jesus and the rich young ruler
introduction
Probably just weeks before Jesus would ride into Jerusalem on the foal of a donkey, a young Jewish ruler, who was a quite wealthy property-owner, urgently pressed Jesus with a daunting question: “Good Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (cf. Mark 10:17-22). The Lord’s immediate response to the ruler’s use of the word “good” in addressing Him was startling. “Why do you call Me good? No one is good except God alone.”
Perhaps Jesus’ startling response was intended to illicit a confession from the ruler that he recognized Jesus was God incarnate, and had thus addressed Him accordingly. But a more probable reason for Jesus’ response can be discovered in Matthew’s account of this incident.
In his gospel, Matthew recorded that the ruler, using the identical word for “good” in both his address and his question, queried, “. . . what good (emphasis, mine) thing shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (Matt. 19:16).
Obviously, Jesus drew attention to the self-contradictory correlation between the theology of the ruler’s address and the resulting futility of his question. If no one but God is intrinsically good, how can anyone—other than God– do something that is intrinsically good? So, if inheriting eternal life for a human (one intrinsically evil, cf. Matt. 7:11) required doing something intrinsically good, no one could do anything to possess eternal life.
It is quite possible that the rich young ruler had—at the very moment Jesus pointed out no human could possibly do anything to possess eternal life—understood that eternal life must be a gift from God, and believed this reality thereby inheriting eternal life.
From Jesus’ further elaboration about inheriting or possessing eternal life, it is clear that He identified from the Law six different things the ruler should do. Either Jesus had just contradicted His point that evil cannot beget good, or the ruler had received the new birth from God and Jesus was further instructing the ruler as one already born again.
The following ten points are offered to support the idea that the rich young ruler was indeed born again in the early moments of his interview with Jesus.
the ten biblical reasons
1. Jesus taught that the whole Law depended upon two commandments: love your God and love your neighbor (Matt. 22:36-40). In fact, Jesus had endorsed this very premise publicly from a cynical lawyer’s response about inheriting eternal life. The lawyer’s answer had included both commandments (Luke 10:25). However, when the respectful rich young ruler inquired about inheriting eternal life, Jesus omitted the first and foremost commandment, “love the Lord your God,” from His answer (Mark 10:19). Why the difference?
The answer is suggested in Paul’s letter to those born again in the Galatian churches. The apostle wrote that the whole Law is fulfilled in one statement: love your neighbor (Gal. 5:14). The apostle’s observation to born-again people was identical to Jesus’ answer to the rich young ruler, indicating the likelihood that the ruler was also born again. The cynical lawyer was obviously not born again.
2. Jesus’ four Law-unrelated commands to the rich young ruler were: go, sell, give, and follow Me. These commands are identical to Jesus’ previous admonishment to those whose Father is God—that is, to those born again (Luke 12:32-33). Thus, the rich young ruler can probably be classed as one born again.
3. Mark’s account of the rich young ruler’s interview with the Lord noted, “Jesus loved him [the ruler]” (Mark 10:21). This statement is reminiscent of the apostle John’s reference to himself as the disciple whom Jesus loved (John 13:23). The fact that Jesus loved the rich young ruler is similar to Jesus’ relationship with John and likely more than merely a description of Jesus’ feelings. Since Jesus never said or did anything on His own initiative (cf. John 14:10), Jesus’ love likely manifested the Father’s love—putting the ruler in the same class of chosen ones as the born-again apostle John, and the “loved one,” Jacob (Rom. 9:13).
The experiential knowledge that Jesus loves one is available only to the one loved, and comes from the Spirit of God witnessing with one’s own born-again human spirit that he is a child of God (Rom. 8:16).
4. Jesus promised the rich young ruler that if he went, sold his possessions, gave the proceeds from the sale to the poor, and followed Him, he would have treasure in heaven (Mark 10:21). If one negates the cause in this cause-and-effect assertion, it would read: if you do not go, sell, give, and follow, you will not have treasure in heaven. Notice the negated promise cannot be made to say, “you will not go to heaven.” It simply says, “you will not have treasure in heaven.” But you will be in heaven. Those who are born again populate heaven; hence, the rich young ruler was born again.
