April 17, 2011
Let’s read a verse from Psalm 23: “Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the LORD for ever” (vv. 5 & 6).
Hymn 341 - Jesus bids us shine
Prayer
Genesis 37:29 - 35
We are looking at the life of Joseph. Last time, we talked about the five “S” words in the story of Joseph: 1) Jacob sent Joseph, 2) the brothers saw Joseph, 3) the brothers plotted to slay Joseph,
Reuben was the oldest brother. When the brothers were planning to kill Joseph, Reuben was the one who suggested that they throw him into a dry pit instead. It seems that Reuben left, after they threw him into the pit. Reuben wasn’t there when the brothers sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites. When Reuben found out that Joseph was gone, he rent his clothes; this was a way of displaying anger. Reuben went to his brothers and said, “Joseph is gone; what am I going to do?” The other brothers didn’t seem to care, because in the next verse they were plotting how to tell this to their father.
The brothers played a dirty trick on their father.They took a kid goat and killed it; they smeared the blood on Joseph’s coat. They tried to make their father believe something different than the truth about what had happened to Joseph. When Jacob saw the ripped, blood-stained garment, he was stricken with grief. He was sure Joseph was dead; he said that he would go to his grave mourning.
Let’s go back to read Genesis 27:6 - 9. This story also had kid goats in it. Jacob was using the goats to trick his father. Now, his sons are doing the same to him.
Read Galatians 6:7. Sowing here refers to planting a seed and reaping refers to harvesting. You are “sowing seed” as you go through life. If you are untruthful, what can you expect to harvest? If you are kind, what can you expect to harvest? You will reap what you sow.
When I was in third grade, my teacher wrote this poem in my autograph book:
Life is an echo: it all comes back, / The good, the false, the true;
So give the world the best you have, / And the best will come back to you.
My father in law used to tell a story about travelers, travelling from one town to another. There was a man living between the towns, and travellers would often stop to talk to him as he sat on his front step. One traveller asked the man, “What will the people in the next town be like?” He responded, “What were the people in the last town like?” “They were very nice.” “Well, the people in the next town will be the same.” Later, another traveler asked him the same question. “What were the people in the last town like?” he asked again. “They were terrible.” “Well, that’s what they’ll be like in the next town.” These travellers were reaping what they were sowing.
I recently read a quote that said, “Many people sow their wild oats during the week, and pray for a crop failure on Sunday.” I think it was supposed to be funny, but it’s very serious. Whatever we sow is what we will reap. Here, Joseph’s brother were doing to Jacob what Jacob did to his father many years earlier. The lesson for today is, what are you sowing? Read Galatians 6:8. Each day we are sowing seeds and we will reap what we sow. I think we can learn that if we are unkind, we will reap unkindness; but if we sow kindness and love, that’s what we’ll reap.
Some of us have been reading through 2 Samuel lately. It’s striking that, at the end of David’s life, he was still fighting giants (see 2 Samuel 21:15-16, 18-19, 20). It wasn’t long ago in children’s meeting that we read about David killing Goliath as a young man. So he fought giants when he was young and he fought giants when he was old. We find that Jesus and David had this character in common. Here at the beginning of His ministry, Jesus fought the devil; and He fought him again at the end of His life in the Garden of Gethsemane. It’s interesting to see this in type.
So is there anything wrong with turning stones into bread? Jesus had the power to do so, and He multiplied bread later on in His ministry when He fed the five thousand. That wasn’t at the command of the enemy, though. Satan doesn’t always tempt us with atrocious sins. Sometimes it’s just, “Will I do what the Lord has commanded or not?”, and Satan knows our weak points. These three temptations illustrate the Lust of the Flesh, the Lust of the Eyes, or the Pride of Life. Eden’s temptation had these three aspects. Eve saw that the tree was good for food (lust of the flesh), that it was pleasant to the eyes (lust of the eyes) and that it was a tree to be desired to make one wise (pride of life).
Satan started each temptation by saying, “If thou be the son of God…” The same thing happened at the cross. The rulers said, “If He be the Christ…” and the soldiers said, “If Thou be the king of the Jews…” They challenged his person, position, and title.
How did our Lord react to these temptations? He quoted Scripture; and quoted it as Scripture, telling the devil that, “It is written.” It’s interesting that all of the passages that Jesus quoted are from Deuteronomy. Some scholars think that Deuteronomy isn’t really part of the canon of Scripture, but Jesus thought that it was. And He wrote it, so He should know.
For the first temptation He told Satan, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.” How important the Scriptures are. There are so many gems and treasures in it. It is so needful for us to feed on the Scriptures, and to balance our work with it. And we can’t just read it, we need to live by it; grasp it and put it into practice. That’s what will be rewarded on the judgement day, not knowledge of the Scriptures.
James tells us that if we resist the devil, he’ll flee from us. This is what Jesus did, and it shows us His dependence on God and His obedience to His Father.
Is it wrong to be tempted? No, yielding to the temptation is sin. It was mentioned earlier that, for our Lord, this was an external temptation. We have a new nature and an old nature. Satan doesn’t have anything to offer to our new nature; so if we truly live in the power of it, we will be less susceptible to sin.
The first temptation didn’t work, so the Devil moved on to the next one. He showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and told Him, “You can have them all if you just worship me.” Satan is the prince of this world. He has power and principality. He reigns in the hearts of unbelievers, and blinds them to the gospel message. Now he offers it all to the Lord. This is the Lust of the Eyes. This wasn’t really Satan’s to give. All things will eventually be given to Jesus, even though all things aren’t put under Him right now (Hebrews 2:8). Jesus quotes Deuteronomy six this time (it was chapter eight before) and tells Satan, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” It was extreme audacity of Satan to say, “Worship me” to the Lord Jesus. Yet that is pretty much what he said when he wanted to become God; now he wants to derail all of God’s counsel and purpose. He can’t, of course; but he can hinder people from getting saved, and he can hinder us Christians from enjoying our faith and growing in it. Later on, in the Tribulation, Satan will have a man who people will worship. He knows that in the end he will lose to God, but that doesn’t stop him from trying to spoil His plans.
Those verses from Deuteronomy, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God” and “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve”, are good verses to take with us. It only takes one verse to shut Satan up; because, as you’ll notice, he never replied to any of the ones that our Lord quoted.
Hymn 312 - Jesus loves me
Prayer