The anatomy of temptation
Readings: Genesis 2. 15-17, 3. 1-7, Matthew 4. 1-11
It is fitting that as we begin our journey towards Easter, the great feast of our Salvation, that we should start with where it all went wrong, with the Fall. We heard a few weeks ago, and reflected on, how God created everything. And now that he has finished, he places humanity at the centre of the garden, an earthly paradise, to care for it and to bring order to it.
Now I’m once again going to sidestep debates over whether this passage is to be taken literally or figuratively because that’s not the point of the passage, its message is that God created us and tasked us with the care of His creation and asked us simply to trust and obey Him, giving us commands to live by as any loving parent would. And the way this trust and obedience is demonstrated is through one tree that is off limits. If we choose to obey him we will leave it be, if we trust him we won’t go and eat from it. It’s not a test as such, rather it is giving us the choice, will we obey and trust?
And then serpent comes along, and in the light of the New Testament we know that the serpent is the Devil coming to tempt. This passage is the archetypal story of every sin we ever commit. Eve isn’t under duress, she can easily refuse the serpent, and yet she doesn’t, she’s already starting to question God’s instruction, and the serpent now gives her fuel to aid her questioning.
And immediately the serpent tries to skew things, notice how the serpent twists God’s words. Did God really say that you can’t eat from any of the trees? He didn’t did he, but now God sounds unreasonable. The seed of doubt is planted, that perhaps God can’t be relied upon, that God’s words are open for questioning.
And as the serpent questions the command, Eve enters into conversation. Rather than sending the serpent on its way, she entertains the notion and responds; ‘well yes we can eat from any of the trees, just not this one tree because we will die if we even touch it’. Now her mind is no longer focussed on the bounty of all of the trees that they can enjoy the fruit of, this great garden to enjoy, her eyes are now firmly fixed on the boundary, this one tree’s fruit, this one spot that is out of bounds. Her perspective has shifted, she no longer sees a bountiful gift but a restriction.
And notice too how she’s overcorrected. God had said to Adam back in chapter 2 verse 17 that if he ate from the tree he would die, nothing about dying if he touched it, but in her overcorrection that picture of God as strict and overbearing becomes even clearer in her mind. And unwittingly she has entered the debate on the terms of the one who is seeking her downfall.
And now the serpent places the cherry on the top ‘you shall not die, you will become like God’. You shall not die, there goes all the risk, it’ll be fine, don’t worry about it. But then the further temptation, it will make life better, you will be like God, you won’t need him anymore. This is the real heart of sin. If they eat the fruit they can cut God out of the loop. They can live without him, have free reign over right and wrong. You can forget about God, declares the serpent, do life on your terms.
How familiar is this pattern, we are free to choose to live however we wish but have commands given by God to help us to reach our full potential and to enable full relationship with God and each other. But we decide that we can question God’s authority, we know better. This thing is never mentioned in the Bible, even though the broader topic is there, and so we can make up what we think about it. Surely God wouldn’t want to stop me doing this. Isn’t God being a bit of a killjoy in saying this is out of bounds. Wouldn’t life be better and I’d be more liberated if I just did things my way rather than his. Why is God seeking to keep me from fullness of life?
In our moments of temptation, when we falter, all too easily divine love looks like envy, our service to Him more like slavery and a suicidal plunge looks like a leap to freedom self fulfilment. We enter into debate with the temptation, and soon we’ll find ourselves fully justified in our course of action.
The fruit is tempting and good to look at, we always want what we cannot have. And so Eve eats, and because Eve has eaten Adam copies. Adam has been there the whole time, this isn’t all on Eve, this isn’t her fault alone, Adam is stood beside her this entire time, completely silent, like a complete numpty. Why aren’t you saying anything Adam? Why aren’t you providing a counter voice? Why are you just stood there doing nothing? How often do we remain silent and allow our brother and sister Christians to just slide into sin, because we don’t want to be awkward or intrude.
And so Eve eats the fruit, and because Eve does, Adam joins in. We do that too don’t we, it’s all too easy to justify not living our lives as God calls us to because other Christians aren’t doing it either. If they’re not doing it, and they’re fine, why shouldn’t I?
