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Triumphing Over Temptation (Luke 4:1-13)
10 Plays10 days ago
Sunday Message recorded 29 September 2024
by Senior Pastor Victor Morrison
First Baptist Church - Columbus, TX, USA
1700 Milam St.
Columbus, TX, USA 78934
Transcript
00:00:06
Speaker
Would you open God's word to Luke chapter 4? We'll look today at Luke chapter 4 verses 1 through 13. Luke chapter 4 verses 1 through 13. We're going to talk about triumphing over temptation. Triumphing over temptation. This is a passage where even Jesus was tempted, but he did not yield to the temptations that Satan threw his way.
00:00:34
Speaker
You know, one thing about Satan is he always tries to make us believe that God's giving us a raw deal. But God's not giving us a raw deal. God's giving us the best deal possible in life. We saw many of our Japanese friends when I was a missionary in Japan, how they turned a spiritual corner.
00:00:55
Speaker
ah during two specific Bible studies. We would take them at the beginning in Genesis because we noticed there were holes in their worldviews. And so we thought, well, let's start from the beginning. Just go line upon line, precept upon precept.
00:01:09
Speaker
And those two Bible studies were the fall of man and the fall of Satan. They did not have a file. They didn't have anything to process the evil that they saw in our world. So our mission team discovered, like I said, that there were holes in the belief system. And so what it led to was they were afraid of evil spirits. Are you afraid of evil spirits? They were.
00:01:36
Speaker
They also began to feel despair over human failure. You know, the Japanese people cannot take it whenever the failure is their fault. And so many times, that's why they'll commit suicide. But you know, a little later, not in Luke 4, but over in Luke 10, verse 18, Jesus says something interesting. He said, I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven. What was he talking about?
00:02:03
Speaker
Why did Satan fall from heaven and what was he doing in heaven anyway? Maybe so, you may be wondering that. Where did he land after he fell from heaven?
00:02:16
Speaker
Isaiah and Ezekiel were inspired by the Holy Spirit to give brief glimpses of his fall. We won't have time to go into those passages because I want us to focus on Luke 4, but I just wanted you to know that Isaiah 14 verses 12 through 15 informs that Satan fell to the ground because he wanted to be on God's throne. He wanted control. He was a very strong angel. And so he was a cherub. Ezekiel 28 verses 12 through 18 describes Satan's life before his fault. You may not believe it now, but at one time he was perfect. He was wise. He was beautiful. He was anointed. He was a guardian cherub, but something happened.
00:03:03
Speaker
Pride, corruption, all of those kind of things, violence. And so God cast him to the ground, exposing his sin and banished him to earth. You know, Satan and God are both at work now on this planet. Sometimes I think people blame God for what Satan does.
00:03:26
Speaker
And we're thinking, wait a minute, mankind is living in what we can sometimes feel like, well, an escape room. Have you ever gone to an escape room with your family? It's kind of an interesting set of circumstances. You're looking for clues.
00:03:42
Speaker
you're You're wondering, who should I believe? What should I believe? You know, a escape room is designed to be fun, but it can become stressful, especially as the one hour timeframe begins to slip away and the door is still locked. And you're thinking, wait a minute.
00:03:59
Speaker
The small group that you are with must quickly look for 10 to 30 hidden clues. You put together like a ah puzzle sort of sort of thing. and So imagine how clear, though, how opposite of this it was for Adam and Eve.
00:04:17
Speaker
God gave them one command. He said, you've got one job. you know It's like there's one thing that he told them to stay away from. Stay away from this one tree, because if you partake of that one tree, you're going to die. You will not continue to live. So then along comes Satan. Now he's been banished from heaven. He's on this earth. He's disguised as a serpent. He tempts. He deceives.
00:04:44
Speaker
He makes them doubt what God has said. He denies God's warning. Will you really die? Surely not. You know, escape rooms have a helpful person. There's a person who is on your side once you go into the escape room.
