Any Father we come before you and again we thank you for this
time. We thank you for our chance to
give you the praise and worship you deserve.
We also come before you and we thank you for the offerings that
have been made. We thank you that you are the
one who gives all to us, the one who is the great provider.
And we just pray these offerings that are given will be used for
your glory. May they be used to honour you.
Give wisdom to those that distribute them Lord, and we
bring them to you as part of our worship.
Well, we thank you for our children.
What a blessing they are to us as a church.
You know the congregation, we just pray for them now as they
head out to Sunday school and team class.
Lord, we just pray that their hearts will be open to the word.
Lord, we just pray that each 1 and in time will come to know
you as their own personal Lord and Saviour.
We thank you for our Sunday School teachers.
We thank you for the blessing that they are to us and to our
children. We thank you for the willingness
to share your word or we pray the words that you've laid on
their hearts will sink deep into the children's hearts or in
Father, we thank you for daring as he's prepared this message.
As we continue our our walk through book of Luke, we'll just
pray that you will give him clarity of thought in mind as he
brings this message to us. We pray for our own hearts that
they will be open to hearing the word and not just hearing that
Lord, we pray that we will let it affect us and change us and
grow closer to you. So we commit Dan into your hand
now and we just thank you for this time.
We share in Jesus name, Amen. Good morning.
Hey, we're gonna start this morning with a video clip.
Alright, That is hilarious. That was, I just cut that down
to a highlight reel. If you go to YouTube and look up
marshmallow test, you can watch the whole thing.
It it is hilarious. But a couple of things about it
that you you might not know. It's actually a very, very old
clip. Most of those kids are sort of
middle-aged now, but what's interesting is that they
followed them through their lives.
And there is a very, very strong correlation between whether they
were able to with stand that temptation with the young and
how well they did through life and sort of the different
outcomes through their life, you know, which is interesting.
The other thing though, there's kind of a caveat in there.
Some of the kids knew the teacher that was was saying it.
If you wait, I'll give you a second marshmallow.
And they had a sort of a, a good sense of trust in that teacher.
Some of the kids did not know. And that also had a huge bearing
on whether they were able to wait, right?
If they trusted the teacher, they knew the teacher, then the
teacher said, I'll come back with the second one.
And they believe that was the case, then they were more likely
to be able to resist the temptation.
So we continue our series this morning through the book of
Luke. This one's called a time to
pause dealing with temptation. That'll make sense as we go.
Now we're going to be in Luke chapter 4 where that takes
place. But we're also going to spend a
lot of time in Deuteronomy. So if you also want to put a
finger in Deuteronomy 8 or a bookmark or something, and we'll
flip backwards and forwards quickly between them a lot
during the service. We got a lot of cool stuff to
look at. So I'm going to do that quite
fast. When it comes to temptation,
there's a couple of things about it.
They're very similar to what we saw in this marshmallow video,
right? When it comes to temptation,
there's always more at stake than what we think.
And even with the marshmallow test, right, it was just about
marshmallows, right? But it did, it was kind of a
foreshadowing of how things were to go for them through their
life. And the second thing is our
ability to resist temptation is strongly linked to our trust in
God. When we're in the middle of
temptation, if we could pause and we could kind of bring those
two things together right into focus, maybe we could gain some
traction when it comes to dealing with temptation.
If we can go, I'm facing this temptation, am I going to trust
God? We can connect those two things.
It it makes a difference to us. Now, maybe you can't see a link
between your particular temptation and your confidence
in God, but we're going to develop that more as we go this
morning. So I'm going to be in Luke
chapter 4 verse #1 and it says this says and Jesus full of the
Holy Spirit, right? Is that that phrase again that
we've seen throughout Luke right under the influence of the Holy
Spirit full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was
led by the Spirit in the wilderness for 40 days being
tempted by the devil. Now just just a quick point.
Remember you know Andy took us through this last week Jesus
baptism, right Remember he comes up out of the water Spirit of
God descends on him like a dove and this big booming voice from
heaven says this is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased.
So this is like God giving him some applause, right well done,
well done. This is my beloved son whom I am
well pleased. Then he's straight from there.
