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Scripture Reading: Matt. 3:13-17; 21:32; John 1:14; Rom. 1:3-4; 8:3; Matt. 12:17-19; Heb. 1:9; Matt. 4:1-11
IV. In His ministry:
А. The commencement of the first God-man’s ministry for the accomplishing of God’s eternal economy:
1. Through His baptism by John the Baptist — Matt. 3:13-17:
а. To fulfill the righteousness according to the way of righteousness brought in by John — v. 15; 21:32.
b. Recognizing that, according to His flesh (His humanity — John 1:14; Rom. 1:3; 8:3), He was good for nothing but death and burial.
2. By God the Father’s anointing — Matt. 3:16b-17:
а. In opening the heavens, indicating that the significance of His baptism was accepted and sealed by the heavens.
b. In sending His Spirit to descend upon Him, indicating that the Triune God would be one with Him as the source, supply, power, and authority of His ministry.
c. Declaring to the universe, particularly to the angels, that according to the Spirit of holiness (His divinity — Rom. 1:4), He is the Son of God, the Beloved of the Father, in whom is the Father’s delight.
d. Based upon the Father’s choosing — Matt. 12:17-19.
e. Because of His loving of righteousness and hating of lawlessness — Heb. 1:9.
B. His temptations:
1. At the beginning of His ministry — Matt. 4:1-11:
а. A temptation under the leading of the Holy Spirit of God arranged by God for the God-man to be tested before His assuming of His ministry — v. 1a.
b. The temptation of the devil — vv. 1b-10:
1) The devil, based upon God the Father’s saying to the God-man in His anointing that He was God’s beloved Son, tempted Him to make a show of Himself being the Son of God for His self-exaltation and self-glorification and to do a miracle to bid the stones to become loaves of bread for His hunger, but the God-man defeated him by not making a show of Himself and not caring for the loaves of bread but for every word of God — vv. 3-4.
2) Again, the devil, based upon God the Father’s saying that the God-man was His beloved Son, tempted the God-man to jump from the wing of the temple so that God would command His angels to bear Him up, but the God-man overcame him by telling him that it is written, “You shall not test the Lord your God” — vv. 5-7.
3) The devil took the God-man to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said to Him, “All these will I give You if You will fall down and worship me,” but the God-man conquered him by not loving the worldly kingdoms and their glory and saying to the devil, “Go away, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve’” — vv. 8-10.
c. It was under the leading of the Spirit of God that the first God-man was brought to be tempted by the devil for His test. With the devil, the enemy of God, that temptation was a temptation, but with God, it was a test, and the test became a battle between Satan and God concerning the accomplishment of God’s eternal economy. Knowing that God wanted to destroy him by the man, in his flesh, that is, in his humanity, whom he had poisoned and spoiled, Satan took the strategy of tempting the first God-man to assume that He was the Son of God, standing far off from the position of His humanity. Knowing this, the first God-man fought back by saying “man” (v. 4), holding fast the standing of His being a man. This defeated Satan’s subtle strategy. Furthermore, in the God-man’s second and third fighting back, His answers, “You shall not test the Lord your God” and “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve” (vv. 7, 10), were His strongest emphasis that He was a man, a creature of God, dealing with Satan, another creature of God, to take the strongest stand with God for God’s glory.
d. The God-man’s defeating of the tempter’s initial temptation equaled His passing of God’s test and qualified Him to be God’s Anointed, Messiah, and Christ for God’s economy.
e. In this initial warfare Satan’s intention was to destroy the One anointed by God for His economy. But he lost the war and left that battleground in shame before the angels of God — v. 11a.
f. In this initial fighting for God’s economy, the first God-man won the war for the glory of God, and the angels of God came triumphantly and ministered to the God-man, taking care of His forty-day fasting hunger — v. 11b.
Matthew 3:13 through 4:11 reveals how the Lord began to live in His ministry, which commenced when He was thirty years old (Luke 3:23). Christ’s ministry was not just to save sinners or to do good things but to accomplish God’s eternal economy. When He became thirty, God established Him to carry out His ministry for the purpose of accomplishing God’s eternal economy.
The end and the ultimate issue of the sixty-six books of the Bible show the conclusion of God’s eternal economy. Genesis ends with Joseph in a coffin, but Exodus ends gloriously with the glorious God in the tabernacle. In the last two chapters of Revelation, which are the end of the entire Scriptures, is a holy city, the New Jerusalem. The Bible, especially the New Testament, has been studied, interpreted, and taught for nearly twenty centuries. We are standing on the shoulders of many who have gone before us and have seen many parts of the divine revelation. Today our interpretation of the Bible is not based upon our narrow view. It is based upon the corporate view of the Body.
