The Third Temptation

Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory. (Matthew 4:8 ESV)

The third temptation built on the first two and was climactic. The first two focused more on immediate results and more narrow needs — filling the stomach and impressing a crowd, or we may say, temporary satisfaction from food and temporary popularity from impressing a crowd in Jerusalem. But the third temptation focus on more lasting and broader-ranging results — the worship of the nations.

Again, we see the cunning of Satan. It is as though he said to Christ, “I see you are a man who is not satisfied with the temporary or the fleeting, or even the awe of a local and limited segment of humanity. You are a man of vision, of grand-thinking, and you want all the nations of the world. Let me show you how you can have them.” Satan, as we mentioned before, feigns sympathy with the interests and goals of God, and seeks to lure us off the path God has given us to walk in, by promising us what it seems to be good things.

First, we should ask how many of us never get past the first two types of temptations. Many of us have given in for food, or some other physical appetite, that would only satisfy us for a few hours, or we have given in for the temporary applause of a fickle and unpredictable crowd, or some other fleeting earthly reward. Many of humanity have never known this third type of temptation because they have already been defeated by the first two.

But some people do sacrifice to achieve greater success. Some are men and women of grand vision, and they go without some physical needs being met to prepare for the future, and they also sacrifice friendships and even the admiration of others because they have labored long in preparing for their career. They have learned the benefit of delayed gratification for the sake of a better and more profound satisfaction. They have been in school working on masters and doctorates while others have pursued immediate results at minimum wages. But despite their willingness to sacrifice to attain their goals, there is still the danger of making these goals all about self, and not about God at all. They run the gauntlet of temptations and distractions only to fail in the long term because they know of no higher purpose in life other than their own will and reputation.

It can truly be said that there is no significant difference between the death of a poor, uneducated man, and a wealthy and successful man, if neither know God, for all that they attained or did not attain in life dies to them at their death.

The wise person has his eyes in his head, but the fool walks in darkness. And yet I perceived that the same event happens to all of them. Then I said in my heart, “What happens to the fool will happen to me also. Why then have I been so very wise?” And I said in my heart that this also is vanity. For of the wise as of the fool there is no enduring remembrance, seeing that in the days to come all will have been long forgotten. How the wise dies just like the fool! (Eccl. 2:14–16 ESV)

Second, we see the emptiness in the temptation for he showed Him the fallen glory of the fallen nations. Satan could only show the fading glory of a fallen world, so even as he gave it in its best light, it was still far beneath the intended will of God for human life. What might have looked impressive to fallen mankind, must have made the heart of Christ weep.

It is said of the fallen world in Scripture, “And instead of worshiping the glorious, ever-living God, they worshiped idols made to look like mere people and birds and animals and reptiles” (Rom. 1:23 NLT). This is the problem of all of the world, that they worship the wrong things — idealizing and idolizing and paying tribute to debase urges, fallen gods, and things that are not gods at all.

What this “human glory” was that Satan showed Christ we are not told — possibly because we would find it alluring and fall into temptation ourselves. It is basically true that what we long for reveals our character. Some people come to a new town and immediately ask where the brothels are, and others come to town and ask where the churches are, each revealing his heart. Some in today’s world, as in every age, would have idealized Sodom and Gomorrah as cities of freedom of expression, wonderful and exciting centers of the arts and of self-expression, instead of the perverse, sinful places they actually were.

But such images would have broken Christ’s heart, and Satan probably suspected this, so I suspect Satan took a different approach and tried to impress Christ with the noble and good things of the nations — perhaps with the added innuendo, “See, they don’t need saving after all.” And even if Satan tried to impress Him with the finest things found in human society — the noblest of all lost people — Socrates, Aristotle, Homer, and the like — Christ would have still known how much more they could have all become if they had only known God intimately and personally. He would also have known that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Rom. 3:23). The scripture says:

All people are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field; the grass withers and the flowers fall, but the word of the Lord endures forever. (1 Peter 1:23–24 ESV)

We should not be overly impressed with the fallen world. Paul showed evidence of having learned the poetry of the Mediterranean unchristian world, and people have learned the benefit of studying the classics of all cultures — whether from the east or the west. Yet we cannot help but weep on some level and wonder what these impressive people could have become if they had known God. We should admire and respect true achievements, but none of them measure up to what Christ will achieve in His grace in the simplest Christian life. Christ said:

Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he. (Matt. 11:11 NIV)

If this was true of John the Baptist, then it is doubly true of every “great man” or “great woman” to have ever lived.

It is contrary to the nature of Satan to show us the glory of heaven. He is a deceiver and an accuser. Christ said of Satan, “When he lies, he speaks out of his own character, for he is a liar and the father of lies” (John 8:44 ESV). We always need to see past the temptation that promises us earthly rewards, and see the superior rewards of heaven. This world needs men and women of character who stand for the right in courageous faith.

We overcome these temptations by focusing on the glory of God, that is found in love, righteousness, peace, joy, and grace. Christ prayed that His glory may consume us:

Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world. Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them. (John 17:24–26 NIV)

Tomorrow we will explore the temptation to worship Satan. Today let it suffice to see past the temptation to impress us with the achievements of a godless world. Only the glory of God is eternal glory. It is better to be bypassed and rejected by the world for worshiping He who is eternal, than for giving in and worshiping this fallen world.