Menu

10:30 WORSHIP ~ Join us for worship each Sunday morning at 10:30am

Jesus Tempted by Satan Pt. 2 Luke 4:1 - 13

February 3, 2019 Speaker: Jim Galli Series: The Gospel According to Luke

Topic: Sunday AM Passage: Luke 4:1–13, Isaiah 14, Ezekiel 28

Click here for a .pdf file that retains all of the original formatting. Easier to read.

      1 Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He became hungry. 3 And the devil said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” 4 And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE.’”

      5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6 And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. 7 “Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.” 8 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY.’”

      9 And he led Him to Jerusalem and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down from here;

10 for it is written,
            ‘HE WILL COMMAND HIS ANGELS CONCERNING YOU TO GUARD YOU,’

11 and,
            ‘ON their HANDS THEY WILL BEAR YOU UP,
            SO THAT YOU WILL NOT STRIKE YOUR FOOT AGAINST A STONE.’”

12 And Jesus answered and said to him, “It is said, ‘YOU SHALL NOT PUT THE LORD YOUR GOD TO THE TEST.’”

      13 When the devil had finished every temptation, he left Him until an opportune time.

You all know that I love key ideas and passages that unlock the meaning of the scriptures.  The big picture.  Answers to the big questions.  What does this all mean?  Why are we here?  Why is the world in such a mess?  Where does suffering come from?  Why is there injustice?

Big questions that the world is asking every day, and God gives His people light.  There are answers in this book.  And the world not only will not hear it, they get angry if you tell them!

This is one of those passages this morning.  This was a huge piece of the puzzle for me, and it's one of those central puzzle pieces that gives you a big section of picture to look at and work in all directions from.  This was a game changer for me.

Now Satan makes some pretty wild claims in this section.  So we want to understand what the Bible tells us about Satan and then we can evaluate what he claims in these verses, as to what is true.

We don't study Satan too often because, in the big scheme of things, he isn't half as important as he thinks he is.  So we don't want to glorify Satan by spending an inordinate amount of time thinking about him or studying him.

But he is a powerful creature and he is capable of wreaking havoc in God's creation, so we need to understand at a basic level who he is and what his traits are according to scripture, and what his limits are.

This will be a mini-theology of Satan this morning, and if we don't finish with the temptation of Jesus, we'll re-attack next week, but from a position of better understanding.

The first thing we need to know is that the claims Satan makes as he tempts Jesus are suspect.  And the reason for our suspicion is based in Jesus words, which are never suspect.  

In John chapter 8, Jesus is having a discussion with the rulers of Israel, and like it always does with them, it gets ugly.  Their focus is on His claim that His Father is God, and basically they say, no, you're a bastard child conceived out of wedlock.  

And Jesus in verse 44 tells them who their father is.  Listen, because this is our base point to understand Satan.  He says;

"You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.

Two things to understand in what Jesus says there about Satan, the Devil.  Diabolos, the destroyer.  He is a murderer.  God made Adam in His own image.  And for that reason, because of the dignity of the image of God dwelling in man since creation, God has said;

Gen. 9:5 - 6  “Surely I will require your lifeblood; from every beast I will require it. And from every man, from every man’s brother I will require the life of man.

      6“  Whoever sheds man’s blood,
            By man his blood shall be shed,
            For in the image of God
            He made man.

The reason God forbids murder is because man is created in God's image, and every murder is a strike against God.

Satan is a murderer, because he hates God and in defiance of God, Satan's purpose is to murder men, who bear the likeness and glory and dignity that God gave His creation.  Satan is a murderer, precisely for that reason.

And guess what was all over the front pages of every news source this week.  Murder.  Are we surprised?

Well, frankly, no.  If there's any truth to Satan's claim that this world has been handed over to him to rule in, are we surprised that there is murder in the headlines.

Shocked, yes.  Surprised, no.  Unborn human life bears all of the dignity of the likeness of God, and abortion is Satanic.  He is a murderer from the beginning, Jesus said.

The first human born, murdered the second human born.  And it was over religion that he did it.  God honored Able's sacrifice.  God rejected Cain's.  Cain murdered Able.  

We have murdered 60 million babies since Roe V Wade in this country.  God told Noah very plainly that He would require recompense for blood spilled by beasts and men.  Can you even begin to imagine the fury that will be turned loose on this nation, just over that single sin of murder.

I believe God is witholding His fierce wrath at this point, waiting for the Day of the Lord, the tribulation period to unleash His wrath.  Satan is a murderer.  And this week our culture of death walked deeper into the darkness of Satan than ever before.  

