Reading:
Luke 3:21-22; 4:1-12.
This
section of Luke which we have read contains all the
principles and elements of what we have been occupied
with in this series of meditations - that is, the
significance of Christ. Here we have the significance of
Christ as the presenting to God of a manhood, a humanity,
which, being according to God's mind, has given back to
it the opened heaven which was lost by the first man; the
restoration of the face of God which was turned away from
Adam and his race because of the kind of man that he
became through disobedience. That, in a sentence or two,
is the significance of Christ.
Now
Luke, as all Bible students know, is peculiarly the
Gospel of the representation of Christ as the Son of Man.
This Gospel is a record of the life, works and words of
the Son of Man, given without any spiritual
interpretation - just the record. It is the only Gospel
which has a preface. Luke says that he took pains to
ascertain the truth of all the things that he was about
to write. The spiritual interpretation came later. It
waited upon two things: firstly, the coming of the Holy
Spirit as the interpreter, secondly, Spirit-indwelt
people to whom He could interpret. In this record, then,
we have no spiritual interpretation, but from the
vantage-ground of our now having the Spirit and the
interpretation in the later New Testament, we are able to
see the spiritual principles which are here.
THE MEANING OF BAPTISM
I must
condense very much into a short space, so let us come to
this matter of Christ's baptism, and reiterate what is
probably well-known to most. It is necessary to our
purpose that we should first of all be reminded of the
meaning of baptism itself. Baptism is not peculiarly or
exclusively a Christian ordinance. There was a Jewish
baptism by water, and when John came baptizing, he was
not doing anything strange so far as Israel was
concerned. They were very familiar with it as a kind of
'nationalization' ordinance, when a Gentile wanted to
embrace the Jewish faith, just as Christians are
baptized. In the pagan world baptism was also known - not
of water but of fire. The basic significance in Jewish,
Christian or pagan world is the same, but for the
Christian it is so much deeper and more meaningful. With
the Jew, baptism simply meant that the man died to his
old racial connections as a Gentile, and rose to become
in effect a Jew, a member of another race. With the
pagan, the baptism of fire or 'making their sons to pass
through the fire' - you remember that phrase in the Old
Testament - was simply a passing as into death, with the
destruction of an old connection, an old system, and an
initiation into something altogether new. In Christian
baptism, the same ideas are present, but with this extra,
that this baptism speaks of the utter depravity of man.
Pagans would not admit that, and the Jews would not admit
that. But Christian baptism testifies to the utter
depravity of man, his hopelessness before God; it says
that he is by God utterly rejected, unacceptable, and
that if there is to be any hope at all he must die and
rise again. It must be a death and a burial, signifying
the complete passing out of that man, as to all that he
himself is and as to all that with which, by nature in
Adam, he is connected. Man's depravity calls for - not
repairs, but death and burial.
That
gives tremendous and wonderful significance to the
baptism of Jesus.
He who
knew no sin, in whom there were no seeds of depravity; He
who was the Son of God, who held the title in His own
rights to be equal with God, and was equal with God; He
who was with the Father in glory, as He prayed,
"Father, glorify thou me with thine own self with
the glory which I had with thee before the world
was" (John 17:5); HE came and identified
Himself with man, in his utter depravity and
God-rejection. When He came to Jordan to be baptized, it
was a most wonderful thing that happened - that He, being
such as He was, should take the place, in death, of one
completely cast out by God, buried from His sight, put
away as being wholly unacceptable to the eyes of God,
identifying Himself with sinful man.
It is
small wonder that John the Baptist, the 'baptizer',
demurred when He came to be baptized. John would have
forbidden Him. "I have need to be baptized of thee,
and comest thou to me?" (Matt. 3:14). John
could not understand this - because God had spoken to
John, God had intimated to John that the Messiah
was in the vicinity. John knew that he was the
forerunner, that he was fulfilling the prophecies
concerning himself as the opener of the door to the
Christ, and he had the intimation that this was He; and
he stood back aghast that such a One should wish to take
this place. "Ye offspring of vipers", John was
saying - 'you serpents' brood, fleeing from the oncoming
fire of judgment, trying to get into the water for your
escape!' That is how John viewed those who came to be
baptized. And then Jesus came on that ground. How
marvellous is the condescension of our Lord Jesus! How
far down He has gone for our salvation! How utterly He
has touched the depths for our sin and sinfulness! Can He
do more?