The Holy Spirit leads him into the wilderness to be tempted by
the devil. So it's important to understand
that this was not some kind of punishment.
When we're facing presentation. It's not some kind of punishment
from God because that's not what we see there in the pattern here
in Luke. I think it looks as this second
part of that verse. And he ate nothing during those
days when they were ended, He was hungry.
So a month and a half without any food.
And Luke tells us at the end of that he was hungry.
A little bit of an understatement there by by Luke,
I think. But, but in the following
verses, Jesus is going to be tempted in three specific ways
and his confidence in God is going to be tested.
This is a very common story, right?
Very well known story. And if you you grew up in church
or you sometime in Sunday school or something like that, you
probably have heard some of the story before.
But every temptation that we face falls into one of three
categories. It's a 3 categories that we're
going to see here. And as we look at how this
works, hopefully we'll gain some insight into how these things
come about and how to win against the temptation.
As we look at these temptations that Jesus face in the the
desert, you'll probably never be tempted to jump off a building
to get God to catch you. You'll probably never be offered
all of the kingdoms of the world.
You know, it's unlikely. So the specifics of these
temptations are not what's important here, not, you know,
not what's the key here, right? The value of this is that on
three different occasions, Jesus is tempted to do something on
his own rather than trust in God.
So it's more the sort of the categories that are important to
see rather than the specifics of the of the temptation that Jesus
faced here. That'll make sense in a second
as well. Just a quick question, right?
What was at stake when Jesus faced these temptations?
If he gave into temptation and he signed what was at stake?
A lot of things actually. But one of the one of the big
ones is you and I. Because if Jesus sinned, then he
couldn't die in our place because he would have to die to
pay for his own sins. And so there would be no
salvation for us. And so, as we said, there's
always a lot more at stake than we think when we face a
temptation. In effect, when we face
temptation, 3 things are at stake.
Every time you attempted, there are three things at stake #1
your future is at stake again, Yo, it was just marshmallows,
but it actually had a bearing on what happened down the track.
And we'll see that as we go in a minute.
Almost always somebody else's future is at stake as well.
If you're an employee an you attempt a new fall into send
you. If you're an employer and you're
attempted, you fall into send, your employees will be affected.
If you are a husband, you attempted, you've fallen to
send, your wife will be affected.
If your wife, your husband will be affected.
If your parents, you fall into sin, your kids will be affected.
And so it goes on. One of the things at stake when
we attempted is somebody else's future.
The thing is though, you know, sometimes I think we think it's
all about us. But every time we fall into
temptation, there's more at stake than we think.
But also it's worse than that, because giving into temptation
is a sin. Bible makes it very clear that
it's not a sin to be tempted, but giving into temptation is a
sin, right? So every time we sin it, it
affects the kind of relationship that we have with God because
what's at stake is your confidence in God and in God's
presence in your life. God hasn't gone anywhere, but
your trust in him has when you give in to temptation.
So really your faith in the sense of your trust and your
heavenly Father is at stake because every time we face
temptation, every temptation is really a question.
And the question is this, can God be trusted?
Can God be trusted? And we've given, when we're
given to a temptation, we answer that question, No, no, we can't.
And so if you are very young. You have a lot of future at
stake. If you are very old, you have a
lot of legacy at stake. And if you're somewhere in
between, you've got a lot of boats at stake.
Every temptation is about your future to potentially somebody
else's future. Or, you know, maybe your parents
gave into temptation and you paid for it and it wasn't even
your sin or, or your weakness or your addiction or your failure
or whatever that you paid the price every single time you
attempted. Not only is your future and the
future of others at stake, but your confidence in God is at
stake. And so here's kind of a bottom
line this morning, right? Temptation is always a test of
our faith, right? Of our in the sense of our trust
in God, not just our self-control.
Temptation is always a test of your faith, not just yourself
control. So remember that as we go on.
And so when we face the temptation, we really want to
pause and that's why the title that misses this morning pause.
We're in a really want to pause and ask these questions.
Is God big enough to address my whatever it is for you right my
loneliness, whatever the temptation is.
Is God big enough to meet my need for intimacy?