00:05:01
Speaker
He's called the game master. The game master can intervene and give hints whenever you're feeling stuck, whenever the group that's in there saying, ah we don't know what else to do, we tried everything. When you feel overwhelmed, it's nice to go to the game master. Wouldn't it be nice if there was a game master that we could go to in this life? You know, the gospel brings all of us trapped in the escape room of temptation some really good news. God in his faithfulness has provided the way of escape through Christ. I'm going to tell you something that Satan doesn't want you to hear today. You can be free. You can be free if you'll just turn to Christ.
00:05:50
Speaker
You know, the truths that are revealed in Romans 5 point the way to forgiveness of all your past sins. They point the way to power over present temptations that are there knocking at the door, but also it points to truths about future in heaven where there's no longer going to be any sin. The presence of sin itself is going to be taken out of the way.
00:06:15
Speaker
I want you to listen to the words of 1 Corinthians 10.13 before we read Luke 4. No temptation has overtaken you. That is not common to man. God is faithful and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation, he will also provide the way of escape that you may be able to endure it.
00:06:43
Speaker
I pray that those things would sink into your heart, those truths, that that promise as we look at the truths that are mentioned in Luke four, all pointing us in the direction of one person, Jesus, all looking at Jesus. I believe that Luke four one through 13 records an encounter that Jesus had with the devil in the wilderness and he overcame three subtle temptations.
00:07:09
Speaker
And I believe he's gonna show us the way to have triumph over temptation in our lives. Would you stand in honor of God's word one more time? We'll pray and then you'll you'll be seated for the rest of the time. But it says, and Jesus, 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. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry.
00:07:38
Speaker
The devil said to him, if you are the son of God, command this stone to become bread. And Jesus answered him, it is written, man shall not live by bread alone.
00:07:52
Speaker
And the devil took him up, showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, and said to him, to you, I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. If you then will worship me, it will be all yours. And Jesus answered him,
00:08:18
Speaker
it is written, you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve. And he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, if you are the son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, he will command his angels concerning you to guard you and on their hands they'll bear you up lest you strike your foot against a stone And Jesus answered him, it is said, you shall not put the Lord your God to the test. And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time. Let's go to the father in prayer. Oh Lord, open our eyes that we could see the victory that is waiting for us in Christ. We know that Satan does have power, but he doesn't have all power.
00:09:15
Speaker
all power, all authority. It's already been entrusted to the Lord Jesus Christ. Jesus, you are the Son of God, your character, your complete obedience to the Father, your complete alignment with what the Father wants to to happen.
00:09:32
Speaker
All of that is why you are worthy. You're worthy to receive all the praise and the honor and the glory. You're worthy of our lives. You're worthy of our obedience. You're worthy of all that authority and all that power. And so please, Lord, help us get a glimpse of all that's available to us in Christ. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. Thank you, you may be seated.
00:09:58
Speaker
I believe that Jesus gives us four important clues for escaping temptation if we will just keep our eyes on Him. So let's look at those four clues together. The first clue is power for overcoming temptation. And if I had power for our AC, I'd put it on right now. But apart from Christ, I don't have power. But before the first sin, right? I mean, this makes sense, right? It doesn't take a rocket scientist. Before the first sin, there had to be the first temptation. And so there's so much that we can learn by going back in time. But what can we do to prevent falling to temptation?
00:10:41
Speaker
It's not something you're going to do only during the temptation. It's something you're going to do every morning before you walk out the door, every day before you leave the house. You are to say, Lord, there's two that I want to fill up on before I leave. You see, I believe there's two reasons why the power of the Father was flowing through. The power of the Holy Spirit was flowing through Jesus' life.
00:11:06
Speaker
I think first that we can see the surrender. Jesus was surrendered to the Father's life, but we should surrender to the Savior. You know, the Bible says we can't do anything apart from Him, but through Christ who strengthens us.
00:11:22
Speaker
We can do all of things that's found in Philippians 4.13. But if you were to go back to Romans 5 again, verses 15 to 21, you would be reminded how the first Adam, Adam and Eve, that Adam, how he felt. he He felt a temptation. What was missing in his life that Jesus had in his life? It's that surrender. Are you surrender to the Lord before you start every single day? You know, I believe that's the way that we should live. We should say, Lord, I give you this day. And that's why this day before I came today, I didn't know that we was going to face all the power outages and stuff. But I was saying to God, Lord, I would need your power. I don't have power. So here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to present my eyes to you. I'm going to present my ears to you.