CHRIST'S BAPTISM NOT FOR HIMSELF
And then
John's great declaration afterward. "Behold, the
Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the
world!" (John 1:29). That is a confirmation of his
apprehension of the significance of Christ: he saw that
this Man was not dying for His own sin; He was not being
baptized because He Himself was a sinner. He was doing it
for the sin of the world. This was all a rehearsal of the
Cross which was coming later, and surely this in itself
speaks to us - could anything speak more forcibly than
this? - of that great feature of God's Man, heaven's Man,
the Man who will get the open heaven, the Man who will
have the face of God - that wonderful feature of His
humility. Yes, He took the form of a man, was "found
in fashion as a man" (Phil. 2:7-8) - a true man; His
was true humanity.
CHRIST IDENTIFIED IN HEAVEN BUT
NOT RECOGNIZED ON EARTH
There
seems a paradox here, almost a contradiction, but here it
is. There was nothing on the outside at all to indicate
that Jesus was different from any other man. John said,
"I knew him not" (John 1:31,33). This is
strange, is it not? He must have heard of Jesus. Their
mothers were kinswomen, and had had a joyful time
together a few months before John's birth, on the
occasion of the annunciation to Mary; and all that had
happened right up through the thirty years must have been
knowledge to John of Jesus. But he had not met Him, he
did not know Him personally. He says: "I knew him
not: but he that sent me to baptize in water, he said
unto me, Upon whomsoever thou shalt see the Spirit
descending, and abiding upon him, the same is he that
baptizeth in the Holy Spirit. And I have seen, and have
borne witness that this is the Son of God" (John
1:33-34). He was identified by heaven but not recognized
on earth. He was so like other men on the outside - true
man; and yet how different inside - what a different
humanity is there! "I knew him not."
THE LORD JESUS A MAN OF MUCH
PRAYER
"Jesus...
having been baptized, and praying" (Luke 3:21). I am
glad Luke put that in there - "and praying".
What is prayer? Prayer has many aspects, but I suppose
the one which stands out most clearly and governs all
other prayer is supplication. It is the act and attitude
of a suppliant asking. Here He has become so truly one
with us in our humanity as to be in our place of
suppliants - that is, altogether dependent upon God.
People who are most conscious of their need, and most
dependent, are the most prayerful people. People who are
most self-sufficient are the most prayerless people. The
Lord Jesus was a man of much prayer, and He started here
in His public life - "and praying".
You see
the features of a man according to God's mind. And if
WE are really born from above, if we have really
apprehended the meaning of passing from one relationship
to the other, if it is true that we are in Christ, these
will be the features which characterize us. We can tell
the measure of our life in Christ by our humility, our
meekness, by our readiness and willingness to come right
down and have no reputation, by our prayerfulness
expressive of our dependence. This is the man expressed,
not only in the individual, but corporately - by
companies representing the whole Church, of which we were
speaking earlier in this series. If they have any measure
of Christ, they will be very humble people, not at all
self-important. They will be consciously very dependent
upon the Lord, and therefore very prayerful people.
HEAVEN OPENED TO CHRIST AFTER HIS
BAPTISM
We have
seen the baptism of Jesus and its meaning, giving the
significance to Him as Son of Man. Then came the open
heaven. The heaven was opened, showing us the kind of man
who inherits the open heaven, the face of God, the
recognition and acknowledgment of God. This is the kind
of man - the man who has died, the man who has been
buried, the man who has risen again on the other side.
That is the man of the open heaven.
And then
there was the Spirit as in the form of a dove coming and
resting upon Him. The Holy Spirit is not given primarily
as power to make us something. Oh, how we clamour for
power, and therefore crave for the baptism of the Holy
Spirit in order that we may have power - meaning that we
may be a success, that our work may be a success. The
Holy Spirit is really given to us because we shall never
get on at all without Him. In our union with the Man who
went down into death, declaring man's hopeless condition,
we are, as He was, utterly dependent upon a power that is
not in ourselves and of ourselves. That is the meaning of
the gift, or the baptism, of the Holy Spirit.
