"Jesus was conceived by the Spirit, anointed with the Spirit at His baptism, offered Himself in the Spirit on the cross, rose by the power of the Spirit, and then at His ascension, the Father conferred the fullness of the Spirit as a coronation gift for His Son."Leithart goes on to note that Jesus then shares the Holy Spirit with the Church, his body, and the Spirit is involved in every part of the life of the church. The whole meditation may be found here.
Led by the Spirit
Leithart was not trying to present a comprehensive list of the ways the Spirit was involved in the life of Jesus, and neither am I. But I do want to comment on one additional way. Jesus was led by the Spirit throughout his life, and in a particular incident recorded in the synoptic gospels, Jesus was led by the Spirit to be tempted.
"Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil."
(Matthew 4:1 ESV - see also Matt. 4:2-11; Mark 1:12-13 & Luke 4:1-13)
Jesus Tempted
Jesus was lead by the Holy Spirit throughout his life. Jesus came to do the will of the Father, but he did so in the power and through the leading of the Spirit. One of the places he was led by the Spirit of God was into temptation. It might seem strange to us at first that the gospels tell us the Spirit leads Jesus into the wilderness for the express purpose of having him tempted by the devil. Why would God do that to his son?
The Bible clearly teaches that the works of Satan, while evil, are still according to God's secret and sovereign will, though not necessarily consciously so, and not, of course, according to God's revealed moral will set forth in the commands of Scripture. In other words, while Satan is in constant rebellion against God and does his worst, he can never go beyond the bounds set for him by God. He roams throughout the earth like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour (1 Pet. 5:8), but God has him on a leash and he must ultimately obtain God's permission before he acts (Job 1-2). Satan intends to thwart God's plans, but his works ultimately end up being used by God to bring about God's good ends. Likewise, people doing things at the prompting of Satan or through the sin in their own hearts may intend things for evil but God works it for good according to his own sovereign purposes (Gen. 50:20; Acts 2:23; 4:27-28; Rom. 8:28).
As with Master, so with Disciple
Christians live in the steady, obedient plodding of the day to day. Life is nothing but one decision after another and we are constantly faced with the decision to be obedient to Jesus Christ or not. And no matter what any individual believer's daily experience looks like, one thing is for sure: we all face daily temptations and trials, things that test our faith. There are daily temptations to doubt God and his Word, to abandon our faith (even if momentarily), to turn our backs on the Father and turn to idols, to trust in self or some strain of worldly wisdom, to syncretize our faith with some mix of works-righteousness or antinomianism, to doubt that the promises of God apply to us, to mix the purity and truth of God's Word with lies from the surrounding culture, and the list goes on and on. This is why Jesus' being led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil speaks directly to this day to day faith-struggle of believers.
Why does this happen to us? As with Jesus, it is not inconsistent for believers to be led by the Spirit, to be walking in the Spirit, keeping in step with the Spirit, and yet be faced with temptations and trials. In fact, as we follow Christ in our daily walk of faith, one of the places we will follow him is into temptation. Of course we pray, "lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil" (Matt. 6:13), and it is right for us to pray this. We probably don't know how many times we are in fact spared from temptation. But other times we will be led to places and circumstances where we find ourselves being tempted.
When temptation comes it is not God himself who is tempting us (James 1:13). The temptation comes as a result of the remnants of our own sinful natures (which are still in the process of being transformed and conformed to the image of Christ), perhaps being awakened by an outside factor, perhaps just being lured and enticed by our own sinful desires (James 1:14). But the temptations are real, frequent, difficult and yet their presence is not inconsistent with a life led by the Spirit.
When we are tempted, we ought not to think we have been abandoned by God or that he isn't still right there with us, indwelling us even, in the person and through the presence of his Holy Spirit. God will never leave us or forsake us. But he will allow us to be tempted, even lead us to that place of testing, where we must face the temptation of sin head on and resist. But thanks be to God, we walk in the strength and Spirit of the one who faced temptation at the very end of all physical strength after fasting for 40 days and nights; who alone in the garden faced the crisis point of decision whether to go to the cross and in the strain, he sweat great drops of blood; who faced down every temptation to partake of many normal and good aspects of everyday human life (marriage, family, leisure, having a home, possessions, etc.) but which was not part of his mission from the Father. Instead, Jesus stuck to the mission and laid down his life, never giving in to temptation. He was perfected through testing and suffering (Heb. 5:8-9) and as we walk in union with him, we walk in his perfection even as we too are being perfected (Heb. 10:14). Part of our being perfected, our sanctification, our being conformed to the Son's image, is our being tested through temptation. We are God's children, and the Lord disciplines those he loves. Part of what is going on when we face temptations of many kinds is that we are being trained in righteousness. We are being discipled, all toward the end that we might share in holiness with him of whose Spirit we now partake (Heb. 12:3-11; James 1:2-4; Rom. 8:26-30).
Temptations and trials happen to Christians. They are sometimes from the accuser of the brethren (Job 1:6-12; Rev. 12:10) or his minions. More often, they stem from our own sinful desires. But, as with everything in our lives, even temptation is part of God's plan for us. God always provides a way out and the temptations which face us are never beyond what we can bear in the strength that he supplies (1 Cor. 10:13). So God always answers our prayers of "deliver us from evil". Whether we take hold of that deliverance by resisting the temptation or not is another question.
Anatomy of Temptation
As with the original temptation of the garden and Christ's own testing and temptation, our temptations always come in the form of lies. We are tempted to believe these lies, and if we give in to them, it results in actions that are disobedient to our Lord. Every temptation is a showdown between truth and lie. This should not surprise us. Satan is not only the accuser of the brethren but the father of lies. He has been lying from the beginning (Jn. 8:44). When Satan's speaks lies, he speaks his native language. Even before Satan lied to Adam and Eve and told them that if they ate the fruit they would become like God (Gen. 3:5), he lied to himself by telling himself that he could become like God (Is. 14:12-14).
Victory over Temptation
Just as every temptation is a lie, every way out of temptation comes through truth. When we face the temptation to believe a lie and to act on that lie and walk into disobedience, the way out always comes by the truth, which is the Word of God. When we resist the devil he will flee from us (James 4:7) as he did from Jesus when Jesus resisted him three times, wielding the sword of God's Word (Matt. 4). In Christ, we not only have been saved from the wages of sin, but we have been freed from the power of sin (Rom. 6:12-23). We now have the law of God written by the Spirit on our hearts (Heb. 10:16). Jesus, our redeemer and great high priest, faced down temptation to the full and never gave in (Heb. 4:15). He faced down temptation with the weapon of the Word of God in the strength of the Spirit. We may look to him when faced with our own temptations in order to receive grace and mercy in our own struggles (Heb. 4:16). And grace and mercy will be ministered to us through the Holy Spirit, and the power to defeat temptation will come from the living and active Word of God, written on our minds and hearts.
Ultimately our salvation from the power of sin is already accomplished by Christ. And even now he is working all things out for our good so that one day, a day which the Father has underlined on his calendar, we will walk in the full freedom from the presence of sin as well.
Can you think of other ways the Spirit was involved in Jesus incarnation and earthly ministry and that he is also now involved in the life of the Church?
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