No Testing

DEVOTION

THE GOSPEL OF LUKE

NO TESTING

Luke 4:9-12

9 The devil led him to Jerusalem and had him stand on the highest point of the temple. "If you are the Son of God," he said, "throw yourself down from here. 10 For it is written: "'He will command his angels concerning you to guard you carefully; 11 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.'"

12 Jesus answered, "It says: 'Do not put the Lord your God to the test.'" 

NIV

It matters not which order these particular temptations occurred because Matthew has them in a different order. The point is that the devil took the opportunity to tempt Jesus when he may have been at his weakest due to not eating for so long, as well as being alone, without any supporting friends to encourage him to stay the course. This in itself is a life lesson for us. We can be sure temptation will be at its strongest when we are alone in the solitude of our minds, separated physically, emotionally or spiritually from any supporting family or friends. But we should deal with this particular temptation and see what we can learn. The first thing we notice which is different from the others is the devil uses scripture to justify his tempting Jesus. Perhaps that is why Luke records this as the last temptation. We are not always tempted by an evil act, but rather by some perversion of the Word of God. We can be tempted to have pride in our knowledge of scripture. We can be tempted by hearing false teaching which would lead us away from the truth. This sort of temptation would tell us we should have it all, we should be healthy wealthy and wise because we are the children of God, and he will give us the desires of our heart, and anything we believe we can have, we can, we only need to claim it. That is true, but it can also be a temptation. What the devil told Jesus was true, it was the scripture, and it was in fact scriptural. All of scripture is true, but it can be used by the devil to tempt us just as he used it to tempt Jesus. As Jesus answered not to test the Lord, he was quoting what was recorded about the children of Israel when they were led out into the desert after their deliverance from Egypt. They were thirsty and questioned if God was with them or not. They wanted God to provide water through Moses. Jesus is telling the devil that if he were to jump, it would be trying to prove if God was with him or not. He knows God is with him so he need not prove it by some act. This has bearing on how we live. Do we test the lord with our lifestyle? Are we in fact jumping off the cliff trying to prove God is with us? That is to say, do we act first and then expect God to show up and make it all good? Who is leading who? We should not make any moves, any jumps, or any life choices before we hear from God. Jumping ahead of God and expecting him to keep up is testing whether he will or not, or in some sense, he is or not. We simply should not test his ability or his presence in our lives. Sometimes when we do not feel his presence we might be tempted to do something to prove he is with us. But as Daryl Scott said the constant presence of God is different from the conscience presence of God. It does not matter if we feel his presence, he is present and therefor there is no need to test him to see if he is there, and will do something for us. God is with us and there is no reason to test him.