00:12:09
Speaker
I'm going to present my tongue to you, my mouth. I'm going to present my hands, my feet, my mind. Everything belongs to you today. Have you done that to the Lord? Have you said, today I surrender to you? Not just the day of salvation. Of course we do it the day of salvation.
00:12:26
Speaker
But also, I believe every single day we should say, Jesus, I want you to be Lord over my life, Lord over my day, so that whatever comes my way, I'm going to have power to overcome temptation.
00:12:40
Speaker
I believe there's a second thing we see in verse one. It says, in Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness. Wow. I believe he was full of the Spirit and because he was full of the Holy Spirit, he was absolutely led by the Holy Spirit. He'd already said, Lord, I want to give you my whole life.
00:13:03
Speaker
All I have, Father, is yours. And so because of that, the Holy Spirit was able to just totally permeate his whole entire life, his whole entire days.
00:13:14
Speaker
You know, I think it's interesting how in Galatians 5, 16, and 26, it says all these different verbs, and they're all about the Holy Spirit. For example, in Galatians 5, 16, it says that we should walk by the Spirit. Do you walk by the Spirit every day? But we also, it says in Galatians 5, 18, like it says here, we should be led by the Spirit. Are you led by the flesh? Are you led by the world, or are you led by the Spirit of God. Verse 25 of Galatians 5 says that we should live by the Spirit. I believe that the Lord wants to be our life. The Lord wants to be our life. And so we should say, God, I surrender my life. I yield my life to you so that today people would see you and not me as I go through my day. But then verse 25 goes on to say, keep in step with the Spirit.
00:14:08
Speaker
You know, it's possible that you may be keeping in step with the Spirit in the morning, but maybe something happens over your lunch hour. Somehow you're tempted, you're tried, you face a test, and maybe you fail the test. And so you're going to walk out of step with the Father, but you need to get back in step, keep in step with the Holy Spirit is what it says. And you know what's really a neat truth that's included in those verses right there in Galatians 5? 16 through 26. He says if you will let the Holy Spirit fill your life, lead your life, if you'll walk with Him, if you'll live by Him, then you will not, this is what it says in the Bible, you will not gratify the flesh, the desires of the flesh. You will not
00:14:56
Speaker
And so that it's a lie from the enemy to say that something is in your life that you cannot beat because Christ in you, the spirit in you can overcome. That's where the power is. So we have to learn how to access God's power every single day. So the first thing we need, we need that power to overcome the temptations. But there's a second thing that I think we need to be aware of.
00:15:23
Speaker
We need to be aware of three common places in life where temptation is likely to occur. Where are you going to encounter temptation? What will be happening in your life? What was happening in Jesus' life? Well, if you were to go back just a little bit into chapter three, remember when I was talking about Jesus' baptism?
00:15:44
Speaker
In Luke chapter 3 verses 21 and 22, remember how the heavens opened? That was great, wasn't it? The Holy Spirit descends. That was also awesome. And then the Father speaks and says, this is my beloved son. I mean, all of those things were like incredible places of affirmation for Jesus.
00:16:06
Speaker
But what happens after the affirmation? Well, we're right here already in Luke 4.1. Temptation comes. You may be on a mountaintop. You may have been to a conference. You may have heard an incredible podcast. You may have had an incredible Bible study in your own quiet time. And you're just thinking, Yes, man, I can walk on the clouds. I'm so excited for what I have in Christ. And yet, if you don't watch it right after a place of affirmation, you could be so susceptible to the enemy's you know temptations and so forth.
00:16:44
Speaker
As a matter of fact, I was looking at Matthew 16, verses 13 to 24. Do you remember when Jesus said, who do people say that I am? And they're telling him, well, some think you're Elijah and some think this and all that. And then he said, but I want to know who you guys say I am. Remember what Peter did?