When the expositors of the Bible came to the New Jerusalem, it was difficult for them to say whether the New Jerusalem was a literal city or a sign. Revelation 1:1 clearly says that Christ made His revelation known to John by signs. The Lamb, who was Christ, is a sign. The lampstands are signs. For eternity Christ in Revelation is called the Lamb, the Lamb has a wife, and the wife is the city. Revelation 21:9 speaks of the city as the wife of the Lamb. How could a city be a wife? Surely, based upon the principle of the book of Revelation, the holy city is also a sign, signifying the composition of the totality of God’s redeemed saints throughout the generations, who have been regenerated, transformed, and glorified. It is not a material, lifeless city but a corporate living person as the bride, having Christ, such a wonderful person, as her Husband. This holy city is the ultimate consummation of God’s economy.
As the first God-man, Christ lived on earth in a particular way for the accomplishing of God’s eternal economy, which ultimately consummates in the New Jerusalem. The very center of the four Gospels is Christ. Matthew 1:18 and 20 say that this God-man’s conception was of the Holy Spirit. The God-man was one person but of two sources. The first source is divine, and the second source is human. He was one person of two natures — human and divine.
The section from the end of Matthew 3 through the beginning of Matthew 4 shows how this God-man lived and ministered. This one section covers three things: Christ being baptized, Christ being anointed by God, and Christ being tempted by the devil. He was tempted by the devil, but He was led by the Holy Spirit to be tempted by the devil, Satan. Have we ever realized that Christ’s temptation was led by the Holy Spirit? In other words, it was the Holy Spirit who put Him into the temptation of the devil. We need to see the intrinsic significance of His being baptized, anointed, and tempted.
Christ started His ministry when He became thirty years of age, the full age God required for anyone to serve Him. All the priests in the Old Testament had to be thirty years of age (Num. 4:3). If you were twenty-five, you could be only an apprentice, a learner, not a full priest. Luke 3 tells us that when Christ became thirty years of age, He came out to minister. Then He was baptized by a man, John the Baptist, anointed by God, and tempted by Satan. Man, God, and Satan were all involved at the beginning of the God-man’s ministry.
When John the Baptist came, God gave up the Mosaic law. The law was over. John the Baptist came with only one way — the way of righteousness. In Matthew 21:32 the Lord said, “John came to you in the way of righteousness.” We have to pay attention to this expression the way of righteousness. Moses came to Israel with many commandments, statutes, and ordinances. Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy cover all of them. But John the Baptist did not bring anything of the law. He came only in the way of righteousness. The way of righteousness is to recognize that you are good for nothing except death and burial.
John’s preaching was the beginning of the gospel of Jesus Christ (Mark 1:1). He declared, “Repent, for the kingdom of the heavens has drawn near” (Matt. 3:2). When people repented, he would put them into the water to bury them. John baptized people with water, indicating that man in the flesh is good only for death and burial. But then the Lord Jesus came to put people into the Spirit to have life (v. 11). This is the New Testament.
Christ’s ministry commenced through His baptism (vv. 13-17). Before He carried out any part of His ministry, the first thing He did was to be baptized to fulfill the righteousness according to the way of righteousness brought in by John (v. 15; 21:32). This means that even though Israel had all the laws of Moses, they were altogether unrighteous before God. Righteousness became bankrupt among Israel. Moses’ law did not help them to be righteous, so God had a new start by sending another man by the name of John. He was different from Moses. Moses was full of culture and education, but John was uncultured and uneducated. He ate wild food and wore wild clothing. Such a one was sent by God to preach the New Testament gospel at the very beginning. He preached by telling people to repent of all their unrighteousness. No one was righteous, so they all had to repent. When they repented, John baptized them, indicating that they were good only for death and burial. After this burial they were led to One who would come after John. This One would bury them into the Spirit to give them a new life.
The Lord Jesus recognized that, according to His flesh (His humanity — John 1:14; Rom. 1:3; 8:3), He was good for nothing but death and burial. Jesus needed to be baptized because He became flesh, and the flesh, in the eyes of God, is good for nothing but death and burial. To bury such a dead person by baptism is the way of righteousness, not the way of the law with its statutes and ordinances.
Christ’s ministry commenced through His baptism and then by God the Father’s anointing (Matt. 3:16b-17). The opening of the heavens indicated that the significance of His baptism was accepted and sealed by the heavens. The Father’s sending His Spirit to descend upon Him indicated that the Triune God would be one with Him as the source, supply, power, and authority of His ministry. His anointing by God the Father declared to the universe, particularly to the angels, that according to the Spirit of holiness (His divinity — Rom. 1:4), He is the Son of God, the Beloved of the Father, in whom is the Father’s delight.