A NEW POSITION TESTED
If that
wants proving, the next step proves it. Before it can be
said, "And Jesus returned in the power of the
Spirit", and began to preach effectively, it has to
be said that in the Spirit He went into the wilderness to
have the whole of His new position tested.
I wish
Christians recognized the meaning of this wilderness
interlude. 'Receive the Holy Spirit and then go and get
on with it - begin today!'? Oh no! Receive the Holy
Spirit, and then have the whole basis of your life in God
put to the test and proved, and THEN go and get on
with the work - but not until then. It works like that in
principle, even if it does not seem to be like that. The
Lord keeps to His law. The baptism of the Spirit was to
be the basis of His new life - it was to be entire
dependence upon God. I am not away from the Scriptures
over this, for He depended upon the Holy Spirit for
everything from this time onwards. "If I by the
Spirit of God cast out demons..." (Matt. 12:28).
Everything was by the Spirit. We will not stay to prove
that.
So this
next step - the temptation in the wilderness - was
basically a testing as to the position taken by Him and
as to what that position involved. We can never take a
position with God and not be severely tested as to the
position we have taken. He had taken a position, He had
come over to occupy certain ground, and now He was going
to be tested as to that new position.
AN ASSAULT UPON FAITH
First of
all, it was the ground of the relationship with God that
had been declared in His baptism, in His figurative
resurrection. "Thou art my beloved Son" (Mark
1:11). That is a relationship with God declared. Now
then: "If thou art the Son..." You see the
question projected in relation to the ground of His
relationship with God, the subtlety of this 'if' -
"If thou art the Son". The subtlety of it was
of this kind: 'Do something about it - prove it by doing
something!' You see the subtlety. Supposing your greatest
friend said something to you of assurance, and then
someone came along and said, 'Well, you had better prove
that by doing something!' Where is your friend? What is
your relationship to your friend? You have not fully
trusted him, you really have not accepted his word, if
you are going to put it to the test in some way. So the
subtlety of the serpent in the 'if' was: 'Do something
about it, prove it - put it to the proof and do something
about it!' To do something about it is to accept a
question in it.
But the
man of the open heaven will stand on this ground: 'God
has said it, and that is enough. No proof is called for;
God has said it.' "It is written..." That is
the man who has the open heaven: the man who, even when
circumstances and conditions are very difficult and
adverse (for God's Word stands related to trial, to
affliction, to adversity) - the man who stands firmly on
the declaration: 'God has said I shall not perish; God
has said I shall not die; God has said, and God is
faithful.' That is not easy. Do not think that this was
just play-acting. This was a terrible ordeal through
which the Son of Man went. It was the very devil in
person. The mere proximity of evil spirits is bad enough
- quite enough to bring your spirit under, to make you
feel terrible; but to have the very devil himself, in
person, making direct assault upon you, under the most
trying conditions of physical and mental exhaustion -
what do we know about that? It was very real. But, in the
reality of it, this Son of Man, for the sake of a whole
race that was to come - His seed - took this position:
'God has said - that is enough!' It is upon basic faith
that the assault is made; upon the faith that is basic to
everything which is to follow.
THE BASIS OF THE TEMPTATION
So we
find that His mission is immediately in view. "He
came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and he
entered... into the synagogue on the Sabbath day"
(Luke 4:16), and the roll was delivered to Him, and He
opened it at Isaiah 61, and began to read: "The
Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he anointed me to
preach..." And then the subjects of His preaching,
the message, His work, His mission, His proclamation, His
utterance, were all here in view, and Satan was out to
destroy that ministry, that mission, to destroy that
utterance, that proclamation, and to silence Him.
Now, if
you look back to the first chapter of this Gospel by
Luke, you have a wonderful parable and example of this
very thing. You have the story of the announcement to the
father of John the Baptist, the announcement of his
birth. Zacharias, the priest, a man holding a high and
influential position, is representative of the nation,
the priestly nation; the whole nation is embodied in
Zacharias. The angel Gabriel came and spoke of the birth
of John the Baptist, which was a natural impossibility.