5. A summary of the synoptics’ accounts of the rich young ruler’s episode with Jesus reveals two things: one, the overwhelmingly urgent need of a spiritual Jew; and two, the ruler’s highest respect for Jesus’ expertise in answering an inquiry about that need. Therefore, common sense dictates that this young ruler of the Jews would not possibly disregard an acknowledged Expert’s prescription for life. Such an action would be like someone with a deadly disease urgently seeking the help of a highly trained, skilled, knowledgeable, and recognized physician, only to totally disregard the proper protocols for healing upon hearing those protocols from the doctor. Such behavior would recognizably defy common sense, bordering on the irrational. The rich young ruler exhibited no such irrational behavior indicating he was born again spiritually.
6. The first command in the sequence of four that Jesus gave the Jewish ruler was to “go.” The ruler promptly “went away.” He obeyed Jesus immediately and without further questions, discussion, argument, or request for clarification. A key characteristic of those born again is obedience to the Lord no matter how unconventional the commands—an obedience clearly manifested by the ruler.
7. Mark’s gospel noted that the highly successful ruler went away “grieved.” Most commentators assume the grief came from the ruler’s decision not to sell his possessions and thereby to forfeit eternal life. But, an equally valid assumption is that his grief stemmed from his decision to sell his possessions and to itinerate with a highly controversial Person—and then having to face his Jewish wife, his Jewish mother, his Jewish mother-in-law, and his Jewish children who all had likely become accustomed to a lifestyle of the rich and famous. Grief from the latter proposed decision is much more likely than from the popularly posited decision of relinquishing the treasures of eternal life in heaven. Thus, the ruler was born again.
8. Jesus commented on the ruler’s grief reaction by warning His disciples that it would be hard, or difficult, for those with wealth to enter the kingdom of God (Mark 10:23). The fact is that the scriptures teach many who unquestionably do enter the kingdom will experience difficulties, hardships, and trials. How difficult it would probably become for the pauperized former ruler to hear derisive remarks from his respected colleagues and contemporaries about his commitment to follow someone who had little, if any, standing with the establishment. Peter (an eye-witness to the interchange between Jesus and the ruler, and who immediately asked Jesus a question about his own discipleship) wrote, “. . . it is with difficulty that the righteous is saved . . .” (1 Pet. 4:18). Difficulties accompany and may even impede entrance into the kingdom, but do not prevent entrance. Hence, the rich young ruler was born again and on his way to heaven—while facing the difficult, unpleasant exigencies of life along the way.
9. Those commentators who do not believe in a “works” salvation have a terrible time trying to explain Jesus’ answer to the ruler about possessing eternal life. This is so because Jesus’ words clearly teach the kind of faith that manifests works. If His words, however, were intended for one born again, as is suggested herein, then Jesus’ suggested works related to faithful service and not to salvation. Such an explanation resolves perfectly commentators’ theological quandary that develops from assuming the ruler was not born again.
10. In his gospel account of Jesus’ experience in the garden at Gethsemane, Mark alone mentioned a “certain young man” who was following Jesus (Mark 14:51-52). When Jesus’ apprehenders arrived, all His disciples fled except for this single young follower. When the members of the arresting party seized this young follower, he left behind a linen sheet that was covering his body and escaped naked.
Some commentators believe this young follower was Mark himself. Our analysis suggests that not only was this Mark, but also this was the rich young ruler who in obedience to Jesus, went, sold all his possessions—except for a linen sheet—gave to the poor, and followed Jesus (as commanded) right into the garden on the night He was betrayed. Thus, this two-sentence cameo was Mark’s way of testifying to his own regenerate state after posing his question, “Good Teacher, what good thing shall I do that I may obtain eternal life?” (Matt. 19:16 combined with Mark 10:17).
conclusion
Summarizing: the rich young ruler had become born again sometime early in his dialogue with his Good Teacher. The episode makes clear that eternal life can only be a gift from God. After being born again, treasure in heaven may be accumulated by focusing on, and following after, Jesus. The rich young ruler was none other than John Mark.
the lawyer, jesus, and the samaritan
As Jesus’ ministry began to widen to include gentiles, a Jewish lawyer—arrogant, cynical, and self- righteous—challenged the uncredentialed son of a carpenter from Nazareth with a personal question about a spiritual matter. “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” (cf. Luke 10:25-37).
In the best of rabbinical teaching traditions—answering a question with a question—Jesus responded to the studied student of the Law, “What is written in the Law? How does it read to you?” Now the tables had been turned. The questioner became questionee.