Is God big enough to meet my need for progress and
professional confidence? Is God big enough to drop into
my world and help me provide for my family has got big enough to
do something in my marriage is, you know, can I pause and wait
on God or do I have to continually make things work and
keep things happening? So that's what's at stake every
time we face temptation, because we don't trust God, we don't
obey Him, and eventually we just stop doing anything.
He says You. Know.
Every time you tipped and your confidence in God is tested.
So we want to try and connect these two ideas.
I, I, I'm being tempted, do I trust God?
I need to link this to Ken, God be trusted and bring those two
things together. So let's see how this works.
Luke chapter 4, verse #3. Jesus devil comes to him, Jesus
in the wilderness after 40 days of of, you know, a month and a
half not eating anything. Devil said to him, if you're the
son of God, command this stone to become bread right now.
This turned water into wine. You know, he could probably do
this. We will.
We wouldn't even blink. It's like, ohh, yeah, that's he,
he's Jesus. That's what he does, right?
But Jesus understands that the issue isn't his hunger or his
self-control, but the issue is, can I trust God?
And we know this because Jesus flashes back to a story from the
history of his people, the Jews when they were wandering in the
wilderness in in the Sinai, if you remember that story right,
Everyday God would come, they would wake up in the morning and
there would be this stuff called manner on the ground was kind of
like honey puffs. And God would provide it
everyday. And if they if they tried to
store it up, it would rot. So they just had to trust that
it would be there everyday. And they were learning that God
could be trusted. So flick back to Jeromy chapter
8 and we'll, we'll have a look at this number 2 and Judah only
82. Moses.
This is at the end of this 40 years in the wilderness and
Moses reflecting back on this and what's happened and he's
giving doing this big long sort of speech to the to the Jewish
people. And he says that Jeromy ate too.
He said, and you shall remember the whole way that your Lord God
has led you these 40 years in the wilderness that he might
humble you, testing you didn't know what was in your heart,
whether you would keep his commandments or not.
And he humbled you and he let you hunger and he fed you with
manna, which you didn't know or your father's didn't know that
he might make. You know that man does not live
by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the
mouth of God. And so if you, if you look at
that whole speech, what, what Moses is saying is, look, God
provided this manner for you, you know, everyday, except, you
know, on the Sabbath, but everyday for 40 years.
He provided this for you so that you would learn to trust him.
And he connected it with his laws and his precepts so that
you would understand, you know, is God's these laws and
precepts? Is God trying to keep me from
getting good stuff? Is God being a killjoy?
Is God, Can I really trust God on this?
This was the whole Adam and Eve thing, wasn't it?
You know, say and said, ohh, you know, God's holding out on you.
That's why he doesn't you need that cause he knows you will be
like him then. And so God was trying to teach
you, look, you can trust God and you know that because he
provides the money everyday, right?
And he connected those those two things together.
And so you know, he doesn't have a hidden agenda.
Guy can be trusted and Moses, look, if you lose sight of that
and you, you, you, you fail to trust him, here's what's gonna
happen, right? Drop down to verse #11 they're
in denomy. He says this.
Take care lest you forget the Lord your God by not keeping his
commandments in his rules and his statues which I command you
today. Let's when you've eaten and are
full and have built good houses and you live in them.
And when you're here and you're flocks multiply and your silver
and your gold is multiplied and all that you have is multiplied.
Then your heart be lifted up and you forget the Lord your God who
brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the the out of the
House of slavery. So he says, look, my concern is
that when you get into the promised land and you're doing
well for yourself and you've got plenty of stuff that you're
going to start to think that you're going to fail to remember
that you need to trust God for your needs.
And you're going to start to think I need to I need to do
this. I need to do everything.
Look at look at what it sees in this number 17.
If we drop down to verse 17 kind of sums of stuff he says beware
lest you say in your heart my power and the might of my hand
have gotten me this wealth. You shall remember the Lord your
God, for it is he who gives you the power to get wealth, that he
may confirm his covenant that He swore to your fathers as it is
today. He says, look, don't forget,
yes, it's important to have enough to eat, right?
