The answer is... "God said"

In Matthew 4 we read the very dramatic account of Satan appearing before Jesus at the end of His 40 day fast. Jesus had been spending an intense time with God, fasting and praying in preparation for the launch of His 3 year ministry. Satan obviously arrived on the scene with a very clear objective, to destroy Jesus and His ministry before He could really even get started.

There have been countless insightful sermons taught on what happened in Matthew 4. Today something particular is standing out to me and I thought it would be useful to bring it to your attention. Satan made three attempts to entrap Jesus. In the first two he leads off with these words, "If you are the Son of God...". 

I don't know how or at what time of life Jesus came to the awareness of who He was, but in some way at some time He came to understand that He wasn't like everyone else, that He was actually the Son of God. Did He have a sudden revelation, or did He gradually begin to have memories of His eternal existence, of the glories of heaven, and of His purpose in coming to earth. I don't know. The Bible doesn't tell us us how any of that realization came to Jesus, but it's clear by the time He fasted in the wilderness He knew who He was and what He was here for. 

After 40 days of fasting He was undoubtedly in a very weakened state. His human body required nourishment. Just like us when we are fatigued and weakened in body, I'm quite sure there was an impact on His emotions, His confidence, and His ability to stand fast. No doubt that's why Satan chose that moment to go on the attack. And he did it by trying to get Jesus in that weakened state to question who He was. "If you are the Son of God". In other words, maybe you've been imagining all this. Maybe you aren't really who you think you are. Maybe you're just the ordinary son of a carpenter. Maybe you should be in the carpenter shop right now, instead of fantasizing about this crazy quest to save the world. Who do you think you are anyway?

As Christians we have a status we often don't fully appreciate. The Bible says we have been adopted into God's family. We are children of the Almighty God. Our sins are forgiven. The Holy Spirit of God lives inside us. We are destined for an eternal home in heaven. We have the assurance of all of these things because the Bible tells us so, and because the Spirit confirms it within us. We have no reason to doubt. But we doubt anyway, and that's where Satan will attack us just like he did with Jesus.

The questions for us will be a bit different. It won't be "If you are the Son of God". Instead it will be something like "Do you really think God could love you?", or "Are you really saved?", or "Is this whole thing with God and Jesus and the Gospel really real?"  You can probably write in the particular doubts that attack you.

Satan seems to be very good at knowing just where our greatest doubts and insecurities lie. He is also good at knowing when we are vulnerable, at a point of weakness. He attacks when our emotions are out of whack and our confidence is weak and our ability to remain steadfast is at a low point. 

Jesus responded to each of Satan's attacks with these words "It is written". If I can paraphrase, He said, "God said". That's really important. What that means is that the way I feel while being tempted to doubt in a time of weakness is not what really counts. What counts is what God said! God said I'm forgiven. God said I'm His child. God said I can do all things through Him who gives me strength. God said He will provide if we trust Him. God said. God said. GOD SAID!

When Satan attacks, as he often will, we have a choice to make. The choice is, who are we going to believe? Will we believe the father of lies whose greatest goal in life is to destroy us, or will we believe the faithful God who loves us more than we can even imagine? 

Unfortunately, Christians spend far too much time being discouraged and downtrodden. We allow ourselves to be overwhelmed with feelings of worthlessness and rejection when the truth is we are children of the King. We have been made righteous by the blood of Jesus, and are on our way to an eternal existence beyond anything we can imagine in our wildest dreams. That's who we are!

So next time Satan or his minions attack with doubts and discouragements, try out Jesus' strategy. It goes something like this. "Oh yeah? Well, God said                                 , and He's a lot more trustworthy than you. You're wasting your time here, so go try out your lies on someone else."

There will be times of weakness. There will be times of temptation. There will be times of doubts. We can't control any of that. But we can control how we will respond. We can control who we will believe.