The lawyer demonstrated his legal acumen: ‘love your God; love your neighbor.’ Jesus judged the lawyer’s answer to his own opening question as correct in terms of physical life, and added that if the lawyer were to obey both commands, to love God and his neighbor as himself, he might prolong his physical life.
God had given Moses the Law, among other things, to maintain and preserve physical life. Since God never bestows eternal life posthumously, the only thing the lawyer himself could do to inherit eternal life was to avoid premature physical death through obedience to the Law, while waiting to see if God would give him a new birth.
However, the lawyer’s self-righteousness bubbled to the surface prompting him to pose a subsequent question: “. . . who is my neighbor?”
To answer the lawyer’s second question, Jesus told a story that has become known popularly as the story of the Good Samaritan. Although Jesus told the story primarily to answer explicitly the second question asked by the lawyer, the story’s remarkable illustrative qualities provided further insight into the spiritual realities of inheriting eternal life.
This short story featured a victim of an encounter with some highway robbers, as well as an encounter with a certain Samaritan who came upon the incapacitated wretch while he himself was on a journey. The Samaritan promptly and fully provided all the victim’s needs in contrast to a priest and a Levite who had themselves separately spotted the victim, but then had chosen not to stop and help.
At the story’s end, Jesus deftly asked the lawyer to identify the one out of the three who had proved to be a neighbor to the robbers’ victim. The lawyer easily and correctly identified the victim’s neighbor from the details of the story. The victim’s neighbor turned out to be the Samaritan. Jesus then directed the lawyer, “Go and do the same,” namely, prove yourself a neighbor to someone in need.
Notice how Jesus framed this last question about neighbor identification. He did not ask the lawyer, “From the story, who would be identified as your neighbor?” What Jesus did say was, ‘Who proved to be the victim’s neighbor?’ This phrasing by the Lord is intriguing, and points the way to the spiritual part of the answer to the lawyer’s original question, ‘What shall I do to inherit eternal life?’
Before we can discover the spiritual realities implicit in the victim/Samaritan story, two issues need clarification. The first is, “How is a neighbor defined?’ The second is, “What does it mean to love, especially to ‘love God?’”
From the Samaritan’s perspective, the victim was a neighbor in need. So sometimes, the biblical meaning of the word ‘neighbor’ is ‘one who has a need.’ This was likely the emphasis Jesus wished to raise in an explicit response to the lawyer’s question, ‘Who is my neighbor?’ This is also the common understanding of those who have enacted so called ‘Good Samaritan Laws.’ Such laws clearly regulate meeting another’s physical need.
However, by the nature of His question at the story’s end, Jesus raised another perspective about being a neighbor—the perspective of the victim, the needy one. For the victim, the Samaritan was the one who loved him, who met his needs. Thus, sometimes the biblical meaning of the word ‘neighbor’ is ‘one who meets a need.’
When it comes to loving, the full meaning of the word ‘neighbor’ incorporates two people with their respective perspectives—the needy one, and the provider. The New Testament scriptures express this reality in the commandment highlighting the actions of both a giver and a receiver: ‘love one another.’ Some believers have trouble giving—others, with receiving.
One other observation that is apparent from the analysis of the Samaritan/victim story is that biblical love is meeting another’s needs from one’s own resources, even when doing so interrupts one’s own comings and goings.
From the meaning of biblical love, then, how does one ‘love God?’ Alternatively, to put it another way, “What resources does the creature have to meet the Creator’s need?” In fact, what need does God have? This is sort of like finding a gift for the one who has everything!
The testimony of the scriptures is that God needs a habitation in His physical creation. God’s first habitation was Adam when God breathed into His creature’s nostrils His Spirit plus air. The tabernacle became the next habitation of God, followed by the temple. In the incarnation, Jesus referred to His own body as the temple of God. In the present age, the church saint is the temple of God’s Spirit (1 Cor. 6:19-20). So ‘loving God’ means turning one’s ‘inner man’ (heart, soul, strength, and mind) over to God as His ‘residence’ on earth. The apostle Paul referred to this as ‘presenting your bodies (to God) a living and holy sacrifice’ (Rom. 12:1).
Now, let’s revisit the lawyer’s inquiry of Jesus about eternal life. The lawyer answered his own question, at Jesus’ prompting, from the Law. But the Law was unable to impart eternal life; had the Law provided the lawyer with life, his question would have been nonsensical. So something more was necessary, and that something more is Jesus Himself. Here is where the implicit meaning of the Samaritan illustrative story comes into play.
