A Nugget from New Life Network

Scripture for the Day – June 27, 2019

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: (2 Timothy 3:16)

We will continue today with the second temptation of Christ which was presented to Jesus by the devil in the wilderness. Just remember, all things that happened in the scriptures were for our benefit to teach us how to fight the good fight of faith and how to walk this thing out.

Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. (Matthew 4:5-7)

Remember, the first temptation was aimed at the flesh of Jesus. That did not work, so the devil is now going to pick a different target. He is going to attack the belief system of Jesus. The sheer gall of the devil is unbelievable. He is about to attack the Word of God (Jesus) with His own Word. By the way, he is still doing that to believers today.

Did you know that the devil knows the Word of God very well? He knows it so well that he is able to twist it to make many people believe that a particular scripture means something it doesn’t mean. Remember, he is the father of lies. He’s even been able to build entire churches around twisted doctrine.

Please notice where he took Jesus on this second temptation. He took Him to a Holy place. He took Him to the pinnacle of a temple and he then quoted scripture to Him. He quoted scripture to the Jesus who was the Word made flesh. Now, if he will do that to Jesus, just think what he will do to us. That is why it is so important for all of us to read and know the Word of God for ourselves. How did Jesus fight this temptation? He fought it with the Word of God. Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. (Matthew 4:7)

One of the things we all need to learn is that the Word of God will interpret itself. You cannot take one scripture and make a doctrine out of it when multiple other scriptures fly right in the face of that scripture. We get too legalistic at times with our inerrancy of the scripture beliefs. It’s not that a particular scripture is in error, but we just may not understand the context or the wording involved. When I run across scriptures like that I put them on the shelf and ask the Holy Spirit to bring me understanding to that scripture through continuing study and prayer.

Jesus was quoting from Deuteronomy 6:16 when He said, “Thou shalt not tempt the lord thy God.” This refers back to Exodus 17:2-7 when the children of Israel were in the wilderness and murmuring and complaining to Moses about having no water.

Therefore, the people contended with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said to them, Why do you find fault with me? Why do you tempt the Lord and try His patience? (Exodus 17:2) The Hebrew word tempt used here is (nacah) which means to test or to try and that is exactly what we see here. I think it may be better understood if we said they were becoming very testy and were trying the patience of Moses and God.

One other thing we need to understand here. Psalm 91 is a beautiful psalm that the devil was quoting when he talked about the angels having charge of thee. This psalm is all about the protection God provides for the believer, but we cannot test or try that scripture by doing something foolish like jumping off the top of the Empire State building to prove how holy we are. God is not going to suspend gravity for foolishness and pride.

So, what we see here is the devil twisting the Word of God to try to get Jesus to do something stupid. He will do the same thing to you, if you let him. Know the Word, and do not let him!!!

 

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