Temptation is the currency of Hell, and the devil was in the wilderness looking for a bargain. “If You are the Son of God,” he told Jesus, “command that these stones become bread” (Matthew 4:3).
How many of us have gone without food for 40 hours, let alone 40 days? The Son of God had fasted for 40 days, and his body was crying out for food. Who wouldn’t be tempted?
But Jesus was not about to sell his inheritance for a meal. Instead, he points to every man’s true source of nourishment: “Man shall not live by bread alone,” he informed Satan, “but by every word that comes from the mouth of God” (Matthew 4:4).
Peter spoke for us all when he said to Jesus, “You have words of eternal life” (John 6:68). And his are the words of our Commission.
We fulfill the Great Commission by calling the lost to Jesus, and “teaching them to observe all that I commanded you” (Matthew 28:20).
Tragically, there are as many interpretations of what Jesus meant by “all that I commanded you,” as there are denominations on earth. How must we sort through all of that…?
An easy way out for you and me is to just leave people to their preferences. “After all,” we reason, “if people want to follow false teachers, that is their choice.”
Praise God that that was not the way of Jesus. He understood what people believed, and with compassion for all – even for those who hated him – he taught the truth of salvation.
So, what can you and I do for a world that has chosen to trade its soul for the Bread of Death instead of the Bread of Life?
Jesus calls us to work on this seemingly insurmountable task of winning the world to Christ by striving to “live by every word that comes from the mouth of God.”
“Wonderful Words Of Life.”
John Staiger
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