But more important than that is understanding who gave it to
you, right? Where it came from, that God
gave it to you, right? So flip back to Luke, keep your
finger in Jeromy, because we'll come back here.
But flick back to Luke, Luke chapter 4, and so sentences
look, turn these stones into bread.
And Jesus answered him, It is written.
What he's saying is that God's already spoken about this.
Similar things happened before, right?
And God spoke to us about how how, how this works through
Moses. And here's what he says.
It is written man shall not live by bread alone.
Jesus just referencing that passage that back there in in
Germany, you saying look, the real issue isn't my physical
need. The real issue is am I going to
trust God? Am I going to trust God?
This is a moral and an ethical issue, not a physical one.
Now we break and we bend God's rules because we don't believe
that that's the case. But every time you attempted,
your confidence in God is at stake, not just yourself
control. We see that again with the next
one. Just before we get to the next
one, just kind of explain this a little bit.
If you are a particularly goal oriented, future oriented person
or you're that kind of type A personality really driven to
achieve, then you could be set up easily for a very specific
and subtle kind of temptation. And the reason is this, right?
Because you are so focused on that thing that you were born
for, right? That you have studied for that
you have been educated for that you've tried to expand your
skill set in and, and, and maybe it's even a thing that God has
called you too, right? And this is a thing that you've
prayed for and you know, this is what God wants you to do.
And you become so focused, become so focused on achieving
that goal that at some point, and this will happen, if it
hasn't already happened at some point in your life, you're going
to have an opportunity to take a giant step, step forward towards
that goal. However, to take that step is
going to require you to have to compromise.
Just kind of put your ethics aside for a minute.
Put your values, just check your values at the door for a minute.
Put aside everything that you know that God teaches you is
right and good. Just put that aside.
And here's the trick, right? Here's the trick.
Not forever, just for a minute, just temporarily, just for a
moment, right? And we think, yeah, but you
understand, right? In the culture that I live in,
in the, in the industry that I work in, right?
In the world I live in, the only way to get where I need to be,
you know, I I need to play by their rules.
But here's the thing. Right in the moment of that
decision, you're gonna discover 2 incredibly important things.
And the moment there, the decision you're.
Gonna discover who you are? And really, you're going to
discover whose you are, right? Listen to how this temptation
goes down, right? Luke chapter 4, verse #5 And the
devil took him up, and showed him all the kingdoms of the
world in a moment of time, And he said to him to you, or give
all authority and their glory. For it has been delivered to me,
and I'll give it to whom I will. If you will then worship me,
it'll all be yours. Why I I will give you control
over everything you see if you just submit to my authority.
No, we're not talking about forever.
Jeez. We're just talking about just
for a moment. We're in the desert.
No one else is gonna see this. You know, just for a SEC now the
question is, why don't you think about you trying to put
yourself, you know, in this place and think, why was this
such a great temptation? Why was this a big temptation?
So we gotta do a bit of a theological sidebar here, right?
We'll just do this very quickly, right.
But when when God created Adam and Eve, right at the creation,
he gave them authority over everything, right?
They're good old fashioned word dominion, right?
Over everything. He gave them authority.
You're in charge. Go and name all the animals.
You're in charge. When sudden Cayman tempted and
right, the the serpent said, look, you can't trust God.
He's holding out on you. He just knows you'll be like
him. That's why he doesn't want you
to eat this fruit. And they went, you know what?
Yeah, we're going to trust, we're going to trust this the
serpent, right? And so they went with him, and
so they shifted allegiances. Guess what went with them?
Their authority, right? So say has this authority.
A lot of the Bible, and particularly as we get into the
New Testament, starts to point to this idea that when Jesus
died on the cross and rose again, but he died to pay the
sin debt that mankind owned. Ohh.
The big goal of that was to gain back that authority that was
lost, which is why you see all these verses all the time like
the Great Commission right It starts off Jesus says all
something has been given to me in heaven and earth.
Anyone know what it is all authority.
Yeah all authority in heaven and earth being given to me.
I've won it back and therefore it starts delegating his
authority right now to to his truly through the Great
Commission. Satan stands that they with
Jesus and Luke chapter 4 and he says I want you to see it.
