Midweek 3 Skirmishes
Hebrews 4:15 We do not have a
high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have
one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.
I saw a picture of
a note in a child’s lunchbox from a mom
recently. It was in a plastic baggie
full of carrots and it said, “Please don’t trade these for Twinkies.” Very subtle- but the mom was doing a great
job of trying to change a child’s mind about eating vegetables and if the child
was a good salesperson maybe they could change a few minds too. Changing people’s minds and beliefs has been going
on for centuries. Our enemies the devil has been at work on that since Adam and
Eve. More than lunches, he fights
battles against us. He hates us. He knows our sinful nature well enough that he
knows how to use it well in his war plan to hurt us and turn us against our
gracious God. He was successful against Adam and Eve in Eden and you know how too
often, he has won those battles against all of us. Little skirmishes- big skirmishes seems like
the devil is always on the attack. The
horrible thing is that the enemy had a bigger target than just us—our hero. Our
enemy targeted his attacks on our champion when our champion lived on earth,
but Our warrior is victorious over his
enemy through all of the skirmishes.
“We do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our
weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet
he did not sin.” One of my favorite commercials for this month is the Farmer’s Insurance
commercial where a bear is in swim trunks and swim googles like it is the
Olympics. Then he jumps into the pool
and you see that the bear is in someone’s back yard pool and he crashes through
the side of the pool. Then their slogan
comes on with a “we are farmer’s….” We cover it all because we have seen it
all. Jesus had seen it all. He covers us. He understands our every temptation
because he faced them all.
Remember the big skirmish when
the devil came to face off against Jesus in the wilderness right at the start
of Jesus’ public ministry. The Holy Spirit led our Savior into the desert to be
tempted. Jesus was the perfect substitute and he won where Adam and Eve had
failed. Remember the Devil’s temptations that day. “God isn’t taking care of you. Tell these stones to become bread.” “God has promised to take care of you, throw
yourself down and let’s make God into a cartoon character trying to keep the
spinning plates from falling to the ground.”
“Let’s forget about the suffering and dying that your Heavenly Father is
talking about. All you have to do is
worship me.” The word diabolical comes from the name Matthew uses to describe
the devil when he came to tempt Jesus in the desert: evil to the core. But Jesus
maintains his bearings: God first. With the Scriptures, he answered all the
temptations of Satan. Jesus told Satan
to jump back into his lake of fire. If the devil was smiling, he stopped and the
dark anger boiling inside him. Defeated,
he gave up that day. Jesus’ victory was
our victory
I’m not sure if we know who said this, but it is true. “Don’t give the devil a ride. He will always want to take the reins- He
will always try to drive.” The devil’s battle plan shifted away from
Jesus to include the high priest and Judas and Peter and eventually us. He pushed both the retired high priest
Annas and his son Caiaphas out of the driver’s seat and drove them to plot to
kill Jesus. Annas and Caiaphas betrayed their God and their purpose as high
priests! The devil was driving them to rid the world of Jesus just as Satan
wanted to do.
The
devil had some success in some of his plans.
Judas pushed Jesus away and Peter denied that he knew Jesus. So,
what is your worst battleground? What temptations are you struggling with?
Where has Satan found you at your most vulnerable spot? In a national religious
survey on temptation, people said they struggled most with worry; lack of
self-control; lust and lying or cheating. Amazingly, when asked why they gave
in to temptation, a few said they enjoyed it or that it got them away from
their real life. But most said they didn’t know why. Doesn’t that match up with our sinful nature? When we were children and even as adults if
we did something wrong and someone calls us on it how many times don’t we say,
“I don’t know why I did it.”
I wonder if Satan is
sometimes surprised at how successful his temptations are. At any rate he is happy whenever he gets our
mind away from Jesus and we have made the devil happy way too many times.
But
Jesus is a far different kind of high priest then Annas or Caiaphas or any of
the Old Testament high priests. Instead of having others prepare the
sacrifice, he did it all himself. The ordinary person could not see the Holy
Place where sacrifices were offered, the altar on which Jesus put his sacrifice
was out in public view on the cross. Finally, our Great High Priest became the Lamb,
the sacrifice! He did all this because loves us! He has room in His heart for
you and me.
He
is one who can sympathize with our weakness. Jesus doesn’t say, “I got you out of this
once, next time you are on your own.”
Instead the Bible says that Jesus died once for all” and that “he breaks
the power of canceled sin.” Jesus
doesn’t look at us struggling with temptations and troubles and say, “What are you
being bothered by that for? Are you
really gonna be tempted by that? Man that is cinchy!” Tempted in every way just as we are but was
without sin.
In
the skirmishes you have with the devil-whether the guilt of skirmishes lost or
looking for strength in the new skirmishes.
Remember Jesus.
“We do not have a
high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have
one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.” Jesus won every skirmish for us.
Every
minute during his life here on earth—in thought, word, and deed—Jesus kept the
Ten Commandments perfectly, as well as everything else the Father wanted him to
do. Jesus succeeded where Adam and Eve failed. Jesus remained pure throughout
his entire life! ‘My food,’ said
Jesus, ‘is to do the will of him who sent me and to
finish his work’” (John 4:34). He
loved to do his heavenly Father’s will!.
The good news is
that he didn’t come to this earth just to see if he could keep his own
commandments as God AND man. It wasn’t simply an exercise. Rather, he faced those daily battles and the final battle
with the devil because none of us could handle the job. There would be no hope
for this human race if someone who was pretty good— let’s say, someone like my
grandma. She was pretty good. But she could never have represented the whole
human race at God’s court. She stood in
church with me and confessed, “I a poor miserable sinner… And if she could not stand before God because
of sin. What chance would I have, or you?
Humanity needed a
perfect someone who would be our hero, our substitute, our stand-in who could
qualify to take our place at the justice bar of God. Jesus is that one. He did
this for us, loving us completely. He gave us his obedience to his heavenly
Father. We are hidden under the garment of our great warrior’s perfect life. His
victory is ours so that we may stand forgiven and holy before God.
While we may not
have had a bear jump into our swimming pool,
we struggle to in thankfulness to remain faithful to Jesus. We lose so many times. But our great hero has not left us
alone to face the temptations and trials of our enemy. When we face temptation, he has our back. “No temptation has overtaken you except what is
common to mankind. And God is faithful; he will not let you be tempted beyond what you
can bear. But when you are tempted, he will also provide a way out so
that you can endure it.”
When
we are hurting, Jesus knows what we feel like. When we have problems, you know
he experienced all kinds of them. He was despised by his enemies. He was
rejected by his own people. People told evil lies about him. When we talk to him,
we are not talking to some far-off God. He hears the words of our hearts and can
certainly relate. He has seen it all and he covers us! Amen
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