Let’s reflect on Jesus’ story, transferring the events in the physical realm to similar kinds of realities against the spiritual backdrop of the spiritual realm. Recall, Jesus had been nicknamed a ‘Samaritan’ by some of His Jewish antagonists (John 8:84). If one then applies this identity transfer to Jesus’ story told to the lawyer, then Jesus’ direction to the lawyer, “Go and do the same” not only meant “meet other’s needs,” but also included “love the One (God in Jesus) who loves you!” Here is the complete spiritual message that, when received, brings eternal life.
The victim in the story illustrated what the potent combination of indwelling sin and Satan does to God’s creature. The sin-driven, Satan controlled robbers acted as Satan’s accomplices in the world. The victim ended up incapacitated, near death—the ultimate state in the spiritual realm always produced by sin and Satan.
The priest and Levite were those from the contemporary and corrupt Jewish religious establishment who were both unwilling and unable to help Satan’s victim. The Samaritan—a figure like Jesus, despised by the Jewish leaders headquartered in Jerusalem—loved God’s creature by supplying his physical needs. Jesus, on the other hand, supplies the spiritual needs of those completely disabled by sin and Satan.
The Samaritan, as Jesus would for spiritual life, provided from his own resources all that was necessary to resuscitate physical life. In Jesus’ case, His own resources from His cross experience provided all that was necessary to restore spiritual life that sin and Satan had robbed from their victims.
One might even speculate that the Jewish lawyer, himself, could be pictured spiritually in the words Jesus used to picture the victim beside the road from Jerusalem to Jericho.
The Samaritan, as Jesus would at His ascension, left on a journey but would return, as would Jesus at His second coming. Anticipating his journey, the Samaritan left the recuperating victim in the care of a surrogate with adequate provision for the victim’s physical restoration, recuperation, and rehabilitation, as Jesus would do for those with spiritual needs through His own surrogates—His disciples.
Jesus, therefore, had Himself proved to be a neighbor by providing the cynical, condescending, self-righteous, needy lawyer—through artful questioning and direction as well as a memorable story—the very foundation for inheriting eternal life. The basis was God, in Jesus, reconciling the lawyer to Himself. Because God might eventually love the lawyer first, the lawyer would then be able to love God, give himself as a vessel for the Spirit’s habitation, and loose his self-righteousness, cynicism, and arrogance. Possessing eternal life, the lawyer could then love, and be loved, by those whom he met in his comings and goings that had needs, either physical or spiritual.
an editorial on the 2008 telescoped/truncated/transferred version
of the gospel of jesus christ
A previous editorial, The 2008 Version of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, highlighted the reality that present-day Gospel presentations discard God’s promise of godliness that is based upon a promised freedom, or deliverance, from the control of indwelling sin in a believer’s life. This often results in either a telescoped/truncated/transferred Gospel.
The scriptures have a great deal to say about behavior in the believer’s earthly life after the forgiveness of his sins with its consequent permanent and irreversible entrance into heaven. How do Gospel presentations account for all this biblical material related to behavioral godliness?
Christendom has fashioned three material-accounting techniques for the biblical requirement of behavioral godliness—telescoping, truncating, or transferring.
The first technique has been to telescope the Gospel, pushing God’s freedom from indwelling sin into His promise of forgiveness. All the biblically recognizable material related to godliness has been pushed into the promise of forgiveness for one’s sins. The promise of forgiveness then becomes contingent upon the behavioral character of one’s earthly life rather than upon God’s promise of forgiveness. Entrance into heaven under the telescoped Gospel becomes dependent upon man’s behavior throughout his earthly life.
The second technique is to truncate the material, either making it optional or simply ignoring it. After all, the rationale goes, the Gospel’s goal is framed (incorrectly) as getting a person into heaven and thereby avoiding hell. So, what happens subsequent to forgiveness with its assured collateral heavenly destination and residence is mainly inconsequential.
The third technique is to transfer the outworking of God’s promise of freedom from sin’s control of the believer to the believer himself who then must accomplish God’s promised results by his own works.
The first technique ends in failure to get to heaven, hence experiencing the calumnies of hell.
The catastrophic consequences of the second and third techniques can be failure to experience, in one’s timeless existence of heaven, the fullness of God’s intended magnificence for His child.
All three techniques end up with faith in God’s Gospel promises either obliterated or obscured.