00:17:03
Speaker
Peter stood up among the disciples and he said, you are the Christ, the son of the living God. And Jesus looked at him and he said, you know what? That's awesome. You said that because man and flesh could not have given you that. That was the spirit. So I mean, don't you know that old Peter was going around to others like you saying, Hey man, I got it going on. But listen, that's when Jesus says I'm fixing to go and I'm going to suffer I'm going to die but three days later I'm going to be raised and you know what old Pete said he said hey Jesus come on over here let's have a little talk he said there's no way that the father is gonna let you go through all that you know and Jesus looks right at him and says I rebuke you Satan he said you set your mind on the things of man none of the things of God and right after a time of affirmation. So all I'm saying is, once you're blessed, once you go home from church today, maybe it'll be tomorrow. We don't know when it'll be. Maybe you'd say, I've already had my test today. Thank you, it's hot enough in this room. But let me tell you, after you're affirmed, just be careful because that could be a place that also I see in verse one, a second place you may be tempted, a place of isolation, a place of isolation that says in Jesus,
00:18:21
Speaker
full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit, where? In the wilderness. In the wilderness. This stretch of wilderness was 35 miles by 15 miles. Can you imagine? There's probably nobody around there. And so there he was all by himself, and Satan comes. Do you think that Satan's gonna attack you in here? He might.
00:18:47
Speaker
But most likely he's going to wait till he gets you by yourself. And then he's going to come at you with whatever it is he can get on you. Do you remember when David got tempted? He was by himself. He was having self-time on the top of his roof. Nothing wrong with that until he notices that the neighbor's taking a bath over there on top of the roof. And then he has not only an I problem with the pronoun I, he's got an I problem, E-Y-E. That's his problem.
00:19:13
Speaker
And so it came to him when he was by himself. You need to be careful when you're in times of isolation, when there's no brother, there's no sister, there's no husband, there's no wife, there's no kids, there's no one around. It's just you and God.
00:19:29
Speaker
Be careful, that's when the the enemy may attack at that weak spot. But there is a third one, and that's a place of deprivation. A place of deprivation, yes, just after a place of affirmation, yes, just in a place of isolation, but what about the place of deprivation?
00:19:47
Speaker
Look at verse two. What was happening in Jesus' life when the enemy comes to him? For 40 days being tempted by the devil, and he ate nothing during those days. And when they were ended, he was hungry. So deprivation, he was starved. He wasn't giving his body what he normally would give his body because he was focusing on praying. He was fasting and praying. But all I'm saying is that was an opportunity for Satan to come. And did he ever come?
00:20:18
Speaker
He says, why don't you turn the stones into bread right here? I mean, imagine something like that. I mean, the first the first thing that someone said whenever we were saying that the AC was out in the Family Life Center, they said, oh, no, the donuts. So I mean, people have different way of processing tragedy and trial and so forth. But notice that Jesus is fasting.
00:20:40
Speaker
You know, there's a really good book by Charles Stanley that was written years ago called Handle with Prayer. And he says in there, what's the purpose of fasting? Why should you fast? Why should I fast? Well, he says fasting can expose sin. Fasting controls appetites. Fasting clears the mind. Fasting purifies our worship. Fasting disciplines your spirit.
00:21:04
Speaker
Fasting clarifies God's will. Fasting aids in repentance. Fasting protects a nation. Fasting can accomplish God's work. Fasting ushers in spiritual awakening. There are many different reasons, but Jesus thought this is the time for me to fast and to pray, to to put food on the back burner and put the Father on the front burner.
00:21:27
Speaker
Well, let's move to the third clue, because if we're going to get out of the escape room of temptation, then we're going to need to know the way out. So I think thirdly, we can see the clue from verse 3 all the way down through verse 12. There are patterns. There are patterns when fighting temptation.
00:21:47
Speaker
You know, James 4.7 says submit to God, resist the devil, and he will flee from you. And that's exactly what happened in Jesus' case in verse 13. The devil did flee. But notice in Ephesians 6.10, it says that we should be strong in the Lord. We've already talked about that, how to get his strength. Strong in the Lord, stand against, he says, the schemes, plural, the schemes of the devil.
