SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 1/30/2020
12:15 PM
My Worship Time Focus: “The Crisis
of Temptation”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
4:1-11
Message of the verses: “1 Then Jesus was
led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. 2 And
after He had fasted forty days and forty nights, He then became hungry. 3 And
the tempter came and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, command that
these stones become bread." 4 But He answered and said, "It is
written, ’MAN SHALL NOT LIVE ON BREAD ALONE, BUT ON EVERY WORD THAT PROCEEDS
OUT OF THE MOUTH OF GOD.’" 5 Then the devil took Him into the holy city;
and he had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, 6 and said to Him, "If
You are the Son of God throw Yourself down; for it is written, ’HE WILL GIVE
HIS ANGELS CHARGE CONCERNING YOU’; and ’ON their HANDS THEY WILL BEAR
YOU UP, LEST YOU STRIKE YOUR FOOT AGAINST A STONE.’" 7 Jesus said to him,
"On the other hand, it is written, ’YOU SHALL NOT PUT THE LORD YOUR GOD TO
THE TEST.’" 8 Again, the devil *took Him to a very high mountain, and showed
Him all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory; 9 and he said to Him,
"All these things will I give You, if You fall down and worship me." 10
Then Jesus said to him, "Begone, Satan! For it is written, ’YOU SHALL
WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD, AND SERVE HIM ONLY.’" 11 Then the devil left Him;
and behold, angels came and began to minister to Him.”
The
name that I have in the focus portion of this SD is actually the title to the
chapter that we will be looking at that is covered in John MacArthur’s
commentary. I have just completed
listing to a sermon by John MacArthur on the first verse in this section,
something that I believe was just his introduction to this section and I
learned some important things that I will be sharing with those who will read
this Spiritual Diary on the internet.
If
I were to ask the question “what is the thing that we believers have the most
trouble with,” I wonder how many would say temptation. Well think about how your life would be if
you were never tempted again. I can say
that if this was to happen to me then my life would be so much easier than it
is now. MacArthur says that “temptation
has been a constant, unrelenting part of human life. Men have tried to avoid and resist it with self-inflicted
pain to make themselves uncomfortable and presumably humble, or by insolating
themselves from other people and from physical comforts. But no person has ever found a place or a circumstance
that can make him safe from temptation.”
I
remember a sermon that I heard probably back in the 1970’s, probably from Hal
Lindsey who was talking about some monks who went on a retreat for an extended
amount of time and the first thing that one of the monks said after coming back
from the retreat was “I never thought of a women the whole time that I was on
the retreat.” To that I thought to
myself, “boy is he lying.”
John
MacArthur quotes a fifth-century Christian who wrote about temptation:
“Fly from all occasions of temptation,
and if shall tempted, fly further still.
If there is no escape possible, then have done with running away and
show a bold face and take the two-edged sword of the Spirit. Some temptations must be taken by the throat
as David killed the lion; others must be stifled as David hugged the bear to
death. Some you have better keep to yourselves
and not give air. Shut them up as a scorpion
in a bottle. Scorpions in such
confinement die soon, but if allowed out for a crawl and then put back into the
bottle and corked down, they will live a long while and give you trouble. Keep the cork on your temptations, and they will
die to themselves.”
There
are a couple of more ways that people have tried to stop temptations that
perhaps we will look at as we begin our next SD in order to finish this introduction
to these first eleven verses found in the forth chapter of Matthew. One thing I continue to remind you and that
is that the theme of Matthew’s gospel is that Jesus is the King, and that he
was writing mostly to the Jewish people.
Spiritual meaning for my life today: One of the ways that I knew that God had
saved me was that He took away swearing from my vocabulary. I am ever thankful for that however there are
times when I wish that He would have take other temptations away from me.
My
Steps of Faith for Today: Keep my eye on the Saviour, continue to seek
to be humble, and to constantly find joy from the Word of God as I read and
study it each day.
1/30/2020 12:42 PM
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