The biblically revealed nature of God’s grace is tragically distorted with resultant misunderstanding ending in man’s malpractice of spiritual living. The salvation from one’s sins, or the deliverance from indwelling sin’s control of one’s life, is placed squarely in man’s non-failure-proof hands as his own personal responsibility. Consequently, the believer’s own works to fulfill this responsibility usurp the glory due God.
The reality of God’s Gospel is that what God requires for His child—forgiveness and deliverance or freedom—God Himself does for His child. God does not help, or enable, man to do what God requires. Actually, God promises to do Himself what He requires of His creature. This is the true nature of God’s grace.
Here, a caveat is in order. Before a child of God is born again into God’s family, God’s grace freely provides a new heart and new spirit enabling the new birth. Otherwise, His child would not be enabled to receive, understand, and believe God’s promises. In this sense, then, God’s grace enables man.
To illustrate God’s grace, after Adam confessed his first sinful act, God Himself acquired and provided His own acceptable sacrifice to cover temporarily the effects of that sin. At the very outset, the undistorted display of God’s grace became obvious. God did not just present Adam with an animal’s skin so that Adam would be enabled to dress himself in the God-supplied clothing. God, Himself, actually dressed Adam in the animal’s skin. What God requires, He Himself does. That’s grace.
God’s Gospel-promised grace is actualized in one’s life by simply hearing and believing God’s promises. Belief is the only response necessary to God’s promises because God is indeed a God of His word.
an editorial on the 2008 version
of the gospel of jesus christ
Today’s gospel presentations are framed, in positive terms, as the way to get to heaven. Framed negatively, they are how to avoid going to hell. That’s it. Nothing more.
Yet the gospel of Jesus Christ recorded in the New Testament scriptures contains something more.
A complete statement of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is: your sins are forgiven (qualifying you for heaven) and you can live free from the control of indwelling sin. The Gospel is a single message, not two. The Gospel is comprised of two inextricably linked spiritual realities in an inviolate sequence: forgiveness and then freedom.
However, today’s version of the Gospel mentions forgiveness only. So, metaphorically, the child of the Gospel is born again with arms only. His legs are missing so he is not equipped to walk the walk his Father designed, promised, and implemented.
The fault does not lie with God. The crippled or handicapped life of God’s child on the way to heaven results from bisected gospel presentations that discard the promise of freedom from sin. One can hear the tragedy in the popular credo: “I’m just a sinner saved by grace.”
A more appropriate biblical credo would be: “I’m a saint saved by grace.”
The spiritual disaster of crippled children on their way to heaven is enormous because the disaster has eternal significance. Their eternal status is not that of children of a lesser god, but rather children of a lesser gospel.
the temptations of christ
introduction
Over the fifteen-hundred years from Moses to Jesus, the Jewish people had lived with members of the Levitical priesthood in their midst—first with the tabernacle in their wilderness wanderings, then followed by Levites living in forty-eight cities strategically located throughout the land (Num. 35:7) and additionally at the temple in Jerusalem until its 70 AD destruction. God made Himself the Levites’ inheritance (Josh 13:33); as priests, they were God’s messengers, readily available to deal knowledgeably with any ignorant or misguided Jews in matters theological (Mal. 2:7; Heb. 5:2).
Just days before His crucifixion, Jesus entered the temple and aggressively brought the Levitical priesthood to a temporary, albeit lengthy, halt (Mark 11:16). About three-dozen years after Jesus’ suspension of His Father’s Levitical priesthood, a Jewish writer, with comprehensive knowledge about the priesthood, recorded the details about God’s newly-appointed Melchizedekian high priest who was competently and comprehensively fulfilling the needs of church saints.
The Jewish writer reassuringly informed his believing brethren that they have a great and sympathetic high priest, Jesus the Son of God, who currently ministers unstintingly on their behalf before the heavenly throne of grace. Jesus’ extraordinary sympathy is founded upon a single, vitally important, reality: the reality of “. . . having been tempted in all things (emphasis mine), without [committing] a sin” (Heb. 4:15).