In the flesh He was good for nothing but death and burial. But by anointing Him, the Father declared something according to another source — the source of the Spirit of holiness, His divinity. The Father declared that this One standing in the water, baptized by John, had two sources: the source of the flesh, His humanity, and the source of the Spirit of holiness, His divinity. According to His humanity, He was in the flesh, which was good for nothing but death and burial, but according to His divinity, He was the Son of God. In the Old Testament sometimes the angels were called the sons of God. Job 1 speaks of a time when God and the angels had a conference, and it refers to the angels as His sons (v. 6). But Christ is not an angel of God. This One is of the divine source — divinity. God anointed Him and declared, particularly to the angels, that He was the Son of God according to His divinity.
His anointing was based upon the Father’s choosing (Matt. 12:17-19) and because of Christ’s loving of righteousness and hating of lawlessness (Heb. 1:9). God brought in the way of righteousness, so Christ as a man hated lawlessness and loved righteousness. Because of this, God particularly anointed Him.
At the beginning of His ministry the Lord passed through a temptation under the leading of the Holy Spirit of God arranged by God for the God-man to be tested before His assuming of His ministry (Matt. 4:1-11). Not many have seen that Christ was tempted by the devil under the leading of the Holy Spirit and under the arrangement of God. This anointed One had to be tested by the evil one before He assumed His ministry.
The devil, based upon God the Father’s saying to the God-man in His anointing that He was God’s beloved Son, tempted Him to make a show of Himself being the Son of God for His self-exaltation and self-glorification and to do a miracle to bid the stones to become loaves of bread for His hunger, but the God-man defeated him by not making a show of Himself and not caring for the loaves of bread but for every word of God (vv. 3-4). If any of us had been in the Lord’s place, we probably would have declared, “I am the Son of God,” and then we would have proved it by bidding the stones to become loaves of bread. But Jesus Christ did not take the devil’s temptation. He was the Son of God, but He did not need to make a show of it. He took the position of a man, who lives not only by bread but also by every word of God. He cared only for God’s interests, not for His need. This is the intrinsic significance of the first part of the devil’s temptation.
Again, the devil, based upon God the Father’s saying that the God-man was His beloved Son, tempted the God-man to jump from the wing of the temple so that God would command His angels to bear Him up, but the God-man overcame him by telling him that it is written, “You shall not test the Lord your God” (vv. 5-7). The devil tempted the Lord again to perform a miracle that would exalt and glorify the self, but the God-man overcame him by telling him that He as a man should not test the Lord His God. He was standing on His position as a man, and He did not want to do anything to show that He was the Son of God.
Those who are young in the Lord’s recovery or in the ministry always want to do something marvelous. You may go to a new place and desire to have gospel meetings with many people getting saved and with miracles. But we need to realize that this is a temptation to exalt and glorify the self. Any thought of doing miraculous things in religion for self-exaltation is a temptation of the devil. The Lord Jesus said, “Many will say to Me in that day, Lord, Lord, was it not in Your name that we prophesied, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name did many works of power? And then I will declare to them: I never knew you. Depart from Me, you workers of lawlessness” (7:22-23).
The devil took the God-man to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said to Him, “All these will I give You if You will fall down and worship me,” but the God-man conquered him by not loving the worldly kingdoms and their glory and saying to the devil, “Go away, Satan! For it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve’” (4:8-10). The Lord defeated the devil by standing on the ground of man to worship and serve only God.
It was under the leading of the Spirit of God that the first God-man was brought to be tempted by the devil for His test. With the devil, the enemy of God, that temptation was a temptation, but with God, it was a test, and the test became a battle between Satan and God concerning the accomplishment of God’s eternal economy. Knowing that God wanted to destroy him by the man, in his flesh, that is, in his humanity, whom he had poisoned and spoiled, Satan took the strategy of tempting the first God-man to assume that He was the Son of God, standing far off from the position of His humanity. Knowing this, the first God-man fought back by saying “man” (v. 4), holding fast the standing of His being a man. This defeated Satan’s subtle strategy. Furthermore, in the God-man’s second and third fighting back, His answers, “You shall not test the Lord your God” and “You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve” (vv. 7, 10), all were His strongest emphasis that He was a man, a creature of God, dealing with Satan, another creature of God, to take the strongest stand with God for God’s glory. God would not deal with Satan as his Creator. Instead, God dealt with him by another creature, man. Satan tried his best to tempt this man to stay away from His position as a man. But the Lord Jesus stood in man’s position firmly to glorify God and accomplish God’s economy.
The God-man’s defeating of the tempter’s initial temptation equaled His passing of God’s test and qualified Him to be God’s Anointed, Messiah among Israel, and Christ among Christians for God’s economy.
In this initial warfare Satan’s intention was to destroy the One anointed by God for His economy. But he lost the war and left that battleground in shame before the angels of God (v. 11a).
In this initial fighting for God’s economy, the first God-man won the war for the glory of God, and the angels of God came triumphantly and ministered to the God-man, taking care of His forty-day fasting hunger (v. 11b).