I want you to feel it. I want you to to kind of bask in
the potential power and glory that you could have and.
You could have it now. No cross, no blood and gore, no
floggings and crowns of thorns and had a 9000, all that
horrible stuff. Think about your poor mother
who's going to have to watch her son be tortured to death on a
cross. Think of how that that will make
you feel. I can give you that now without
you having to go through all of that.
It was a very real temptation, right?
It was a big part of the reason that he came, and it was God's
will and it was God's destiny for his life.
Now, this is going to happen to you, and this is going to happen
to me again. At some point, it's going to
happen that you're gonna be locked and loaded on that very
thing that maybe, you know, God put you here for.
And you'll be tempted to take your eye off what you value and
temporarily get under someone else's authority or potentially
gain a lot of authority. And the illusion is there's just
for a moment, look, I'm just gonna put this aside just now
and I'm just, once I get through this thing, this firewall,
whatever it is, then when I get on the other side of it, I'm
going to pick the stuff back up again and I'll just carry on,
right? And we'll be fine.
That's what we think. But what we find is when we get
to the other side of that moment, when you get what you
win, after, you know, you close the deal, you get the girl, you
know what, whatever it is, the moment you get to the other side
of it and you get the, then there's this kind of sense of,
but I'm not sure that I can trust that God's on my side
anymore. And the next time a similar
temptation comes your way, I'm gonna think, yeah, I need to act
in a similar way as I did before, because I don't know
that God can be trusted in these matters.
Like we said, right? Temptation is not just a test of
your self-control, it's a test of your trust in God and for the
people who who here, who who really like to love to take
things forward, just just really goal oriented, just those kind
of people, right? The issue is, it's not the deal,
it's not the scholarship, it's not the competition, it's not
the game, the team, whatever the issue is, do I trust God?
Do I trust God? So Jesus did what he did.
Every time he was tempted, He goes to the Scripture to where
his people were tempted the same way.
And so before they entered the promised land again, Moses in
the book of Deuteronomy is, is reflecting back on their time in
the, in the 40 years. And he's giving them, you know,
he's praying for them and giving them advice.
And he says, whoa, whoa. Right before you enter the
promised land, before you, you, you start building cities and
homes and houses and you state your own economy before God
makes you great in the eyes of other people.
I want you to remember who got you here.
I want you to remember who got you here because you'll never
accomplish the will of God by abandoning the principles of God
and you'll never maintain the blessings of God by abandoning
the values of God. And sort of a key point that
he's making. We're gonna be in judo only
Chapter 6. If you wanna flick back there.
So let's have a look at it right?
Jeromy chapter 6 verse #10 Here's what he says.
This is Moses reflection on these things he says.
And when the Lord your God brings you into the land that he
swore to your fathers, to Abraham and Isaac and Jacob to
give you, with great and good cities that you didn't build,
and houses full of all good things that you didn't feel, and
systems that you didn't dig, and vineyards and olive trees that
you didn't plant. And when you eat and are full,
then take care lest you forget the Lord who brought you out of
the land of Egypt, out of the House of slavery.
What does that mean for us? It means when you're tempted to
abandon God and you think I need to do this thing just to get
further along to get towards the goal.
Stop, right? Pause, pause and think.
Who got you this far? Who gave you this ability to to
get where you've got right? Who got you through their last
exam? Who provided when you were in
crisis last time? So why would you abandon him?
Now? Look at drop down verse 13.
Look. At what he says.
It's the Lord your God. You shall fear Him, you shall
serve, and by his name. You shall swear.
So this is the verse that Jesus basically sort of paraphrases in
Luke chapter 4. He kind of puts his own spin on
it. So let's go back to Luke chapter
4. Who's number 8?
Saints showed him all the kingdoms of the earth and said.
I'll give you authority over those.
And Jesus answered him, said it is written, you should worship
the Lord your God in him only. Show you serve.
You know what Jesus wanted more than all the kingdoms of the
earth? Unbroken fellowship with the
Father. You already got it in the end.
