all you want and keep your faith, but God’s Word tells you that this is
not so.
So this is your warning: Don’t play games with God. God will
not be mocked. You will not trick him with empty words.
Let’s also speak to the temptations themselves: Learn that
the devil’s temptations are ugly. Righteousness is beautiful. Temptations do
not call us to a higher and better life. They call us to a baser and meaner
life. This is not surprising, because temptations are always lies. Happiness is
promised, but it is not truly delivered. Often you find that the people who
give themselves over to temptations the most are the most miserable. Life can
become so miserable that they prefer to murder themselves rather than go on
living the way they have. This also is not surprising, because Jesus says of
the devil that he is a liar and a murderer.
These are a couple things to keep in mind. But let us not
forget the main teaching which is our hope of everlasting life. The main thing
is that Jesus has atoned for your sins on the cross, and lived a righteous life
in your place. He has suffered and died for the temptations that you have
accommodated and accepted. He has fulfilled the Law that you have not kept with
his righteous life. Therefore you are forgiven of all your sins and righteous
before God, because you have been given him as a gift. When you hear of Jesus’s
withstanding of temptations, you should rejoice, for he didn’t do this for his
own benefit. He did it for you.
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