By application, Jesus’ sympathetic and gentle high-priestly ministry extends to all gentile believers as well. This biblical essay will show how Jesus was indeed tempted in all things and yet never sinned.
the essence of all things
Temptations, also known as testing or trials, assault all believers through three avenues: two from sources outside the believer—the devil and the world—and one from an inside source, indwelling sin. These three avenues, plus any combination or sequence of the three, comprise the essence of all things. So during His earthly ministry, Satan tempted Jesus, as did the world and indwelling sin. The temptations from this terrible trilogy were recorded in holy writ so believers might take confidence that they will benefit from their loving, knowledgeable, empathetic, and compassionate high priest in times requiring God’s mercy and grace.
Satan’s threefold temptation of jesus
Since the virgin birth had produced a Jewish male infant without indwelling sin—and Jesus never committed an act of sin—Satan could not access Jesus’ inner man in the same way he would later use at Judas’ betrayal. Satan was, therefore, limited to attacking Jesus externally—from outside.
Immediately following His baptism by John, the Spirit consigned Jesus to the wilderness for forty days and nights of fasting (cf. Matt. 4:1-11). Following this prolonged fasting, Satan appeared in the wilderness, suggesting Jesus take the initiative to assuage His intense hunger pangs by doing a miracle. Since His Father had not given any word (i.e., instructions by which a man lives) endorsing the satanic suggestion of the stones-to-food conversion, Jesus obediently demurred.
Next, Satan removed Jesus from the wilderness to the temple’s pinnacle in Jerusalem. While Jesus stood at the edge, Satan reasoned with Him from God’s word that He could immediately and publicly produce His credentials as God’s Son by launching Himself into space. The Satanic reasoning went this way: “the Father will instruct His angels to catch You.”
Satan’s subtlety must not be overlooked here. The Father intended Jesus’ resurrection to be the event of His credentials presentation demonstrating that He is the Son of God (cf. Acts 13:33). Thus, a preemptive leap from the temple into angels’ hands would put the Lord God’s plan at risk, thereby coercing God into making some program adjustment. Such action, as Jesus reminded Satan, would contravene God’s very word of not putting the Lord God to a test.
Finally, Satan whisked Jesus off to a very high mountain—perhaps the very mountain where, later in His ministry, Jesus’ kingship over the whole world would be displayed through His transfiguration. On the mountaintop, Satan—the god of this world (2 Cor. 4:4)—made a legitimate but premature offer of all the kingdoms and their glory. The offer, however, contained a contingency clause: “if You fall down and worship me.” Jesus again countered Satan’s reasoning from God’s word. The only legitimate object of one’s entire self and service is the God of the scriptures (Deut. 6:16). Therefore, Satan’s proposal for luciferian adulation was scripturally preposterous!
Following Satan’s temptation, and departure, angels arrived and ministered to Jesus underscoring the enervating viciousness of the threefold temptation.
It may be noted that the strategy Jesus used exclusively to foil Satan’s scripture-twisting temptations was to rely solely on God’s unvarnished word. Man does, in fact, live on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Entertaining Satan’s speculative reasonings from God’s revelations to man can, and often does, lead to separation from God—spiritually and physically.
the world’s temptations of jesus
To catalog each temptation Jesus suffered from the world could prove tedious and repetitive. So this section of the essay contains a few relevant observations and principles that will aid those interested in discovering occasions when Jesus was tempted externally by the world. Two biblical examples reveal the nature of the temptations and His responses to those temptations.
A biblical definition of the word “world” is helpful. The “world” is a diabolical organization of spirit beings and human beings that is under Satan’s direction and control. The world was inimical to Jesus but could only bring temptation against Him, not from within Him (Heb. 12:3). At no time, however, can Satan and his world system operate outside God’s control.
The world continually and unrelentingly promotes Satan’s agenda. Satan’s agenda has the single goal of making the believer think that he is obligated to do something to make himself like God—self sufficient, independent, and righteous. Satan’s temptations through his world system are always couched in terms of what man must do to make himself godly. This is, indeed, a noble goal in life—being godly—and, in fact, forms a key element in God’s salvation. However, becoming like god for man happens only by man believing God’s promise that God Himself will make man like god (cf. Ezek. 36:25-27 and 1 Pet. 1:3). When a believer makes an initiative based upon the primary thought behind Satan’s agenda, an act of sin is likely to follow.
Note this extraordinary self-revelatory statement that summarized Jesus’ remarkable relationship with His Father during His earthly ministry: “I can do nothing (my emphasis) on My own initiative” (John 5:30a). Jesus underscored this reality by repeating: “. . . I do nothing on My own initiative, but I speak these things as the Father taught Me. And He who sent Me is with Me; He has not left Me alone, for I always (my emphasis) do the things that are pleasing to Him” (John 8:28-29).