We justify our sin in so many ways yet what comes from sin, and what came from that first rebellion is death, not immediate physical death, they didn’t keel over upon eating the fruit, but spiritual death. They bite into the fruit expecting a fuller life, and it’s like it turns to ash in their mouths as death comes, and they are cut off from God and from each other. The first thing they do is realise they are completely exposed to each other and to God, and they become fearful and suspicious, and so they make clothes to hide themselves from each other, to keep the other out, and then they hide from God. Every time we sin we build up walls between ourselves and God and other people. We keep them away out of fear or suspicion.
In our Gospel today Jesus undergoes the same testing as we see in Genesis; take a bite, look at all you could have if you stop listening to God and listen to me. The difference here is that Jesus doesn’t fall at the first hurdle, or the second, or even the third. He resists every time. He undergoes the same temptations we do and resists, and he will continue to do so for the rest of his life.
Now Jesus in his humanity is just as human as you and I, He underwent the exact same level of temptation that we all do under the same conditions that we all do, so what is the difference between Jesus and Adam and all of us who are in Adam? Jesus is living His life completely open to God, living His life solely for His Father and He is rooted deep in Him. He refuses to listen to creature over creator, refuses to follow His impressions over His instructions and refuses to make self-fulfilment his goal.
If we look at these passages there is one clear difference, look at their responses to the temptation. Eve starts a conversation, she opens up to it and starts rationalising it. Jesus shuts it straight down, He doesn’t even entertain the possibility. And there’s also a difference in their method. In the first passage, Eve & Adam are relying on their will power, I can do it, I can resist, I can make it happen. And how often do we do the same. But their will power fails because will power isn’t real power, real power is in the Word of God. Real power is rooted in God’s Word to us in Scripture. And we see this in the Gospel, Jesus responds to every temptation with Scripture, He bats them away with God’s Word, trusting in its truth. Even when the devil turns around and quotes scripture back at Him to justify what he is offering, Jesus knocks it back with further Scripture. So often we can find stuff in the Bible to justify what we are doing, we can prooftext a justification, but all too often we are using it out of context and for our own purposes and not truly seeing what the Bible is actually telling us.
Now I don’t think any of us are under the illusion that we are Jesus, that we can live perfectly as He did. But in putting our faith in him we are now living his sort of life, not Adam’s sort of life. And so we can learn from to stop relying on ourselves because our wills break, and instead we are to rely on God. If we are to respond to temptation as Jesus did then we need to be rooted in Scripture, we need to know our Bibles and what they tell us, we need to be digging into them to strengthen ourselves.
But there is something greater at play here too beyond a lesson in how to resist temptation. Look again at that moment when Adam & Eve sin, they sew fig leaves together. They attempt to cover over their shame and their sin with leaves. It’s a pitiful covering, it’ll tear and break and wear out in days. We so often attempt to do the same, deal with our sin, deal with our failures and make them up to God ourselves, but it doesn’t work, it’s as pitiful as those leaves.
But if we skip ahead in Genesis chapter 3 to verse 21 we find that ‘The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them’. Sin requires sacrifice, it’s clear right from the start, creatures are killed to clothe Adam & Eve, suitable clothing is made for them. And right from the start it is also true that the Lord provides, he sacrifices and makes.
And this same God has provided his Son, who is stood in that desert battling the tempter, who is the sacrifice for our sins, whose righteousness and perfection we are clothed with as a cloak when we put our faith and trust in him. The Lord provides the sacrifice and covers over our sin and shame. So once we are in Christ, when we do fall, we do not drop like a stone, but instead fall back on His grace and Christ’s saving death and resurrection. As we walk with him we can trust in God to help us resist temptation, and we can trust in Him to catch us when we do fall.
So, my brothers and sisters, this Lent as we look at our lives, as we leave behind those things that keep us from God, as we thought about on Wednesday, let us learn to resist temptation not in our own willpower, but leaning on Him for our strength and His Word for our help. And let us also not lose heart when we do sin, because Easter is coming, when we celebrate Jesus’ saving work that redeems us from despair and gives us everlasting life, where we are clothed in his righteousness.
Amen.