In 6 states a living baby, post birth, can be murdered.  If that doesn't shock and sicken you, you need to check your own pulse.  We are perilously close, or perhaps even past the german words, and I'll probably say them wrong, but Kat's not here;  Lebensunwertes Leben.  Life not worthy of life.

Slaughter the babies.  Slaughter the infirm.  Slaughter the ones who . . . are different from the ones in power to slaughter.  Our culture is knocking on that door, and the root cause is Satan, who is murderer number one and who reigns in this world.  Day by day, increasingly;  unchecked.

So there's that.  And the other thing Jesus told us in that single statement is that he is a liar, and not just any liar, he is the father of all liars.

In Genesis 3, in a sinless garden of God's perfection, the serpent shows up and the first words ever recorded that he said are what?  A lie.  Lies.  Deceiving lies.  First 3 words?  Hath God said . . . and then he tells Eve lies.

And he said to the woman, “Indeed, has God said, ‘You shall not eat from any tree of the garden’?” 2The woman said to the serpent, “From the fruit of the trees of the garden we may eat; 3but from the fruit of the tree which is in the middle of the garden, God has said, ‘You shall not eat from it or touch it, or you will die.’” 4The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! 5“For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Lies.  Satan tells lies.  Satan has two ways that he strikes out at God in his war against God.  He murders, which is a strike against the dignity of the image of God given man in creation, and he lies about God and causes men to join him in his rebellion against God.

All false religion falls into the lies category, and of course then murder crosses over into that.  If you dropped me into the middle of ISIS I probably wouldn't last an hour before they were dragging me around behind some Toyota pickup truck in the name of their god, small g, allah.

So that's Satan's plan of attack against the Almighty God who he hates.  Let's dive into our text then this morning and I'm sure we'll go on some more side-bar journeys as we seek to understand this passage.  In fact I know we will, so fasten your seat belts.

We'll pick the story up in vs. 5 this morning having covered the first temptation last Sunday.  If you missed that, It's been put up on our web pages.  You can read the manuscript from last week there.

      5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6 And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. 7 “Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.” 8 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY.’”

For some reason, Luke has flip flopped this temptation from the order that Matthew gives.  Matthew does the stones into bread, and then throw yourself off the temple because God said so, and then the kingdoms of the world.

In John's first letter, 1John 2:15 - 17 says this;  15  Do not love the world or anything in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 16  For all that is in the world— the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life— is not from the Father but from the world. 17  The world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God remains forever.…

The "world" here is the greek word Kosmos.  And it means the world systems.  The fallen world ruled by Satan.  All the systems of the world are under his rule.  And to love that corruption is to hate God.  So John says don't fall in love with Satan's corruption of this world.

And then he speaks of 3 areas where we are tempted;  the lust or desires of our fallen flesh.  Pleasures that our bodies want that God forbids.  2nd is the desires of our eyes.  Lots of cross-over.  But these desires are for things, and control of things that do not belong to us.  The sin of coveting what isn't yours.  And finally pride.  Pride is sin because it robs glory from God.

In Luke's account those three temptations are given to Jesus in that same order that John gives us in his letter.  Flesh, turn the stone into bread.  Eyes, all the kingdoms of the world.  And pride, throw yourself off the temple.  God will intervene because you're so important.

Perhaps Luke liked that order.  We don't know.  We can ask him someday when we get to heaven.  Meanwhile, it doesn't matter, except in Matthews order the value of what is offered seems to ascend.  The second in Luke's order is the most important in terms of God's purposes and plan for Jesus.

Vs.5 And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.

We don't know where this vantage point was and it doesn't really matter.  Matthew says it was an exceeding high mountain.  But what Satan is offering here is what we just talked about.  

The Kosmos.  The authority to reign over this entire world.  All of it's Kings, all of it's kingdoms, all of it's people, everything.  Everything that Satan now rules over in this fallen world.  All the kingdoms.  All the authorities to reign in all the world.

I think the little words, in a moment of time, are important.  I think Satan showed Jesus all of the authorities to reign, the Bible calls them kingdoms, but the word means the power of the authority to reign, dominion as opposed to real estate, and I think the reason he adds in a moment of time is because Satan showed Jesus all of the World rulers similar to what we see in Daniel chapter 2.

You remember the statue in Daniel chapter 2 with head of gold, the Babylonian one world rule, then the silver below the head which was the next one world rule, the medo-persians, and then the bronze mid section which was Alexander the Great and Greece, and finally the iron legs which is the Roman empire and that lasts all the way to our day where it is iron and clay, a poor mixture, brittle and fragile.

I think Satan showed Jesus all of that because he is behind all of that.

Satan says look with your eyes at all I have rule over.  6 And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish.