Jesus averted succumbing to the world’s overpowering temptations by His God-supported resolve to do nothing on His own initiative. All Jesus’ actions and words were done under the Father’s strict and completely authoritative direction, ever-present supervision, and unlimited power. That is why Jesus was able to make His accurate and uncontestable claim to Philip: “. . . he who has seen Me has seen the Father” (John 14:9).
Such self-determined passivity on Jesus’ part toward His Father’s guidance meant Jesus committed no sin. When faced with temptations from the world, His Father’s directions contained not one endorsement to commit a sin (cf. Jas. 1:13); He always pleased His Father. Hence, though powerful and cunning, the world’s temptations were perfectly impotent against Jesus.
The Father has also provided all His believing children with those resources necessary to resist or avoid sinning when besieged by worldly temptations (cf. 1 Cor. 10:13).
For those who are familiar with God’s revealed word, Satan often—if not exclusively—employs his world’s propaganda machine to distort God’s word. Distortions and the resultant deceptions induce the world’s victim to rely upon speculative human reasoning independent of, or protracted beyond, God’s revelations. Speculative human reasoning by believers can lead to spiritual disaster.
Two biblical examples of Jesus ever-effective thwarting of the world’s temptations are as follow.
One, shortly after miraculously feeding four thousand from seven loaves of bread and a few small fish, the Pharisees and Sadducees began to argue with Jesus. The Pharisees and Sadducees—educated, high-profile, influential, and powerful national leaders–were the world’s spokesmen. Their intention was to tempt Jesus much along the same lines as Satan had tempted Him in the wilderness—to validate His identity by demonstrating the Spirit’s power through Himself at their behest (Matt. 16:1-4). Jesus’ response to them was to enthusiastically accede to the Father’s intent that His future resurrection would be the sign that would validate His identity.
Second, while on the cross the fellow-crucified robbers, passers by, chief priests (a coterie of retired high priests), scribes, and elders were tempting Jesus: “If You are the Son of God, come down from the cross” (Matt. 27:39-43). The world was tempting Him at a very painful, humiliating, and susceptible moment. Yet Jesus was wholly committed to following precisely the Father’s plan of Him offering Himself voluntarily (John 6:51; 10:11, 15; Eph. 5:12; Heb. 7:27; 9:14, 25) as a satisfactory sacrifice for sins, and for indwelling sin, of both Jew and gentile.
One further thought. Believers sometimes think that if God would only clearly articulate and inform them of His will in each of life’s trials, then they would be able to endure without yielding and committing a sin. In thinking this way, it sometimes escapes one’s notice that a faithful God “. . . will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also . . .” (1 Cor. 10:13). God’s will, while under temptations, is revealed adequately in His word. In case of uncertainty, consider doing nothing on one’s own initiative!
Sometimes when under temptation, God’s will antagonizes one’s own will—particularly through temptations that attack from within. This phenomenon leads us to the final kind of temptation our Lord endured that exposed Him to being tested in last component of all things—indwelling sin.
indwelling sin’s threefold temptation of jesus
It may be difficult to find extra-biblical support for this reality of indwelling sin tempting Jesus. So we will develop this truth carefully and diligently from the scriptures.
Two critical truths were necessary for God’s salvation plan to achieve perfect, God-acceptable results. One, a human sacrifice—one who had himself committed no sin–had to be prepared. In addition, the sacrifice would have to die (physically) in a voluntary fashion and not by a death of violence. The second truth was that God’s sacrifice, later to become God’s high priest for God’s children, had to be tempted in all things—including sin dwelling in his physical body. These two truths both lead us to one unavoidable conclusion: God’s candidate for the perfect sacrifice for man’s salvation must, of necessity, have a body indwelt by sin at some point in his physical life.
Let’s review some biblical facts. The man, Adam, was (through his seed) alone responsible for the entire human race receiving indwelling sin that forms an integral part of everyone’s genetic make-up. That indwelling sin compels everyone—without exception—at some point in his development to commit a sin. God adjudicates immediately that initial sin resulting in that person’s immediate spiritual death followed eventually by his physical death (Rom. 5:12-14, Western text).
