Passing through their midst

Luke 4:1-30 from the daily reading in the One Year Bible

Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around by the Spirit in the wilderness ² for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He became hungry.³ And the devil said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.” ⁴ And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’”

⁵ And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. ⁶ And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. ⁷ Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.” ⁸ Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’”

⁹ And he led Him to Jerusalem and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down from here; ¹⁰ for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You to guard You,’ ¹¹ and, ‘On their hands they will bear You up, So that You will not strike Your foot against a stone.’”

¹² And Jesus answered and said to him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”

¹³ When the devil had finished every temptation, he left Him until an opportune time.

¹⁴ And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district. ¹⁵ And He began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all.

¹⁶ And He came to Nazareth, where He had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath, and stood up to read. ¹⁷ And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. And He opened the book and found the place where it was written,

¹⁸ “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives,
And recovery of sight to the blind, To set free those who are oppressed,
¹⁹ To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord.”

²⁰ And He closed the book, gave it back to the attendant and sat down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on Him. ²¹ And He began to say to them, “Today this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.” ²² And all were speaking well of Him, and wondering at the gracious words which were falling from His lips; and they were saying, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” ²³ And He said to them, “No doubt you will quote this proverb to Me, ‘Physician, heal yourself! Whatever we heard was done at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well.’”²⁴ And He said, “Truly I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown. ²⁵ But I say to you in truth, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the sky was shut up for three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land; ²⁶ and yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath, in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. ²⁷ And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian.” ²⁸ And all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things; ²⁹ and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff. ³⁰ But passing through their midst, He went His way.

Today’s text says:  Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around by the Spirit… Jesus returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit, and news about Him spread through all the surrounding district. And He began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all… He opened the book and found the place where it was written,  “The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, Because He anointed Me to preach the gospel to the poor. He has sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, And recovery of sight to the blind, To set free those who are oppressed,  To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord.”    Jesus, God in flesh, was filled with the Holy Spirit. He was led by the Spirit. He had the power of the Spirit and He was anointed; had the Spirit upon Him to preach, to proclaim and to heal. If Jesus, God in flesh, needed the Holy Spirit to live and to minister as a man, then how much more do we who are in these fleshy bodies?  

The text says:  …being tempted by the devil. And He ate nothing during those days, and when they had ended, He became hungry. And the devil said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread.”  And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone.’”… he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.”  Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.’”  And he led Him to Jerusalem and had Him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down from here; for it is written, ‘He will command His angels concerning You to guard You,’  and, ‘On their hands they will bear You up, So that You will not strike Your foot against a stone.’”  And Jesus answered and said to him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’”  We too, like Jesus, will be tempted by the devil. 1 Corinthians 10:13 says:  No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.  Hebrews 4:15 says:  We do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.  Jesus, as He is in all things, is our model for how we are to overcome the temptation we face. If Jesus needed the filling and the power of the Holy Spirit, if He needed to be led by the Spirit, then surely we too need the Holy Spirit. The devil’s temptations have not changed. As he did Jesus, he will try to get us to question whether we are God’s children. In the same way that he tried to offer Jesus another way to the kingdom, he will try to do the same today. Just as he tried to convince Jesus to test God, even quoting scrpiture out of context, so he will try to distort God’s word today. In John 14:26 Jesus says:  “The Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you.”   The power of the Holy Spirit, His teaching and guiding, His reminding us of all that the Word of God says, is the way out of temptation.

The text says: … they were saying, “Is this not Joseph’s son?” Like they did with Jesus, people will also remind us of our flesh. They will try to make us like them, ordinary people, bound to our flesh, not children of God, filled with and led by His Spirit.   The text says:       And all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things; and they got up and drove Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff.  In John 15:18-25 Jesus says:  “If the world hates you, you know that it has hated Me before it hated you. If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, because of this the world hates you. Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A slave is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted Me, they will also persecute you; if they kept My word, they will keep yours also. But all these things they will do to you for My name’s sake, because they do not know the One who sent Me. If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin, but now they have no excuse for their sin. He who hates Me hates My Father also. If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have both seen and hated Me and My Father as well. But they have done this to fulfill the word that is written in their Law, ‘They hated Me without a cause.’”   The text says:  But passing through their midst, He went His way.   We too, Like Jesus, filled with the Holy Spirit, led by the Spirit, having the power of the Spirit, are anointed by the Spirit to walk in His way. We too are just passing through this world, filled and led by the Holy Spirit.  

Thank You Heavenly Father, Lord Jesus Christ and precious Holy Spirit for providing a way out of every temptation. Thank You for Your guiding, filling and anointing, that I might walk in Your way.  Amen.