Matthew 4:1

‘Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.'

Jesus was ‘led up of the Spirit' into the wilderness. The Spirit knew how important it was that He understood how to approach His future, and guided Him to find a quiet place. ‘Led up' suggests that leaving the Jordan valley He climbed up onto the slopes of the wilderness of Judaea. And there He was to be tempted by the Devil.

It was not that temptation was the prime purpose of the Spirit Who led Jesus into the wilderness, but rather that it was the inevitable consequence of His doing so. For He could not possibly face up to His life work without facing up to the Tempter, who would continually be one of His main opponents. He would ever be lurking in the background ready to pounce when he felt that he could trip Jesus up, and ever fearful that this One Whom God had raised up and anointed, Who had a unique relationship with God that he did not fully understand, would one day prove his downfall, and would meanwhile be carrying out assaults on his own cosy position. But Jesus was being led by the Spirit. And He knew that if He walked step by step by the Spirit He would be led into all truth.

But who were the main players in this drama? We should now perhaps pause to consider each of them.

1). The first is Jesus Himself. Born of a virgin by the Holy Spirit, truly human, and yet ‘God with us' (Immanuel), descended from Abraham and aware of the promises made to Abraham which He Himself must bring to fulfilment; a son of David, and of the royal line, and thus destined to be the everlasting King Who would deliver His people; yet also the Son of the living God and His beloved; the One named Jesus Who was to save His people from their sins; and the One Who as a man among men represented His people in Himself, as God sought through Him to bring all His purposes to completion. On their behalf He had been taken into Egypt, and on their behalf had ‘returned from exile'. On their behalf He had been baptised. Now He was needing to lead them out of the spiritual exile which still gripped their hearts.

2). The second is the Spirit of God, through Whose activity Jesus had been born, and Who had set Jesus apart for His God-appointed task (had anointed Him) and would be continually with Him in it.

It was He Who had hovered over creation when all things began. It was He Who had given wisdom, first to Moses, and then to the elders in the wilderness (Numbers 11:17), as the people were led through towards their triumphal entry into Canaan. It was He Who when they were in dire straits from their enemies had empowered charismatic leaders to deliver them from bondage (regularly in Judges). It was He Who had empowered their first kings, and especially David, the man of God's choosing (1 Samuel 16:13), and whom God had appreciated. And when the kings had ceased to enjoy His empowering, beginning with the failure of Solomon, He had inspired prophets to bring the word of God to the people, and the Psalmists to inspire the people to worship. Always working invisibly He had been revealed by His actions. And He had continually maintained in Israel a minority of faithful, believing people, who had remained true to God. And now He was commencing the final surge which would bring all God's purposes to fulfilment. Working in and through Jesus, the Spirit anointed King (Isaiah 11:1), Servant (Isaiah 42:1) and Prophet (Isaiah 61:1) of Isaiah, and later through His Apostles and His new community of people, He would reach out into the world with the word of God, bringing to God those who were His chosen, a multitude which no man can number, until one day the full number will have been gathered in.

3). The third is the Devil, or Satan (‘adversary') revealed in Scripture as a powerful fallen spirit, by no means omniscient or omnipresent, but long lasting and devious, and ruler of a host of fallen spirits like himself, with whose assistance he was struggling to prevent the success of the purposes of God which he knew would lead to his eventual downfall.

It was he who in the shadows of the Plain of Eden had used the snake to lure the Man and the Woman into their failed rebellion against God (Genesis 3). It was he, through his minions, who had infiltrated the world of humans by ‘possession' so that God had had to destroy the large part of mankind in the Flood (Genesis 6:1). It was he with his princes whose shadowy figure lay behind much of the turbulent history of mankind (Daniel 10). It was he who at times received authority to test the faith of those who were faithful to God (Job 1-2). It was he who sought to oppose and prevent the deliverance of God's people from sin (Zechariah 3). And now he was engaged in his greatest struggle, the prevention of the success of this One Who had been raised up by God, Whoever He might be, (for he was not quite sure). But one thing he did know and that was that He had been declared to be God's own beloved Son, whatever that might mean. And it was necessary somehow to prevent His success.

And now here they were together in the wilderness, as the final purposes of God, to which the prophets had looked, began to unfold. And only God knew how long these ‘last days' were going to last.