00:22:15
Speaker
Do you know that the word schemes there is the Greek word methodia? Does that sound like anything to you, methodia? This is methods. See, if Satan can't get you with one method, one approach, he'll try another one. He tried three different approaches with Jesus. So let's look at these because he might try these on you. Let's look at the patterns. Let me mention them briefly. First, he may attack you related to your identity.
00:22:43
Speaker
who you are. He said, if you are the son of God, he may cause you to doubt. He may cause you to question, am I really accomplishing all I want to have accomplished in my life at the age I am? Is that what you would be thinking? you know He may attack you in your identity. He may attack you with provision. you know He says, you know see those stones down there? Command those stones to become bread. He knows Jesus can do that. Yet Jesus is thinking about that and he says, wait a minute.
00:23:13
Speaker
What you're asking me to do is to use my power apart from the Father's provision. And so he says, wait a minute, you're causing me to question my identity, and so you want me to prove who I am by making this great thing come to battle. Be very careful whenever you have those kind of temptations that come into your life. But the main thing I want you to see with every single pattern is, what did Jesus do to overcome it?
00:23:41
Speaker
See, the devil lies. So if he's gonna lie, you need to respond every time with truth. Truth from the word of God. Always share truth from scripture with the devil and he'll drop it right then. Because Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 8.3. And basically what he's saying is, when he's saying it's written, man shall not live by bread alone, he's basically saying, you know what, my life.
00:24:07
Speaker
My life and man's life should not be directed and controlled by the appetites of the body. It ought to be controlled by the directives of the Father, by the leadership and commands of the Father. So the first line of attack could be against your identity. It may be so something about provisions. You're questioning whether God's going to really provide for you or not. Let's go to the second one. Could be attack you in the area of ambition. Don't you know that the the the enemy knew He's the Son of God. I don't deserve people's worship and glory, but He's the Son of God. He certainly deserves the whole wide world to follow Him, to glorify Him, to sing His praises. And so Satan wants to stop that. Satan doesn't want you to sing God's praises any time in your life.
00:24:56
Speaker
So he comes at Jesus and says, I know what the ambition is here, that the whole world would follow you. The whole world would praise you. And so that's where the that's where it was. So the enemy was offering Jesus position without the pain. You don't have to go to cross. Position without the pain. Success minus struggle. The crown without the cross.
00:25:20
Speaker
There's only one little catch in what Satan said to him and what he may say to you. That one little catch is huge if you'll just worship me. That's what he said. If you'll just fall down and worship me, I'd give it all to you. You don't even have to go to the cross. Jesus knew right away he wasn't right.
00:25:40
Speaker
It would have separated the eternal bond that the Son and the Father had had for all eternity past. Think of all that they had gone through. Yes, there would have been maybe instant gratification of self, but also, you know what would have happened? At that moment had Jesus given in, it would have been instant nullification of the cross. So we're not going, we're not gonna be able to enter into God's family. We would not be going to heaven if he would have done that.
00:26:10
Speaker
You know, he was offering him global reign. I can give you every nation. All of them will follow you. But at the same time, he was saying, but the one cost is global redemption. Nobody's going to be honored but you.
00:26:27
Speaker
That's how the enemy always. He's so focused on attacking us about self. Self and our ambition, our position. Or how about this one? Patience. Isn't it about patience? Underneath the surface, I think that's what was all going on there.
00:26:45
Speaker
I don't know how it happened to be honest, but I got choked up then in my office and I'm getting choked up again now thinking about it. But I wonder if Jesus looked at the faithfulness of the Father. He looked at the helplessness of humanity. He looked over at Satan and quoted Deuteronomy 6.4. And he said, you know what? It's written that you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.
00:27:12
Speaker
You know, he could not betray that that bond that he had with the Father for all eternity past. It makes me once again think of my Japanese friends whenever I would hear them all their lives. They'd been taught Buddhism. They'd been taught Shintoism. They would have been taught to worship a tree and worship a rock and all these different things. But we saw some of them turn from that.