All this domain.  Satan is offering dominion.  Power.  Authority to reign.

Let's take one of our side trips.  Isaiah 14 shows us how this authority, this dominion that Satan claims to own, how it works.  This is a fascinating insight into the Kosmos, the worlds dominions.  Turn to Isaiah 14, or just listen as I read.

It's a taunt against the king of Babylon who was the world ruler at the time.  And the perspective of the taunt is one of ultimate victory that God has brought.  It's addressed to Israel.  

Keep in the front of your mind that Satan is the unseen force behind the king of Babylon because beginning in vs.12 the speaker looks past the earthly king and speaks to the devil who is the source, unseen.

Is. 14:3 And it will be in the day when the LORD gives you rest from your pain and turmoil and harsh service in which you have been enslaved,

4 that you will take up this taunt against the king of Babylon, and say,
            “How the oppressor has ceased,
            And how fury has ceased!

      5 “The LORD has broken the staff of the wicked,
            The scepter of rulers

      6 Which used to strike the peoples in fury with unceasing strokes,
            Which subdued the nations in anger with unrestrained persecution.

      7 “The whole earth is at rest and is quiet;
            They break forth into shouts of joy.

      8 “Even the cypress trees rejoice over you, and the cedars of Lebanon, saying,
            ‘Since you were laid low, no tree cutter comes up against us.’

      9 “Sheol from beneath is excited over you to meet you when you come;
            It arouses for you the spirits of the dead, all the leaders of the earth;
            It raises all the kings of the nations from their thrones.

      10 “They will all respond and say to you,
            ‘Even you have been made weak as we,
            You have become like us.

      11 ‘Your pomp and the music of your harps
            Have been brought down to Sheol;
            Maggots are spread out as your bed beneath you
            And worms are your covering.’

All the kings of the nations with all of their dominion end up in one place together.  Hell.  Sheol.  And the picture here is that this king of Babylon, as powerful as he was, he'll end up in the same place as all the other kings of the earth.

In the end, all the kings of the earth and all of their power and persecution and punishment of the nations will all be in hell together and the ones who are already there are saying here comes the king of babylon.  No better, no stronger in hell than we are.  Get ready for the maggots O king of babylon.

But then the diatribe changes gears from the king of babylon and looks beyond the human dupe, to Satan who has actually been behind the scenes, driving him.  The king of babylon will be in sheol with all the other important kings, but let's look at the power behind the kings of the earth.

This next part describes Satan in his role as the one who has usurped dominion and authority to reign on earth.

 Vs  12 “How you have fallen from heaven,
            O star of the morning, son of the dawn!
            You have been cut down to the earth,
            You who have weakened the nations!

      13 “But you said in your heart,
            ‘I will ascend to heaven;
            I will raise my throne above the stars of God,
            And I will sit on the mount of assembly
            In the recesses of the north.

      14 ‘I will ascend above the heights of the clouds;
            I will make myself like the Most High.’

This is what Satan wants.  To be worshipped.  To be God.  His boast is that he will be like the Most High.

      15 “Nevertheless you will be thrust down to Sheol,
            To the recesses of the pit.

      16 “Those who see you will gaze at you,
            They will ponder over you, saying,
            ‘Is this the man who made the earth tremble,
            Who shook kingdoms,

      17 Who made the world like a wilderness
            And overthrew its cities,
            Who did not allow his prisoners to go home?’

I said early on that Satan wasn't really very important.  This is where I base my claim.  As much as he has wreaked havoc on this world, some day we'll look down in the pit where satan is locked up and we'll say;  Him?  Really?  This is the person who made the world tremble?

As if to say, this pipsqueak?  He's not very impressive.  Him?
This is the same Satan that's offering Jesus what?  All the dominions in the world?  Really?  So Jesus can end up in the pit with all the other big rulers who are laying on a bed of maggots and are being eaten by worms.

In Ezekiel 28 there's another king who's going to be cut down to real size.  This time it's the king of Tyre.  And again, Satan is the one holding the puppet strings.  Listen to some of the taunt, by God, against this king who is really just a dupe, a puppet for Satan.

 2 “Son of man, say to the leader of Tyre, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD,
            “Because your heart is lifted up
            And you have said, ‘I am a god,
            I sit in the seat of gods
            In the heart of the seas’;
            Yet you are a man and not God,
            Although you make your heart like the heart of God—

And in the next verses, God gets sarcastic.  Nice to know God has a sense of humor and uses sarcasm to make this mere man look rediculous.  It's also interesting in the next verse that Daniel is the benchmark for wisdom, more so than even Solomon.

