Subject: Loyal to who?? |
Bible Note: The Son was loyal to the Fathers promise to save mankind and therefore He was obedient unto death for our sake. It was a matter of not yielding to a temptaion that was authentic, as a man He felt the temptation, but his impeccable character caused his not to yield. He showed Himself to be Loyal to His friends, to the point that He laid down His very life for our sins. Jesus was indeed God in the flesh, and that is the key. He was on earth as a man and He gave up His high place to the lower position for us. It was Jesus the man who was tempted. Temptation as well as sin is related to flesh, but Jesus was born of the Spirit of God. So He was obedient to the Father, for our sake and even though He was truly tempted He did not sin. But maybe these may help expound more: ***The secret of a godly life lies in Jesus Who lived on earth as a Man, and Who was tempted in every way as we are, but never sinned even once in thought, word, deed, attitude or motive or in any other way (1 Tim.3:16; Heb.4:15). (1 Tim. 3:15,16). Temptation is not the same as sin. Jas.1:14,15 makes that clear. Our mind has to agree with the temptation before we sin. It is clear from Matthew 4 that Jesus was tempted. But His mind never agreed with any temptation even once. Thus He never sinned. He kept His heart pure. Jesus was born of the Holy Spirit. He did not have the 'old man' that we were born with. We have sinful flesh, whereas Jesus did not have sinful flesh. He came only "in the likeness of sinful flesh" (Rom.8:3). But the Bible teaches that our Lord "was tempted in all points as we are" (Heb.4:15). We do not have to analyze this, even as we do not analyze the mystery of God becoming Man. We only have to believe it. At every point, in every temptation, Jesus obeyed His Father, unlike Adam. God's Word says about Jesus, "He learned obedience and was made complete" (Heb. 5:7-9). The word "learned" is a word that relates to education. So what this verse is saying is that Jesus received an education in obedience as a Man. In each situation, He obeyed His Father and thus completed His education as a Man. Thus He became a Forerunner for us, so that we too can follow in His footsteps, overcoming temptation and obeying God (Heb.6:20). Our Lord can sympathize with us in our struggles against temptation, because He too was tempted like us (Heb. 2:18; 4:15; 12:2-4). The purity of Jesus as a Man was not something that He received on a platter, but one that was acquired through battle. But those battles were not endless ones. Every temptation was conquered - one after another. Thus, over the period of His lifetime, He faced every single temptation that we are tempted by - and overcame*** ***Was Jesus Tempted? Some assert that Jesus could not be tempted by citing the following passage: Let no one say when he is tempted, "I am being tempted by God"; for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does He Himself tempt anyone (James 1:13). Two claims are given to support the above conclusion: 1. Jesus was God in the flesh. 2. Since God cannot be tempted, Jesus was immune to temptation. The true claim The first claim agrees with scripture. Jesus was indeed God in the flesh. See John 1:1-5, 14 and Colossians 2:15-18 for this evidence. The false claim The second assertion does not agree with scripture. Twice the writer of Hebrews indicated that Jesus was tempted. For in that He Himself has suffered, being tempted, He is able to aid those who are tempted (Hebrews 2:18). For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin (Hebrews 4:15). Conclusion Jesus was tempted by Satan, and was in fact tempted in all the ways that we are tempted today. Yet He did not sin. One reason Jesus is our perfect high priest is because he can sympathize with us. He knows how it felt to be tempted.*** ***it behooves us to accept the account of the temptation without being presumptuously inquisitive. Of course, it has supernatural features, but the supernatural confronts us all through the life of Jesus, so there is nothing strange about it here. Jesus had taken upon him our flesh, and hence he could be tempted, with a possibility of falling. But his divinity insured his victory over temptation. He became like us in ability to fall, that he might make us like unto himself in power to resist. It behooved him to be tempted, and thus sharing our nature with its weakness and temptation he might bring us to share his nature with its strength and sinlessness. Sinlessness does not preclude temptation, else Adam could not have been tempted, nor could Satan himself have fallen. Moreover, temptation is in so sense sin. It is the yielding of the will to temptation which constitutes sin. *** |