Enduring Temptation
Stephen Terry
Commentary for the October 18, 2014
Sabbath School Lesson
“Then Jesus was led by the Spirit
into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” Matthew 4:1, NIV
Temptation,
we all know what that is, right? It’s when Aunt Polly goads us into having a
second piece of her famous chocolate cake at the family reunion. She knows how
good it is and how hard it is to resist. She also knows we have been trying to
lose those few extra pounds, but she waves that delectable chocolaty goodness
under our nose anyway. Who can resist temptation like that?
But isn’t
temptation of the Devil? How can Aunt Polly be tempting us? She is in church
every weekend and prays and studies her Bible. She tells everyone she loves
Jesus and is one of the first to shout “Amen!” at every baptism. Would the
Devil do that? But the evidence condemns her. After all, isn’t it called Devil’s
Food Cake? A Christian wouldn’t tempt us, would they? So it seems either it is
not a temptation or Polly is not a Christian.
James may
find some problem with Aunt Polly, for he tells us that temptation does not
come from God.[i]
This is perhaps a lynchpin of Jacobine theology. James, Jesus’ brother, had
been raised as a faithful Jew, probably working in his father’s carpenter shop
and carrying on the family trade after Joseph’s death. Once Jesus was gone from
the earth, apparently James stepped in to fill the position of headship in
Jerusalem.[ii]
Some have referred to him as the first bishop (episkopos) of Jerusalem.[iii]
For whatever reason, the Apostles appeared not to have challenged his authority
to do so. It is perhaps on the basis of the authority of this office that the
epistle bearing his name was written.
James could
have easily asserted his blood relationship to Jesus as the basis for authority,
but in order to be on an equal footing with the Apostles, it was also said that
Jesus had appeared to him after the resurrection[iv]
and even that Jesus had indicated that he should take charge.[v]
It may be significant that these sources which venerate James and cite the
basis for his authority in the church are also sources believed to be
authoritative at the time by the Ebionites, a Jewish-Christian sect that
promoted Jewish practices and denied the divinity of Jesus. For whatever
reason, they apparently saw James as sympathetic to their cause.
This
relationship to the Ebionites may call into question the authorship of this
epistle, but more importantly it may present a challenge to its theology,
authentically Jacobine or otherwise. When we compare the statement regarding
temptation with other biblical accounts, there definitely seems to be a
conflict.
The
assertion that God has nothing to do with temptation does not seem to agree
with Matthew’s account regarding Christ. After the Savior’s baptism we are told
that the Holy Spirit led him into the wilderness to be tempted.[vi]
Truly, the account states that the Devil did the actual tempting. However, if
we look at it from a legal perspective, God was certainly involved and perhaps
even complicit in the temptation. After all, if I know a dragon is hiding in
the recesses of a cave, and I take my child by the hand and lead him into the
cave, if the dragon kills him, I would be an accessory to his death because of my
foreknowledge of the hazard. Similarly, it is God (Holy Spirit) leading Jesus
into temptation per Matthew’s account.
We might
also cite the words of the Lord’s Prayer, “Lead me not into temptation.”[vii]
If God is not leading us into temptation then this request makes no sense. This
passage also seems to be in conflict with James on this issue. However, we
might expect confirmation of the assertion that God has nothing to do with
temptation in the Old Testament if Jacobine theology is more in line with previous
Jewish practice.
When we look
at the Old Testament though, we find even more conflict with the assertion in
James. In the Book of Job, we find God setting up an otherwise righteous man to
be assaulted by the Devil.[viii]
The strong temptation presented through his wife and no doubt a real temptation
in all the misery he was suffering was to “curse God, and die.”[ix]
Eventually, Job cried out at the injustice of the situation.[x]
But in the end, although his loss was restored in kind (assuming you can ever
replace the loss of beloved children) God took a tough stance with him and told
him he had no write to question what was done to him, since He was God and Job
was not. This is almost a direct reply to the statement in James. James said God
does not tempt. God says, “I am God and I can do what I choose. You cannot
question it.” This seems more in harmony with Pauline theology than Jacobine.
Paul, in his Epistle to the Romans, says that we have no more right to question
the justice of God in His ways than a lump of clay on the potter’s wheel has to
question the potter about what he is making.[xi]
One other example of God’s involvement with temptation is the Tree of the
Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden.[xii]
Who created that tree? And who placed it in the garden to be a temptation to
the first pair? If we are totally honest with ourselves, we must admit that
temptation has been a part of humanity’s existence from the very beginning.
In the
modern era of “feel good” theology, we don’t like to think of God in this way.
We like to think of our relationship with Him as being like a marriage, a love
relationship. Who likes to have their spouse constantly testing them? Would you
like it if your spouse constantly asked you to choose between something you
really liked and them? God seems to be constantly testing our faithfulness to
Him throughout the Old Testament. If the relationship were like a marriage, I
would start to wonder about that constant need for reassurance in the relationship.
However, if it was because of an earlier betrayal, I might begin to understand
the insecurity, and as God’s creation, we have certainly done that to Him far
too many times.
We may find
it uncomfortable to be constantly tested like this. But it does give us
opportunity to build trust and to demonstrate trust to God. Using the example
of marriage again, if every time we don’t like what our spouse does, we give in
to the temptation to cry, “I’m getting a divorce!” then our marriage probably
will not last long. But if we tell ourselves our spouse is not our enemy and
learn to trust his or her goodwill toward us in spite of their failings, the
relationship will grow stronger and stronger each day. We can do the same with
God, if instead of trying to figure Him our all the time, we simply trust Him.
Logically, if He is truly God, we really have no other sensible choice.
In the
twenty-third Psalm,[xiii]
our relationship to God is compared to that of sheep to a shepherd. We are told
that God leads us in the paths of righteousness. Later in the Psalm, we end up
in a dark valley. God is there with us, but we have ended up there anyway. How?
Well if we are following the Shepherd’s leading then He must have led us there.
The fact that He is also in the valley with us perhaps confirms that. Maybe the
path of testing and temptation is the path of righteousness and has been from
the beginning.
When we
consider all of these examples, we might be tempted to doubt God for not being
what we felt Him to be. However, we might be guilty of “God in the box”
theology that makes God into what we are comfortable with rather than whom He
really is. By definition, God is without limits. Knowing that, are we then
placing limits on His behavior? Are we judging that behavior by human standards
of justice? We like to say that God’s character is contained in the Decalogue.
But is that simply another box that God needs to fit into? We don’t even fit
into that box ourselves. Who of us can say they have never violated a
commandment? Someone made that assertion once to Jesus, but when Jesus revealed
to him that he coveted the wealth he had accumulated from his neighbors so much
he could not part with it, he realized the hollowness of his boast.[xiv]
When we try
to make that same box fit God, we reveal our hypocrisy. God will not allow
himself to be put in there anyway. The Decalogue says not to lie,[xv]
but God directed his prophet to lie.[xvi]
God said that in the case of adultery, both parties should be killed.[xvii]
There was no mention of a chance to say “I’m sorry,” and get off the hook. But
when David committed adultery and even murder over Bathsheba, neither one had
to die. Instead, God produced the Messiah through David’s line, and not through
another wife but through that same Bathsheba.
Can we
really say what God will and will not do? What makes us feel that we can bind
God to our understanding like that? The ancients when approached by God
responded with fear and trembling. Why do we then feel like we can carry Him
around in a box under our arm as though we had Him on a string to make Him
perform for our friends? Perhaps we would do better to admit that the Lord’s
ways are unsearchable, or better still simply be silent before Him.[xviii]