At least thirteen characteristics describe indwelling sin. Indwelling sin:
-invades, at conception, the physical bodies of all humanity through one’s biological father,
-permeates and effects all members of one’s physical body (including the brain, endocrine system, etc.),
-generates deceptions (wrong thoughts) and lusts (strong feelings),
-promotes consistently the agenda of asserting one’s independence from God,
-irresistibly compels all developing humans to commit an initial act of sin,
-yields spiritual death by God’s immediate judgment upon one’s initial act of sin,
-causes enslavement to itself through an act of sin,
-causes non-violent physical death,
-is activated (empowered) by any law intended to regulate human behavior,
-causes failure of its own agenda-generated human resolve, determination, and disciplines that are all impotent against indwelling sin’s power,
-can be controlled only by the Spirit’s completely effective power, actuated by the believer through faith in God’s promises, to deactivate indwelling sin,
-can cohabit the believer’s body with God, Christ, and the Holy Spirit without defiling the believer due to the cleansing power of God’s high priest, and
-has been eviscerated of its enslaving power in the human body by Jesus’ death and resurrection (thereby establishing the second part of Jesus’ gospel, cf. Acts 13:39).
God ingeniously provided a physical body meeting the requirements for His atoning sacrifice. The body would be conceived and born without indwelling sin through the agency of the Holy Spirit working alone with the seed of the woman (Luke 1:26-25).
The virgin birth avoided Adam’s lethal legacy. Presence of indwelling sin in the infant body of God’s firstborn would eventually have compelled its host to commit a sin at some point in the host’s physical development. Such a sinful act would mean disqualification from being a substitutionary sacrifice for the elects’ sins because the sacrifice would die physically only for his own sinful act.
Here is the point at which a seemly irresolvable divine conflict arises—the conflict between the need for a sinless substitutionary sacrifice (not an indwelling-sin-free sacrifice) and for the sacrifice’s voluntary death (from indwelling sin). The distinction between being sinless and sin-free is worth understanding. A sinless sacrifice has committed no act of sin even though it is not sin-free, i.e., the physical death-producing virus of indwelling sin cohabits the human body.
God’s remedy for this intractable conflict was to incorporate indwelling sin into Jesus’ body at some point just before His death on the cross (2 Cor. 5:21; cf. Rom. 6:9-10; Heb. 12:3).
God’s remedy had at least three effects. The first effect was that the Father’s solution allowed a mature and temptation-tried Jesus—like every believer—to live for a brief season with indwelling sin while at the same time without yielding to sin’s compulsive and deceptive lusts (as promised by God to all believing mankind in 1 Cor. 10:13). Such a condition allowed Jesus to be tempted by indwelling sin just like all believers are, thus qualifying Him for His sympathetic priesthood.
By way of a second effect, God’s remedy provided for Jesus the possibility of voluntarily relinquishing His physical life through indwelling sin on the cross.
The third effect was a believer could receive God’s New Covenant promises of freedom from the law of sin and death. Jesus’ death (from indwelling sin) and resurrection (from death) provided the mechanism through which Spirit baptism of the believer into Christ’s death and resurrection would provide freedom from slavery to indwelling sin (cf. Rom. 6:1-23; Ezek. 36:26-27).
The question now arises, “When, exactly, did God make Jesus sin?” (2 Cor. 5:21). The answer lies in a reference the writer to the Hebrews made regarding Jesus’ qualifications for high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. The writer wrote, “In the days of His flesh, when He offered up both prayers and supplications with loud crying and tears to Him who was able to save Him from death [death meaning separation from fellowship with the Father, not a premature physical death that would obviously undermine God’s plan of the cross], and who was heard because of His piety . . .” (Heb. 5:7). Furthermore, the same writer continued, likely referring to the same event, and wrote, “For consider Him . . .” followed by, “You [Jewish believers] have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin [as He did], . . .” (Heb. 12:3-4).
These descriptions in the letter to the Hebrews of Jesus’ life experience lead us to a garden in a place called Gethsemane on the night He was betrayed. You can read the full account by combining Matt. 26:31-45, 56; Mark 14:32-41, 49-50; and Luke 22:39-46. Gethsemane’s experience was unparalleled by any other recorded event in Jesus’ life.
Let’s look at a summary of Jesus’ quite-unique Gethsemane experience. For the only time recorded in the scriptures, He asked three of His disciples to help Him spiritually by praying. Three times in unprecedented succession, He asked the Father fervently to remove from Him “this cup.” Both before this event—John 12:27—and after this event—John 18:11—Jesus asked only