The Competitor

"If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become loaves of bread."

Matthew 4:3

As much as Jesus is our example of perseverance in running the race, it must be said that He did not run alone, without competition.  There is another in scripture who stands as one who doggedly and with determination pursues his goal, from one garden to the other, from Eden to Gethsemane, and beyond.  He appears tireless, and does not seem to accept defeat.  He uses every means at his disposal to accomplish his purpose, and he is a dirty competitor.  He is, of course, Satan.

In the broad scheme of God carrying out His purposes for humankind, there are a number of critical, and even strategic, points at which Satan shows up, points at which, were it not for the superiority of God's grace, he might have permanently undone God's plan of redemption.  In the life of Jesus on earth there are several of these critical moments, as when Herod sought to eliminate any Messianic competition by murdering all the male children in Bethlehem and its environs.  Another such moment was in the garden the night before Jesus' crucifixion. Mel Gibson, I believe, rightly alluded to this in his movie, The Passion of the Christ, by placing Satan, in his classic form of a serpent, there at Jesus' side as he prayed for strength to accomplish the task for which he had been sent.  In a beautiful - and biblical - image, Jesus finally crushes the serpent's head under his foot.

The past two days, I have been looking at another of these critical moments in Jesus' earthly life and ministry.  Matthew 3 records Jesus' baptism by his cousin, John.  As Jesus comes up out of the water, he has an experience that He must have recalled over and over again in the years of his earthly ministry, one repeated during two other recorded events in the gospels.  In this moment of "fulfilling all righteousness" (3:15),  Jesus - and presumably, John and those present - audibly hears the very voice of the Father from heaven say, "This is My beloved Son, with whom I am well-pleased."  I believe this voice was not just for the sake of those observing, but to give assurance to Jesus Himself, based on what happens next.

Immediately Jesus is driven (Mark 1:12) by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness, where he fasts (and prays, based on a true understanding of biblical fasting) for 40 days and nights.  By the morning of the 40th day, Jesus is very hungry.  His flesh demands food, and in his flesh he would like to satisfy that craving.  And he could have; all he had to do was leave the wilderness and get something to eat!  Except for one thing:  the Spirit had not given him leave yet of his fast. 

At this critical moment, the devil - so faithful to his purposes - shows up and offers Jesus a simple solution.  "Didn't God say, 'This is my beloved Son?' Well, if you are the Son of God, you must be able to turn rocks to bread!  Hey, go for it!  And by the way, this will prove what you thought you heard back there at the river.  By doing this, you will kill two birds with one stone:  you'll satisfy those annoying hunger pains, so you can get on with praying without distraction, and you'll satisfy any doubts you may have about whether it was really God's voice calling you His Son.  Such a deal!"

Well, I wondered, what would be so bad about that?  Where in the Bible does it say that God's Son cannot make bread from rocks if He wants to - or needs to?  Wasn't He there at creation?  Didn't God make all things through Him?  What's the big deal?  Just this:

1.  It would have tested God, violating Deuteronomy 6:16, as Jesus pointed out in response to one of Satan's other attempts.  Thus He would have disobeyed God.

2.  In doing so, Jesus would have acted independently of the Father, by Whose authority He had been sent to the wilderness to fast and pray.  As He had not yet indicated to Jesus that His fast was over, by taking matters into his own hands, Jesus would have been disobeying God.

3.  It would actually have been an act born of doubt, not faith.  By responding to the phrase, "If you are the Son of God," to satisfy his fleshly cravings, Jesus would actually have been giving in to doubt.  And the Apostle Paul tells us, "Whatever is not from faith is sin" (Romans 14:23).

4.  It would have been a selfish misuse of his authority and power.  When we see Jesus use his supernatural powers in later chapters of the gospels, it is always on behalf of others, always for the purpose of ministry, never by some self-centered whim nor to satisfy himself.

For these reasons, if Satan had succeeded in convincing Jesus to turn rocks into food, Jesus' ability to accomplish the redemption of His people would have been impossible.  He would no longer have been the spotless, sinless Lamb of God, but a tainted sacrifice liable - as we are - for his own sin.  And Satan would have won.

The evil one is so subtle.  He will challenge us to disbelieve and to disobey.  In those moments, we must not cling to personal "experiences" nor even to voices from heaven, audible or otherwise.  In those moments, we need to look to our champion - Jesus - who, though he had every right to claim God's words spoken very personally to him, relied on the writtten word of God, and said, "It is written, 'People do not live by bread alone, but by every word which comes from the mouth of God."  Jesus depended on the written word to validate God's spoken word, not the other way around.  Thank God he did, and God help me to do the same!

"Help me, Lord, to know when I am being tempted, and to fly to Your written word for strength, and for guidance, and to dispel the lies of the one who would defeat me."