We will not stay with all the details, but the upshot was
that Zacharias handed back the question to Gabriel: 'How
shall this be? I am an old man, my wife is old - how
shall this be?' It was a doubt. Now see the force of the
reply of Gabriel : "I am Gabriel, that stand in the
presence of God". 'Do you know who you are talking
to, questioning? You are challenging the very authority
of heaven, the very ability of heaven to do as it will.'
This was an act of unbelief in the face of heaven and
heaven's highest messenger. "I am Gabriel": it
was a severe rebuke. 'Now then, Zacharias, it will be,
but this shall be a sign - for a season you will be dumb,
not able to speak; your ministry will be suspended
through unbelief.' And he was a type of the whole nation.
Israel has lost its ministry and its message to the world
for the whole of this dispensation. Israel is dumb as the
messenger of God to the nations throughout this whole
dispensation. It has nothing to say to the world from
God. Why? Because of its unbelief.
Now
Satan was working on that line, on that principle, with
the Son of Man. If only he could get Him to entertain a
doubt as to this Sonship, as to the Father's expressed
attestation - "Thou art my beloved Son"; if he
could get Him to entertain a doubt, by doing something to
try and prove it; then he had silenced Him, robbed Him of
His ministry. You know quite well that you have no power
in ministry, whatever you may say, if there is a question
in your heart, if there is not a complete faith in God in
your heart. If Satan can bring in any unbelief, any
question about God, your ministry is crippled. Satan was
after this great ministry - "The Spirit of the Lord
is upon me, because he anointed me to preach..."
That is the basis of the temptation.
THE FORM OF THE TEMPTATION
The form
of the temptation was threefold. Whether you take it in
Luke's order or Matthew's, it does not matter. I prefer
to take it in the order in Matthew. I will do that now
simply because I think it is the spiritual order. That is
no aspersion upon Luke. He had his own way of writing for
his own purpose. He was recording just facts as he
collected them.
(1) An Attack upon His Body
First of
all, the assault was made upon His body, and the question
which arose in principle - I am not going to stay with
it, I just mention it and pass on - the question which
arose in principle was: Was this Man ready to present His
body "a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to
God"? Was He prepared for His body to be utterly at
God's disposal, and not held for His own personal
interest, benefit, convenience? That is why Paul says,
"I beseech you..., brethren, ...to present your
bodies..." (Rom. 12:1). The devil has a great desire
to get hold of our bodies. They are our media for
expressing what is inside. If he can capture the medium
he has captured a lot. You know all that comes later on
by interpretation of the Holy Spirit. "Know ye not
that ye are a temple of God, and that the Spirit of God
dwelleth in you?" (1 Cor. 3:16). "Present your
bodies." It was an attack upon His body, to get Him
to let in unbelief and doubt and fear because of the
physical consequences of the course that He was taking.
That carries very much with it.
(2) An Attack upon His Soul
In the
next place, in Matthew's order, it was an attack upon His
soul. The devil took Him to the pinnacle of the temple
and said, "Cast yourself down"; and, trying to
enforce or reinforce his temptation, he even comes over
to Christ's ground - "It is written". Christ
has said that; Satan is trying to capture the situation
by using the enemy's means, the enemy's ground.
"Cast yourself down." What is this? Well - 'Do
something to realize your ambition in a quick way. You
have come to get a following, you have come to win men,
you have come on a mission; now then, secure the success
of your mission, get this following by doing something
wonderful, something miraculous! Nothing will happen to
you: you will come down from the pinnacle safely, whereas
anyone else would be dashed to pieces!' 'Here is a quick
way to success. Realize your ambitions by some
expediency, by some policy.'
Oh, the
curse of policy in the world! "Is it politic? Will
it get success? Will this expedient achieve our end
quickly?" That is the soul of the fallen man, the
soul of the old Adam. We are all there. This is not
something subjective. This is true of us all in Adam. We
do not like the long-drawn-out road of patient waiting to
see God vindicating, while everything is against us, the
road which seems to have no turning. Trust in God? Oh,
let us do something to accelerate! It is said of Philip
Brooks of Boston that he was walking up and down his
study one day, seeming very heavy and perplexed. A friend
came in and asked, 'What is the matter?' 'Oh,' said
Brooks, 'I am in a hurry and God isn't!' Do something to
make God come into your stride! - that is the soul, and
it really is crucifixion to the soul to refuse anything
and everything like that.