Ohh, he got both, yeah. You know you and I get when we
want the kingdoms of the earth, and we're willing to sacrifice
unbroken fellowship with the Father in order to get them
neither. We don't get either, but in that
moment, right when you can feel it and you can see it and you
think, but if I don't, it won't. And if I don't, he won't and and
all of that. And it seems like this is the
only way forward. Who is it or what is it that you
want so bad? And it may not even be a bad
thing that you want. You know, it may not even be a
simple thing that you want, but what is it that you want so
badly that you're ready to trade what's important in order to get
it? And that thing is going to be
different for each of us. But what is it for you?
Because the other thing here is if you bow and break and you in
this moment, right you, you miss the opportunity of knowing what
God would have done in this situation.
Don't trade what's important for what's immediate, because if you
do, you'll never know in what way God might have shown up on
your behalf. And the next time it comes
around, you'll be in even more tempted to compromise for
whatever the next step is that you think you need.
Your God can be trusted. You know.
That was great part of Andy's message last week.
He's the God who wants to intersect in the details of your
life, because in that moment you discover who you are, and in
that moment you discover whose you are and who he is, right?
The God who is faithful. So big question, right?
What is that you want so badly you'd be willing to compromise?
But instead, would you be willing to trust your Heavenly
Father in and through those details?
Okay, so last one, right? Satan tries a different tack.
Chapter 4 verse #9 says, And He took him to Jerusalem and he set
him on the pinnacle of the temple and he said to him, if
you're the son of God, throw yourself down from here.
Now this is where Satan gets pretty slick, right?
The devil gets pretty slick here because previous two right sides
come to him and see the devils come and said do this and Jesus
is gone. No, he's just quoted a an Old
Testament passage. God's already spoken about this
right. So no, I'm not going to do it.
Any quotes Scripture to him. And so he says again, we'll do
this. No, Scripture says this right.
So this time say that says do this and he quoted Scripture
right. He grows Scripture.
He says even the son of God. It's very yourself down from
here because this number 10 for it was written, he will command
his angels concerning you to guard you and on their hands,
they will bear you up. At least you strike your foot
against a stone, right? Couple of quotes from the Old
Testament there from the Bible. He says, look, do this because
Bible says this. What's going on here?
Satan is subtly suggesting that it's going to be a very
difficult for Jesus to convince people that he is the Messiah,
right? In the previous 50 years before
this, there's been several people had risen up claiming to
be the Messiah, the the the promised one of of God.
And so say, instead of saying this is going to be really hard
for you to to prove to people that you're the Messiah.
So they're up on the pinnacle of the temple.
The temple was the largest stone structure in the world at that
time. It's about 13 storeys tall,
which is about the same height as the tallest building in town.
So next time you little town have a look that's about the
temple, right? So the standing on there and
says, here's what you need to do, right?
Throw yourself off, right? So all these people down below,
right in the courtyard and whatever they be looking at,
they look this dude right on the top of the table.
What's going on there? And then it's like, wow, man,
he's, he's jumped off and you'll be falling down.
But God will be forced to intervene because Scripture
clearly says that he's not going to allow you to get busted up
here. And so God's going to have to,
to do this. So why don't you right, just
come up with this great plan, pull the trigger on it, and then
waiting for God to come and bail you out.
And because He has to, right? He's on a bound by Scripture to
do so. Now, you may not realise this,
but we do this all the time. We do this all the time.
It's the temptation to take a bunch of ideas and launch a plan
and then say, well, God, you're going to help me, are you?
After all, you know you're going to bless me, right?
Because you're a good God. It's the temptation to presume
and assume on God. It's kind of like a bunch of
teenagers, right? Getting in a car and one of them
saying, hey, saying to the driver, just drive as crazy as
you want. My dad is a lawyer.
He'll get us off. That's kind of what what what
this is like. It's like not studying for a
test, but then thinking God is forced to make you pass or just
being reckless with money and then think that God has forced
to to act on your behalf. Now, in the church world, we
often cover this up with some clever technology, our
technology terminology. We cover this up with some
clever terminology and it goes like this.
We're just going to step out in faith and trust God.
Now that's a real thing, right? Without faith, it's impossible
to please him. Anything you do in service to
God, you're gonna have to step out in faith in a, in a certain
way. But what we really mean when we
say that is we've come up with this idea that it's not very
well researched and it defies common sense.
