The Third Temptation

[HKHaugan]

The third temptation finds Jesus being taken up on an ”exceedingly high mountain.” The devil’s subtle technique is to make us think that we can be on top of the world if we can find the highest place, the highest social position, the highest emotional binge, the highest educational achievement, the highest accomplishment, in short, being number one. I’ve always considered the mountains to be a kind of experience that carries you to the top of all you are in mind, body and spirit. You climb them so when you get to the top you not only accomplish something physically, but there is an emotional satisfaction and a sense of being at one with the surroundings, a parallel to reaching the real top, a relationship with the Lord God. What I have come to realize is that the mountains point to God who created them and that He created them for us as He did all the earth. He is above it all.

In Genesis you see Him saying to Adam and Eve, “…fill the earth and subdue it.” That is, to bring the understanding of the earth to His spiritual place in your mind and in your heart. Fill the earth with images of Him who sees the earth as His gift to us to enjoy. Your bodies and minds are the receivers of the gift and the very fact of enjoyment is the interior perception He has created within us to sense and feel its qualities. That is what subduing the earth is all about. You don’t grab it like a present, rip off the string and paper, throw away the box and use it until you tire of it then look for something else to feel good with. Recognize it is a gift from God for our pleasure and enjoyment. See it in its spiritual context. It is something we are given to enjoy temporarily to prepare to enjoy Him eternally. Look at God first then manage it with respect for Him.

With that in mind what we have seen in the first two temptations is the devil’s strategy to lure Jesus away from His Father by getting Him to ponder, to rethink, to redefine who He is, where He is and why He is here. In this his third temptation, the devil wants Jesus to consider the top as being in control of the world, its people and its institutions. Instead of having a vertical focus on His Father see everything only in a horizontal focus. It’s being on top of the world you can see, having control of every political, economic and social institution, being number one over it all to do what He wanted with it. Isn’t that a temptation for us as well?

The devil wanted Jesus to keep from seeing above the world to the real top, His Father. Use physical, emotional, spiritual hunger as the focus of the moment, the de jour menu for thought and action. Make momentary needs the all-consuming personal object that requires immediate attention.

Think for a moment if you were Jesus. What would you like most to control? If you loved people and saw them suffering wouldn’t you want to rid the world of suffering, poverty, war, hate and all the plagues of human misery? You could change all this in a heartbeat. You could make the world what you want it to be. If you are the Son of God shouldn’t this be the way you think?

Weakened by hunger, alone in the wilderness, this is the moment the devil was sure he could get the human Jesus to give in, for the sake of people, Himself and getting His mission accomplished. “All this I will give you,” the devil said, “if you will fall down and worship me.” Never wavering for an instant Jesus replied, “Away with you satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and Him only shall you serve.”

The wilderness of the world and its standards is where fallen humanity is because that is where satan is. He is “the prince of this world” which means of the now, the temporary, the false ego, ‘me first’, the shifting sands of trends, fashions and idolatry (whatever the world gets us to think is number one outside of God). What the devil was really fighting was what he knew about himself. He was going to be defeated and eliminated. His end was sure and Jesus was there to expose him to the world and to face him at the very point of human exhaustion because that is where we are. This is where Jesus chose to counter him---through the Word and in the Spirit.

He came to show that real humanity is not about immediate personal satisfaction and being number one in the now but about a faithful relationship with God in the eternal present. It is not about getting what I think I need (perceived needs) but what God has revealed spiritually (our real needs), a relationship with Him that captures our minds and hearts. For Jesus this meant death on the Cross in our place. For us it means crucifixion of our sinful nature and freedom from it in Christ through His Resurrection. Our mission is now defined, bring the God above the mountains into the flatlands of the wilderness that hearts can look above where Christ sits at the right hand of the Father and reconcile the world of minds and hearts to Him.