(3) An Attack upon His Spirit
And then
the attack upon His spirit: "If thou wilt... worship
me." "God is a Spirit: and they that worship
him must worship in spirit and truth" (John 4:24).
When we come to worship, that which comes forth from
our spirit is a spiritual thing. So, through the body and
through the soul, the enemy was seeking to strike at the
innermost man in his relationship with God in spirit,
because it is by spirit that we are joined to the Lord.
"He that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit"
(1 Cor. 6:17). Satan's thought is: 'Oh, to cut in there!'
That is the form of the temptation.
THE VICTORY
Just a
word as to the victory. The victory of the Son of Man was
threefold: over the flesh, over the world, over the devil
- a threefold victory through faith, maintained faith,
stolid faith under the most trying and adverse
conditions. This is the man that has the opened heaven;
this is the man who has the face of God. This is the
Spirit of Sonship. This is the order of mankind that God
has set His heart upon; this is the kind that Jesus
Christ has come to beget through the travail of His soul.
WHAT OUR BAPTISM MEANS
Finally,
the application. It was by His baptism that He effected
it all, that He took the ground and held it and secured
it before God right through. It was through His baptism
that He was attested, accredited and established as the
Son, as God's representative Man, as "the firstborn
among many brethren". But then we may open the later
New Testament, and on the day of Pentecost we hear the
Apostle crying, "Repent ye, and be baptized every
one of you" (Acts 2:38). I am not going to give an
exposition on the subject of baptism, but I want to say
this, that our baptism is our means of declaring that we
stand on the ground of this Man. We have died to one
manhood, one mankind; we have ceased, voluntarily, to
have a life in that relationship. In our innermost being
a severance has taken place, a circumcision inwardly of
the heart has taken place, and we have passed out from
all that, by way of a grave; and now we occupy, in Christ
risen, the ground of another order, another man, another
kind; we are alive unto God.
That is
what we mean when we are baptized. We have said, earlier,
that baptism as an ordinance effects nothing: but baptism
is the New Testament means given for declaring a fact
which exists, and the poignant point of this is that
every man and woman of Adam has been baptized, all the
sinners in the world today have been baptized. I do not
mean that they have gone into a baptismal pool or been
sprinkled. I mean that, in the baptism - the death - of
Christ, the whole world was taken and given the chance of
a new relationship, had it provided for them, carried out
for them, effected on their behalf; and if every man and
woman in the whole creation is lost, it will not be
because they were not redeemed, but because they have not
accepted their redemption, they have not taken the place
which Christ has secured for them. Our invitation, our
call, our beseeching, our entreaty, is that men will come
into the thing which God has done for them in Christ.
They are there, but they have to declare that they are
there before it is made good for them. Our baptism is the
testimony to the fact that we are on this ground of the
new man, and that, accordingly, heaven is open for us,
the face of God is turned towards us in Christ - a new
creation, "accepted in the beloved" (Eph. 1:6),
on the ground of this heavenly Man.
That is
the significance of Christ. Oh, if you have gone that
way, if you have given that testimony, keep the meaning
ever in view. I so often meet Christians who have at some
time borne that testimony: they have had it explained,
they have accepted and believed it, and have been
baptized; but oh, how they are living to the old man, how
they are influenced and actuated by the old man's
interests, how their soul is still mastered by worldly
ambitions! I often feel like asking: Were you baptized?
What did you mean? Have you really apprehended your death
in Christ's death? Have you apprehended the meaning of
the other side - that you are alive unto God, and only
alive unto God, and you have no life other than unto God?
Have you? If not I am not surprised that you are not
enjoying the open heaven, the face of God, the glorious
presence and power of the Holy Spirit, victory over
Satan, over the world, over the self-life. You have got
to keep this ever as a living reality before you.
May the
Lord Himself put His seal to this word, by making us men
and women after this kind, even according to Christ.