Blessed are you………
The Hubble telescope hangs high
above the earth – above the cloud and haze of the earth, in the clarity of
space, the telescope captures the wonders of the universe around. A picture
stays in the memory – of a galaxy in formation, slowly twisting round in a
great, incalculably great spiral of red and white and orange. ……
Now, the New Testament tells us
that the God who created that wonderful galaxy, is the same God who sent His
Son into the world
Why ? out of love ! this was God’s
purpose……..
We read in John 3.16: For God so loved the world so much that He
gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him may not die but have
eternal life….. and there is a magnificent passage
in Philippians 2: that speaks on this same great scale about Jesus
‘of His own free will He gave up all that He
had,
He became like man and appeared in human likeness,
but it
then continues………
He was humble and walked the path of obedience………’
what
do these words mean ?
He was humble and walked the path of obedience………’
We see something of their
meaning in Matthew 4…..
Where, listening to the Gospel,
we find there something of who Jesus is……
In Matthew 4, we find Jesus led
by the Spirit into the desert, probably to the place the Jews called Yeshimmon
‘the place of Devastation’ – 525 square miles of desert, of scrub, to the South
of Jerusalem, unforgiving, hostile
territory in the desperate heat, which then falls away 1200 feet down to the
Dead Sea. Here it is that Jesus is led…..
and
here in Jesus, in the desert, Satan puts Him to the test,
that
obedience of Jesus, that faithfulness to God in all things,
is put
to the test………
The
At 1483 ft high, they are twice
the height of Arthur’s Seat.
From the beginning the
technical challenges in building were enormous,
for the
building weighs 100,000 tonnes.
The builders discovered that the
ground was soft , the foundations were going to have
to be the deepest in the world at nearly 500 feet deep,
and as it was to made of concrete…… the question was would the concrete
bear the
weight ?
The television programme, showed
concrete columns being tested under fantastic pressure, shattering into powder, one after another,
and then
finally
- one mix, one type of concrete stood,
firm, unbroken….
In the desert……….
we see Jesus at the beginning
of His ministry facing at the very outset, all that Satan can throw against Him
to break His obedience, His faithfulness to God………to try to prevent, to
distort, to thwart the unfolding of holiness and love and the gospel in the
world in Jesus.
So Satan comes to test the
Lord;
in three
temptations,
the
first: to turn stones into bread by divine power,
this is a testing, a searching
of the root of the life of Jesus a
testing of where that root is – and here, in His answer, we see the
obedience and faithfulness of Jesus…..the root of His life is in God, in every Word that comes from God,
in the
life that comes from God……….
The second temptation took
place at the tower in
on one
side dropped away down in to the Kidron valley, 450ft. Here Jesus is tempted by
Satan to throw Himself down - to throw Himself off the tower in
But Jesus rejects this…… saying
- the Scripture says – do not put the
Lord your God to the test - His answer shows the perfect faithfulness and
obedience that Philippians speaks of – Jesus will only seek God’s will.
In the third temptation Satan
shows Him all the kingdoms of the earth,
and invites
Him to consider the attractions of earthly power, of domination
or of empire.
Jesus’ answer here was : Worship the Lord
your God and serve only Him shows that He has chosen the way of a
servant………..
So Satan……….
testing
His dependence on God,
His seeking of God’s will,
His life as a servant………
Satan fails………..
Through this test
Jesus shows His perfect obedience,
perfect faithfulness to God, dependence on His Father in heaven,
that
in all things He seeks God’s will
and
that He will live life in lowly service, not conquest
And just as we see the marvel
of creation in an unfolding galaxy,
so
here we see the marvel of creation, as Jesus re-makes human life
Look through the Old Testament
– you will find Moses disobeyed God, David abused the
power given to him, Elijah’s strength failed……
all of
these men, at critical moments, failed,
But Christ is stronger – that
mysterious passage in Luke 11, fits perfectly here “When a strong man, fully
armed guards his own home, his possessions are safe, But when someone stronger
attacks and overpowers him He takes away the armour in which the man trusted
and divides up the spoils…
This is what is happening here,
the Lord Himself is the one stronger than all, who overpowers Satan, overcomes
the forces of evil, defeats the dark powers that dominate the earth
Moses, Elijah, David fail………
But not Jesus
! in the time of test !
so see
here in Jesus, a new kind of human life is being re-created
As the life of Jesus unfolds,
we see in wonder, that He lives in perfect faithfulness and obedience to God,
that He lives a unique life, in a perfect walk with God, and through this life,
this perfect human life, Jesus is making whole human life, the human body, the
human mind,
and day
by day living as the Father wishes us to live.
Now when we come to Christ,
this
is His gift to us………that same life,
that
same walk with God……..
the
same overcoming of sin in our own lives day by day…..
He shares this His life with us
by His Spirit,
in Him
we learn to depend on God for all things,
in Him
we learn to seek God’s will in all things,
and in
Him we learn to live a life serving others………
May His life indeed be ours………
AMEN