00:27:37
Speaker
And we heard them when they would sing the song, it's outdated now, but it was an old song says, I will give you all my worship. I'll give you all my worship. Are you giving God all your worship? Or would you say, well really my career, well really money, well really the group you know that I wanna be accepted in, wow. you know We've been looking at patterns of temptations, attacks related to appetite,
00:28:07
Speaker
Attacks related to ambition, attacks related to attraction. Remember when he was up on the pinnacle of the temple? It's like, throw yourself down. Man, that would have got a big crowd. That would have probably been in the Jerusalem times. Wow. Jesus throws himself off the pinnacle of the temple. It's 450 feet up there.
00:28:25
Speaker
But he wasn't he was focused on doing the Father's will, not his own personal will. He didn't want to attract attention. Do you want attention? Is that what you want? Or do you want your attention to go to Christ? I think that's where we ought to say, don't look at me. Look at Jesus. He's the one that's worthy. Well, I want to close with one more thing here, and that's the persistence, the persistence after resisting resisting a temptation.
00:28:52
Speaker
You know, it does say that the devil left him, didn't it? When the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him. That's the end of it, right? No, that's not the end of it. Until, until an opportune time, until an opportune time.
00:29:09
Speaker
You know, I got to thinking, what's the longest war in human history? And so I got to do a little bit of research, and I found one is the Spanish War, the Reconquista, it's the Reconquest, but it lasted 781 years. That's a long war, isn't it? 781 years, from 711 to 1492. But then I think, well, wait a minute, I know one that's lasted longer than that, the Arab-Israeli War.
00:29:36
Speaker
I mean, this is not just between Hamas and Israel. No, the Arab-Israeli conflict has been going on for 2,500 years. But then I thought, wait a minute, I know a war that lasted longer than that. Satan against God. Satan against God. And I think, wow, that's that's been going on 6,000 years or better. Why should you be vigilant The reason is because your enemy's coming back. Maybe you won the battle today. Maybe you'd say, I didn't complain once the AC was out. That's great. You won that battle. But just because you won that battle doesn't mean you win every battle. So we also need persistence. Yes, we resisted that temptation, but I guarantee you're going to need a prolonged
00:30:24
Speaker
resistance because temptation will come knocking again. So when I was looking at that last verse 13, I thought there's two things that I just need to tell the congregation. Two things I want the flock to know. You're the flock of God. You're his family. You're his people. And I'm just an under shepherd. I'm called here to equip you, to protect you, to let you know what God wants you to know from scripture. And so when I looked at this, I thought we need to be vigilant for two reasons.
00:30:53
Speaker
The first reason is because our enemy is toxic. He is toxic. You ever known anybody that's toxic in your life? It's like they can't, it's just in their nature to be toxic. You know that when it says that he his name is the devil, you know what the devil means, that name? The devil means the slanderer. It means the slanderer. It means the liar. See, Satan's not gonna tell you the truth. He's gonna tell you a lie.
00:31:23
Speaker
You know, 1 Peter 5, 8 says that Satan is like, he kind of uses a metaphor, he's like a lion, a roaring lion. And what he's seeking is somebody that he can devour. See, Satan doesn't love you. God loves you. Satan hates you. Satan hates me. And he wants to devour you. He wants to eat up all the plan that God has for your life.
00:31:49
Speaker
So that's why we need to be alert. We need to say, wait a minute, I want to be vigilant. Revelation 12 verses 7 through 12 compares him not to a lion, but to a dragon. He says he's like a dragon. And you know what that dragon does day and night, it says?
00:32:05
Speaker
It says that night and day, day and night, he just accuses the brothers. He accuses the brothers. He accuses the brothers. It's not true, but he accuses. That's what I'm getting at. So we need to be vigilant because our enemy is toxic, but we also need to be vigilant because our enemy is strategic. He is strategic. Like I was talking about earlier with the Methodia, the methods, the schemes of the devil,
00:32:33
Speaker
yet it says he will come back to Jesus and enough at an opportune time. We already talked about one opportune time, right? Remember, we were talking about Peter. Peter had a great moment there, you know, that one, that one shining moment. But imagine what it would have been like for Jesus to spin and have to rebuke his main leader right there.
