The Two-Hundred-Forty-Fourth (The Temptations)

We’re going to look at a topic this week that we’ve touched on a couple times previously, but never looked at in depth.  If you noticed the subject, no, it’s not about the singing group of the 60s and 70s!  We’re going to dive into some aspects of Yeshua’s temptations in the wilderness that you may not have considered previously.

Obviously, the main lesson in the wilderness temptations (Matthew 4:1-11, Mark 1:12-13, Luke 4:1-13), and likely the one you’ve heard most preached about, is the use of the Word of YHWH, specifically scripture, to combat Satan’s temptations.  This is a clear picture provided by Yeshua in His responses to Satan, and it’s important to recognize that despite His relationship to YHWH, namely, that He is YHWH’s Son and as a result has His own authority He could speak from, Yeshua still used scripture.  He was given all things by YHWH (Matthew 11:27), but instead of telling Satan, “By My authority as the Son of YHWH, I choose not to test My Father,” He quoted scripture stating that we shall not put YHWH to the test.

This brings up another interesting aspect of this event.  Yeshua had the authority the whole time He was in the wilderness to cast Satan out of His presence.  He did it all the time with demons throughout His ministry.  However, it wasn’t until He had gone through forty straight days of being tempted that He commanded Satan to leave.  

He went through all the temptations of Satan because that’s what He had to do.  We find in Luke’s account that Satan gave Yeshua every temptation, and this was necessary because if there was even one left out then Satan would have the opportunity to argue to YHWH that if only he had tempted with that one temptation then Yeshua would have sinned just like the rest of mankind.  Just look at the account of Job.  Satan’s constant argument was that it was because of this or that as to why Job didn’t curse YHWH (Job 1:9-11, 2:4-5).  So, in order to not give Satan a leg to stand on and argue whether or not Yeshua would have sinned, He was tempted with every sin imaginable.

Obviously, we don’t see each and every sin Yeshua was tempted with recorded in scripture, but the indications are there, as we just noted, to show that He was.  We are only given three of the temptations, but in my opinion, they are a perfect summary of every category of sin a person could be tempted with.  These three temptations cover what I find to be five general categories of temptations, and it’s useful to take a moment and recognize those because you can be sure that at some point we will be tempted in the same way.  You probably have multiple times already in your life.  I know I have.

First, Yeshua was tempted with satisfying His hunger by turning stones into bread.  This is very clearly a temptation to satisfy fleshly desires.  Remember, according to Matthew’s account, the temptations recorded occurred after forty days and forty nights of fasting.  Both Matthew and Luke make it a point to state that Yeshua was hungry by that time.  If you’ve ever fasted for any length of time, even accidentally because you got caught up in something and forgot to eat or maybe your schedule prevented you from eating, you know what it’s like for your body to be crying out to you that it needs food.

Satan went straight for the category of satisfying the flesh, because He knew Yeshua would be hungry and based on his experience with all the naturally minded people he had tempted in the past this has the potential to be the most effective temptation for someone.  Of course, hunger is only one aspect of fleshly desires, but you can be sure Yeshua was tempted with all the others in the previous forty days.  Lust, debauchery, drunkenness, etc., Yeshua was tempted by them all.  If Satan had the power to take Yeshua to places like the pinnacle of the temple and on top of high mountains and show Him all the kingdoms of the world in an instant, he certainly had the power to create scenarios to put Yeshua in in order to provide an effective temptation.

This brings us to the next category of temptation that is identified by tempting Yeshua to throw Himself off a high place like the pinnacle of the temple.  In this temptation, Satan tried to use a page out of Yeshua’s playbook and quote a scripture to tempt Him.  This is an important aspect of this temptation because it shows us what the category is: proving YHWH’s promises.  Or, to put it another way, doubting the truth of YHWH’s word.

We’ve covered the state of modern day Christianity multiple times in terms of the general move towards believing science over scripture, so we won’t rehash that in detail here.  However, no matter how confident you are in the truth of YHWH’s word, you almost certainly will still be tempted with doubting it.  In the same way that Satan “cherry picked” a couple verses to tempt Yeshua, you’ll find more often than not that when the temptation to doubt is present it tries to pick out some piece or part of scripture and use it rather than keeping all of scripture intact.  

The other thing you’ll find is that just like Satan’s temptation of Yeshua, your temptation will start from the natural and then go to the spiritual, to YHWH’s Word.  Satan started with the natural/physical action of Yeshua throwing Himself down off a high place, and then he tried to use some verses of scripture to prove that not only was it ok to do that, but that YHWH would protect Him if He did.  You find that a lot today where Christians will desire to act a certain way, or do a certain thing, and then find some verses to justify it’s an ok thing to do.  They’ll even go so far as to say it was YHWH that wanted them to be that way or do that thing in the first place, because “that’s the way He made me,” or “why would He allow us to do it if He didn’t want us to?!”

The next category of temptation we see in these events in the wilderness is a temptation of achieving power or control.  It may seem ridiculous to us that Yeshua was even tempted with this given His authority and position as the Son of YHWH.  I mean, He was already above Satan just because of this fact, right?  However, He had to be tempted with this, just like every other temptation, because this is one of the most common ways man has been tempted all throughout history, and the easiest way for man to be corrupted.  

