Satan has the audacity to approach Jesus and say to Him, 'If You are the Son of God.' If he is disrespectful to Jesus, you can bet your bottom dollar, he will be the same to you, probably worse.
In this passage, Jesus had been led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After Jesus had fasted for 40 days, the devil came to start the temptation. Note, the devil will always come at your weakest moment (remember Eve as she looked at the forbidden fruit in Genesis 3). Jesus must have been very hungry after such a long time and the devil came with the tempting words, 'If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.' To most people, this would have been hard to resist. Jesus was no different, remember He was in human form.
Think back to the times when you have been at your weakest and the very thing you want, or even crave for, is offered on a plate. It's not easy to resist; but Jesus used the Word of God to deal with this, 'It is written.' This is why it is so very important to read our bibles. If we don't know the Word, how can we use it when we need it?
Here the devil uses the word, 'if,' three times. In verse 3,'If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.' Again in verse 6, 'If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down.' Finally in verse 9, he uses the word differently, 'All these things I will give You, 'if' You will fall down and worship me.'
The word, 'if' can imply doubt or probably, as used here, 'since'. Used towards Jesus both would have been disrespectful. One would have been stating, 'I doubt that You are who You say You are.' The other, a very loose term of, 'Since You claim to be the Son of God.'
This very small word can pack a very large punch. Many of us are tempted to say, 'What if this happens?' or 'What if I pray for him and he isn't healed?' It's a word that we would benefit from using sparingly. It is similar to the negative part of the word, 'but'. 'Yes, I will do that, 'but,' I'm not sure it'll work.' When we speak doubt, we do without!
If you use the 'if' word lot, try changing how you say something. We need to choose our words wisely, 'For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.' Matthew 12:34. Make the abundance positive by using God's Words that forge a way forward, not words that negate any form of faith that you have been taught.
Copyright 2020 Grahame Howard
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