00:32:57
Speaker
to rebuke him. Mark 9, 31 to 33, he had to rebuke his main man. But then if you were to look at John 8, 39 to 47, he came to help the Jewish people for sure know about salvation. They'd been waiting a long time for the Messiah. But of course he wanted it to go beyond just the Jews.
00:33:17
Speaker
But then the Pharisees tell him, look, we're Jews. We don't need you. and We don't need what you're whatever it is you're selling. So in John 8, 39 through 47, he realizes, you know what? You guys are being lied to by the enemy. Maybe some of you feel that way. Maybe you think, I've been going to this church all my life. That by itself is not enough.
00:33:40
Speaker
just by itself. If you're a member of the church, I'm so glad. But you need to be born again if you're not born again. That's what makes the difference. Whenever you personally commit your life to Christ, it's not that you're a part of a certain group. It's that you individually have turned from sin and repentance and put your faith and your trust in what Jesus did for you on the cross. That's the only thing that's going to get you into heaven. So if I'm a minister worthy of salt, I'm going to tell you that because it's the truth. It's the truth.
00:34:10
Speaker
But then, of course, the betrayal by Judas and the arrest by the temple guard in Luke 22, 39 through 53, whenever Jesus realized what's happening, he said, you know what? This is the hour of darkness. And that's why he permitted it to happen. Luke and Matthew are not the only biblical writers that introduce us to the only undefeated champion over sin. The only one. It's Jesus.
00:34:36
Speaker
It's Jesus. It tells us in Hebrews 4, 14 through 16 that Jesus is what kind of champion. He's a sympathetic champion. He's a sympathetic champion. If you'll come to him today, come to him humbly and say, Lord, I just need you. I need what you did for me on the cross. He's also sinless. That's why he can make a difference. He didn't give in to Satan's temptations ever, his whole life. That's why when he died on the cross as a substitute for our sins, it made all the difference because he was sinless. It was a perfect sacrifice and it atones for your sins and my sins.
00:35:13
Speaker
all of our sins, but it also says you come near to that throne of grace through Christ, you're going to receive mercy. you're gonna receive grace to help in time of need. He's so supportive. Yeah, he this is who he is. I don't know who Satan's trying to lie to you and tell you Jesus is this or that. Jesus is supportive, he's sinless, and he's sympathetic. That's who he is. He's a great savior. I don't want you to know him. That's why every single Sunday I give an opportunity for anybody that would like to trust Christ to do so.
00:35:48
Speaker
You know, today we've looked at four things. The power that'll help you overcome temptation. The places where you're likely to encounter temptation. Patterns when you're in the fight. The one thing you need to remember is truth. Give the enemy truth in response to whatever lie he's trying to tell you. And then remember,
00:36:11
Speaker
prolonged resistance. It won't be over today. It won't be over tomorrow. He's going to continue to attack us, so we need to be continually vigilant, alert, and ready. But let Jesus help you with this. Why don't we stand together? We're going to give an opportunity for people to respond if they would like to trust Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior. We're going to be singing an interesting song for our invitation song.
00:36:38
Speaker
I need thee every hour. I need thee every hour. That is so true. So when we sing this song, all we're asking you to do is acknowledge that that's true, that you do need Jesus every hour. Let's go to the father in prayer. Lord, thank you so much for this time to look into your word. Lord, I've been beat up by sin before lots of times.
00:37:01
Speaker
But I'm so glad that you overcame sin and you can help me, you can help these people to overcome temptation anytime. And so help us, O Lord, to look to you, to turn to you, to surrender to you, to turn back, turn away from sin and turn toward Christ.
00:37:20
Speaker
realizing that, your Lord, you went to the cross, and on the cross, the enemy gave you everything he had, and yet it says that you triumphed over the enemy on the cross. Lord, hallelujah, what a great Savior we have. So bless this time of invitation if there's anyone here who has not yet personally trusted Christ. I pray today be the day of salvation. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.
00:37:49
Speaker
This is a ministry of First Baptist Church, located at 1700 Milam Street, Columbus, Texas.