The worldly man desires the power and authority of the world, and Satan will give it for a price and for a time.  This power and authority is fleeting though, as is recorded in history.  Even the chosen people of YHWH, Israel, lost their worldly power and authority because as certain men gained their position as ruler they became corrupted by it.  Even the wisest man who ever lived, Solomon, ended up being corrupted.  

The last two categories of temptation we see in the wilderness are somewhat related.  Through all of these three temptations, Yeshua was tempted to 1) prove His authority and position as the Son of YHWH, and 2) prove His power as the Son of YHWH.  

In every one of these three temptations, do you notice how Satan started?  “If you are the Son of YHWH…”  In just this simple phrase, Satan challenged not only whether or not Yeshua was actually the Son of YHWH, but also if He had the power of the Son of YHWH.  I don’t know if Satan believed or knew at that time that Yeshua was actually the Son of YHWH, or if he was just trying to tempt Yeshua to doubt who He was, but either way, it’s interesting to note that every temptation started with that challenge.

The other important aspect of these temptations is that neither Satan nor Yeshua challenged each other on the statements that they made.  They didn’t question the truthfulness of the statement and they didn’t question the authority for the individual to make the statement.  This aspect gets more fascinating as you dig into each temptation and look at it through the lens of what it means that those statements are true.

In the first one, Satan challenged Yeshua to turn stones into bread.  Had this been an impossible task, Yeshua could have just said so, but the fact of the matter is that in this one seemingly simple challenge was culminated multiple opportunities for Satan, the master accuser, to gain the upper hand.    

The most obvious opportunity was for Satan to prove that Yeshua was just as weak as every other man in that he leans towards prioritizing his flesh over doing what’s right spiritually.  What’s not so obvious is that had Yeshua told Satan that it was impossible for stones to turn into bread, Satan would have proven that there is a limit to YHWH’s power and thereby given him the opportunity to say he is the same as YHWH.  You see, Satan’s whole goal has always been to set himself up as YHWH, but his powers are limited and YHWH’s are unlimited.  Proving that YHWH’s powers are limited just like his would show that he and YHWH are equals.

The truth is that had Yeshua commanded the stones to become bread, they absolutely would have.  We know, based on events later in Yeshua’s ministry, that not only can He multiply things like loaves and fish (Matthew 14:14-21, Mark 6:30-44, Luke 9:10-17, John 6:5-14), stones can cry out in praise (Luke 19:40)!  We also know that according to Yeshua, not one thing is impossible with YHWH (Matthew 19:26).      

The temptation of protection from harm was also not challenged by Yeshua in its truthfulness.  Had He stated that YHWH would not have saved Him, He would have proven fallibility in YHWH’s Word, but the truth was that if Yeshua had thrown Himself down, He would have been protected.  The scripture quoted by Satan was not one specific to the Son of YHWH, however.

Satan quotes this from Psalm 91, a psalm generally about YHWH’s protection.  The very beginning of the psalm tells us who this protection is given to.  There are two things required, and one is a result of the other.  A person is given the protection described if they live under the covering of YHWH and by doing so remain in His shadow.

What stuck out to me as I read this is the image of remaining in YHWH’s shadow.  The Hebrew word used for remain, which is sometimes translated to abide or rest, is luwn, and it means to stop or stay for some time in a place.  The imagery here is one of being in a shadow, and when you are in the shadow of something, the light that is casting the shadow is only shining on that thing, not on you.  

If everything were completely dark, with only one light shining, and you were completely in the shadow of something that was between you and the light, you would not be visible by an outside observer.  In other words, the only thing that observer would see is the object that is casting the shadow.  If we apply that to the imagery in this psalm, we see that if we are truly dwelling in YHWH’s covering, we are in essence spiritually invisible and only the glory of YHWH is seen.  If we stick our hand or our foot out of the shadow and try and claim some of the glory we are opening ourselves up to be visible to the enemy, and we are no longer fully under the protection of YHWH.  

You see, this idea goes both ways.  If we are completely in the shelter of the Most High, living our lives that way, everything that happens for us in our lives is from Him.  If anyone comes at us to attack or accuse us, we can just point to YHWH and say, “take it up with Him!”  At the same time, YHWH, through His role as our shelter, desires to take care of us.  We know that YHWH wants to have a relationship with man, His creation, because that’s clear in the account of creation and in His desire to restore that relationship after the fall of man, which is described throughout all scripture.  Man has a choice though, because that’s how YHWH created man, and it wouldn’t be very convincing for someone to choose YHWH if he or she saw that YHWH doesn’t take very good care of His people!

The last temptation, that Yeshua would be given the power to rule all the kingdoms of the world, is another example of Yeshua not challenging the validity of Satan’s statement, and the final thing we’ll cover this week.  Clearly, Satan was not only given the authority to rule over the kingdoms of the world, but he also had the ability to give that to whomever he wished.  Yeshua did not challenge that, and we’ve looked at how Satan’s authority came to be in previous studies so we won’t belabor the point.  The only thing to emphasize here is that in Luke’s account we find Satan’s statement is that the authority he has was handed over to him.  He did not take it by force and it wasn’t that he didn’t have the right to it.  Adam handed it over when he sinned.

I hope this focused look at the temptations Yeshua went through in the wilderness was a blessing to you.  Hopefully, you found something interesting or learned something along the way!    

Shabbat shalom and YHWH bless you!

-Rob and Sara Gene