In fact, it defies, just defies wisdom.
In fact, we haven't actually sought any wise counsel on this.
And the 1 old guy that we kind of casually mentioned it to
really raise some eyebrows. So we just didn't mention it
again. But we are going to pull the
trigger on this idea and we're going to step out in faith and
we're going to trust God. And God is going to have to bail
us out because they're verses that say things like, my God
shall supply all your need according to his riches and
glory. And God is faithful and God is
rich in mercy and God is a God of grace.
So we're just going to launch it and then we're going to wait for
God to bail us out. That is not faith, that is
presumption. And then when the miracle
doesn't happen, we blame God. Because here's the thing, right?
God is not your genie. God is not your genie.
He is God. He's not a genie in a lamp.
He is merciful and he's full of grace and all of those things,
but before he's all of those things, he is God.
You don't play him, you don't manipulate him, you don't force
his hand. That's not faith, right?
Faith is not coming up with an idea, pulling the trigger on
that idea, and waiting for God to bless it, right?
That is not faith. Faith is simply responding to
the promises of God. Not our bad ideas.
So that's exactly what this temptation was.
Now listen to what Jesus says. Now Jesus, because he knows his
people's history. He did like he did with the last
temptation, right? He reaches back into the history
of Israel and he remembers this story where they face the same
temptation, right? And so the story here is about
to come to this place in the area of reform and in in the
Sinai, and they run out of water and it's a very rocky desert,
right? It's pretty dangerous.
And there's, there's a lot of them and there's no water.
And so, but then they started to taunt God and they start to
taunt Moses as his representative and saying, is
God trustworthy or not yours representative?
You, you, you need to access Moses.
And so let's just jump into the middle of that story.
Exeter 17 Just really quickly, and then we'll go to Jeromy and
look at Moses reflecting on it later.
But here's what happened at the time.
Exodus 17 Two, therefore the people quarrelled with Moses,
and they said, give us water to drink.
And Moses said to them, Why do you quarrel with me?
Why do you test the Lord? But the people first did there
for water, and the people grumbled against Moses and said,
why did you bring us out of Egypt to kill us?
And our children, our livestock were first.
Now God was very merciful to them that day, and he and he
provided water for them. And I'll let you read that for
yourself, but drop down to 1st #7 it says, and he, Moses called
the name of the place Massa and Miraba, right?
Which means testing and arguing because of the quarrelling of
the people of Israel and because they tested the Lord by saying,
is the Lord among us or not? If God was here, he did what we
want. Yeah.
So Exodus is the story of what happened to the Jerome is the
speech where Moses is going over those events.
Listen to the way Moses recounts those events in from Exeter 17
in his speech. So Jerome chapter 6 verse 16, he
says you shall not put the Lord your God to the test as you
tested them at Mesa. Yeah, don't do that again.
Don't do the In other words, when you get to the promised
land and you begin to settle in in there, don't talk, taunt God
like you did back back there in the desert and say why I thought
you loved us. You have to act so Jesus is
standing there on the highest point of the temple, 13 storeys
up. Satan's going.
I got a good idea. You jump, God will save you.
It'll be great. Jesus reaches back to the story
in in in Luke chapter 4 verse 12.
Jesus answered him either said right, it's written, you shall
not put the Lord your God to the test.
He's quoting Moses here. Jesus reflects on this story and
he says, I know what it is you're asking me to do.
You're asking me to test God. I don't test them.
I don't assume. I don't presume.
I don't manipulate. I'm here to cooperate with my
Heavenly Father. I know what you're up to.
And no, I'm not gonna jump. I'm not gonna try and force his
hand. I'm just not gonna do it.
Now, it's very subtle, right? But if we were to, to condense
this down into one phrase, it would kind of be this.
As Christians, we have been called to cooperate with God,
not manipulate God. The men and women who are the
most disappointed with God are people who who believe in God,
but rather than cooperate with him, they spend all of their
sort of religious and Christian time trying to manipulate God.
That is, they had a plan for God's life and it seemed like
God was cooperating with that plan.
