Again, the devil took Him to a very high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them; and he said to Him, “All these I will give You, if You will fall down and worship me.” Then Jesus said to him, “Begone, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.’” Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.
Matthew 4:8-11
For the past two reflections, we have discussed the tempting of Christ by the devil in the wilderness following His baptism. The first temptation was material in nature, tempting Jesus to turn stones into bread at a time He was hungry. The second temptation involved tempting God by asking Him to deliver Jesus from the bad choice of throwing Himself off of the pinnacle of the temple. Today we examine the third temptation.
The devil took Jesus to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world. At this point Jesus is weary and exhausted. He is exhausted from hunger, and weary from fighting off temptation. If there is ever a situation that is ripe for failure, it is when we are weary and exhausted. This is our weakest moment. And the devil comes with the strongest and most attractive temptation—power. He tells Jesus, who is looking at all the kingdoms of the world and their glory—“All these I will give You, if You will fall down and worship me.” (Matthew 4:19)
Think of the things that tempt us most—lust, and specifically lust for money, power and possessions. Think of the Ten Commandments for a moment.
To have no other gods before God. When we spend all of our time acquiring money and power, we make money, power and possessions our God.
To worship something other than God is giving the power over our lives to someone or something other than God.
To use the name of the Lord in vain is to take power away from God and express our own power over God.
To not remember the Sabbath day is to prioritize our own lusts (interests) over God.
To fail to honor our parents shows ingratitude to them, and ultimately to God, who gave them to us.
To murder someone, either literally (killing them) or with words (gossip) is to hold ultimate power over someone else, to decrease them in order to increase ourselves.
To steal is to not be satisfied with what we have, and to desire the power to take something that isn’t ours. This adds to our power while decreasing the power of someone else.
To commit adultery is to fall to lusts of our flesh.
To bear false witness increases our power over someone while decreasing the power of our victim.
To covet is to chase after something we lust for that isn’t ours and shows a degree of ingratitude.
The devil told Christ deny God, go against His commandments, and fall down and worship the devil, and the devil would gratify all of the lusts Christ could possibly have for power, money, possessions, by giving Him all the kingdoms of the world.
Here is the irony. Because Christ is one with God, all of those kingdoms are His anyway. And here is the irony for us, when we have Christ, we can have nothing and still possess everything. (2 Corinthians 6:10) The opposite is also true—we can have everything, all those kingdoms and glory that the devil tempts us with and still feel empty, like we have nothing. Because gratifying those desires of the flesh and falling to temptation ultimately leaves us empty. The one who has Christ really has everything.
The Christian life ultimately comes down to a choice between striving for the kingdoms of earth, or the kingdom of heaven. It’s one or the other. We can’t really have both. That isn’t to say we can’t own a home or a business, that we can’t enjoy some material success or have material desire. There can only be one priority, and we have to ask ourselves what is that top priority—is it the kingdom of heaven or the kingdom of earth?
Jesus rebukes Satan. He doesn’t offer much explanation. He just tells Him to be gone. He emphatically restates a version of the first commandment—that we are to have no other god before us. He tells Satan that He will only worth the Lord and only Him will He serve.
Now in His weary and exhausted state, having fought off the devil and his temptations, we see that Jesus is victorious, the devil leaves Him, and He is comforted by angels who come and minister to Him. If this was analogous to a boxing match, we might imagine that after a tough round of boxing, the bell rings, the fighter retreats into his corner and is attended to by his trainers. We will go many rounds with the devil in life, some we will win and some we will undoubtedly lose, but the angels will come and minister to us when we are fighting the good fight, and will equip us to go back into battle.
We are tempted with these desires every day. There is an opportunity for material lust, bad choices, and holding power over someone else on an almost daily basis. The spiritual battle is to keep God as the priority each day, to worship nothing above God.
Keep fighting against the devil. He rarely rests. This is why we must be vigilant at all times. And when we fall, we must get up again and keep fighting, trusting that God’s angels will be there to comfort and strengthen us, and confident that the ultimate payoff, the kingdom of heaven, is on the table for all those who fight the good fight throughout life. It’s not the kingdom of earth that should be our focus, but rather the kingdom of heaven. Faith is seeing the powerful kingdoms of earth at our fingertips, but believing the greater kingdom is the one we can’t see and having the strength to keep fighting for it.
Lord, thank You for everything that I have and everything that I am. Thank You that I am alive, breathing, with clothes to wear, with a roof over my head. Help me to be grateful for the “kingdoms” You have given me, and to not lust for the “kingdoms” I do not have. Help me to have the discipline to make You the priority, to desire You above all other desires. In my moments of exhaustion, please send Your angels to comfort and strengthen me and keep me focused on the Kingdom of heaven. Amen.
Make God the priority today. Seek after His power, not your own. Keep your eyes on the kingdom above, not just the “kingdoms” that are in front of us.
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