      3 Behold, you are wiser than Daniel;
            There is no secret that is a match for you.

      4 “By your wisdom and understanding
            You have acquired riches for yourself
            And have acquired gold and silver for your treasuries.

      5 “By your great wisdom, by your trade
            You have increased your riches
            And your heart is lifted up because of your riches—

6 Therefore thus says the Lord GOD,
            ‘Because you have made your heart
            Like the heart of God, (remember satan's signature sin from the last passage.  I will be like the most high . . . )

      7 Therefore, behold, I will bring strangers upon you,
            The most ruthless of the nations.
            And they will draw their swords
            Against the beauty of your wisdom
            And defile your splendor.

      8‘ They will bring you down to the pit,
            And you will die the death of those who are slain
            In the heart of the seas.

      9 ‘Will you still say, “I am a god,”
            In the presence of your slayer,
            Though you are a man and not God,
            In the hands of those who wound you?

      10 ‘You will die the death of the uncircumcised
            By the hand of strangers,
            For I have spoken!’ declares the Lord GOD!”’”

BTW, those words describing the fall of the  king of Tyre were written about 240 years before they actually happened.  Not a problem for our God who knows the end from the beginning.

Another big shot king who claims to be a god.  Like god.  And God puts him in his place.  But then the next part is fascinating, because God who can see past the boasting human king will address the person who again, is holding the puppet strings of this king.  God speaks past the king to Satan who is the master of this dupe of a human king who is an empty boaster.

 11 Again the word of the LORD came to me saying,

12 “Son of man, take up a lamentation over the king of Tyre and say to him, ‘Thus says the Lord GOD,
            “You had the seal of perfection,
            Full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.

      13 “You were in Eden, the garden of God;
            Every precious stone was your covering:
            The ruby, the topaz and the diamond;
            The beryl, the onyx and the jasper;
            The lapis lazuli, the turquoise and the emerald;
            And the gold, the workmanship of your settings and sockets,
            Was in you.
            On the day that you were created
            They were prepared.

      14 “You were the anointed cherub who covers,
            And I placed you there.
            You were on the holy mountain of God;
            You walked in the midst of the stones of fire.

      15 “You were blameless in your ways
            From the day you were created
            Until unrighteousness was found in you.

      16 “By the abundance of your trade
            You were internally filled with violence,
            And you sinned;
            Therefore I have cast you as profane
            From the mountain of God.
            And I have destroyed you, O covering cherub,
            From the midst of the stones of fire.

      17 “Your heart was lifted up because of your beauty;
            You corrupted your wisdom by reason of your splendor.
            I cast you to the ground;
            I put you before kings,
            That they may see you.

      18 “By the multitude of your iniquities,
            In the unrighteousness of your trade
            You profaned your sanctuaries.
            Therefore I have brought fire from the midst of you;
            It has consumed you,
            And I have turned you to ashes on the earth
            In the eyes of all who see you.

      19 “All who know you among the peoples
            Are appalled at you;
            You have become terrified
            And you will cease to be forever.”’”

God was kind enough and gracious enough to give us these two views of how Satan is behind all of the kings of this earth, this Kosmos, all the world systems are the dominion of kings and presidents and prime ministers, and ultimately, Satan is the one in the background, like the wizard in the control booth in the Wizard of Oz, he's controlling all the dominions of this world.

That's what he offers to Jesus.  Did Satan read Daniel chapter 2?  I'm sure he did.  He's got nothing to offer Jesus but a bed of magots in hell, and they both know it.  The end of Daniel ch. 2, written 450 years earlier says;

 44 “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed, and that kingdom will not be left for another people; it will crush and put an end to all these kingdoms, but it will itself endure forever. 45 “Inasmuch as you saw that a stone was cut out of the mountain without hands and that it crushed the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver and the gold, the great God has made known to the king what will take place in the future; so the dream is true and its interpretation is trustworthy.”

Jesus may be in His humility in His human incarnation, but Satan's got nothing to offer but a kingdom which will be crushed by the Stone cut out without hands, which is this same Jesus.

The authority to reign of Jesus, the dominion of Jesus Christ when He returns to this world triumphant is that kingdom which will endure forever.  Satan is deposed from being king on this earth and Jesus will reign forever.

Vs. 7 “Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.”

Daniel chapter 2 that we just read states clearly that it's all His already.  Satan's offering Him an inferior version of what's already His.

And all He has to do to get a spoiled world and then a bed of maggots in hell is worship Satan.  What a deal.

8 Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY.’”

Again, Jesus uses the Word of God, already written to do combat with Satan.  Next week if God preserves us and it pleases Him we'll look at the final temptation of the three.  I never dreamed we would spend 3 weeks in this section, but the Holy Spirit has lead us in this.