And then God takes a left turn and then they go, well, that's
not the plan. They just couldn't believe that
God would do something like that.
Or circumstances take a right turn and they go, well, I just
can't believe that God would allow something like that to
happen. And the whole Christian
experiences experience has been trying to get God to cooperate
with him. God will always.
God will never, you know, if I will, then he's got to do this.
You know, God of grace. I found this verse in the book
of Ezekiel. I'm not really totally sure what
it means, but I think it means that God has to do what I've
said about to do. So they've never really come to
the the place in their life where where, you know, arms wide
open my deal before your deal. I'm here to cooperate.
But instead, the whole angle has been let's take on Gold.
We're trying to manipulate him. And that when we do that and we
all do that, it just sets us up to face disappointment on the
flipside, right? If you've been around someone
who's just gone through some incredible tragedy and they just
never lose their confidence in God and they trace their their
trust in God. And when you around people like
that, you know, you just feel dwarfed, you know, by their
faith. Think, man, I don't know that I
you don't. And yeah, I don't know.
I'm just thinking one of those right now, right?
Gets you quite emotional when you think about it, when you see
that that kind of faith in God. Where they just can kind of go.
Look, if that's God's choice for me, I don't know what he's
working. I don't know what the plan is,
but I'm just gonna stick with him.
Yeah, that, that's an amazing thing.
And but these are not men and women who got there in a moment.
There were people who lived their lives with no intention of
trying to manipulate God. And so even in the middle of
devastating circumstances, they don't come away disappointed
with God. The other thing with people
trying to manipulate God when we when we do this is it's really
hard to get an answer to this question, right.
It's really hard to get an answer to the question, what's
your will for my life when you don't ask the question because
you want to say, here's my my will for my life.
Please get with the programme. Yeah.
And so you you don't get sort of the guidance from God that you
need, but also right, you're not really aware of the breeze on
the beach until you face into it.
What I mean by that is God speaks loudest to the soul that
is most surrendered to Him. So where are you on this one?
Right? Listen to your prayers.
Your prayers are a key thing here.
What's your response to critical or negative elements?
Listen to the thoughts that come to mind when you attempted to
sin. Are you tempted to make excuses
for your sin? All right, three questions for
this week we conclude. First one, is this where am I
tempted to meet a legitimate need in a way that's not
pleasing to God? Companionship, intimacy,
progress, financial goals, friendship, something to do,
whatever It is because that that particular area of your life is
where God would like to show up in an unmissable and even maybe
tangible way if you would let Him.
What's at stake is my confidence in God's willingness to show up
in my world. Second question, where am I
tempted to try and leverage and use God's power for my own ends?
Where do I presume on God? Don't put God to the test.
God's not your genie. I work for him, not the other
way around. But how much and what areas am I
trying to manipulate God? God, I'm going to do this.
You need to bless it, right? You need to do this.
And thirdly, where am I tempted to take a shortcut and do the
right thing but in the wrong way?
And so you know, my prayer is that we'll always be men and God
are men and women of God who wake up everyday ready to
cooperate and pray like Jesus taught us to pray.
You know thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven,
because to be a manipulator rather than a cooperator.
Just as just to set yourself up. For disappointment when God does
what God's gonna do. So what we want to do in the
middle of temptation is just pause, right?
Just pause and go, here's my temptation.
Do I trust God and just try and bring those two things together?
Alright, so that we're able to say, OK, I'm not gonna let this
steal my future. I'm not gonna let this steal my
family and I'm not gonna let this steal my faith, my
confidence in God, because the temptation is to act on my
behalf, right? And therefore say to God, I
don't trust that you will act on my behalf.
Are you willing to pause? Am I willing to pause?
Are we willing to pause? Let's pray.
Father, we thank you for this incredible narration of the
events that happened 2000 years ago with Jesus in the desert.
And we thank you for the things that we can learn.
Lord, please help us to to be able to pause and Tim and times
the temptation. Lord, thank you that you're a
for giving. God, we don't always get this
right and we thank you for your forgiveness, but we also don't
say that lightly. Lord, thank you for the
instruction in your word and the love and the grace that it was
given to us. Thank you in Jesus name.