But specially, I say, they beset those who are, or fancy
themselves, the children of God. And, therefore, I humbly suppose our
Lord had to endure and to conquer these very temptations because He was
not merely a child of God, but the Son of God--the perfect Man, made in
the perfect likeness of His Father. He had to endure these temptations,
and to conquer them, that He might be able to succour us when we are
tempted, seeing that He was tempted in like manner as we are, yet without
sin.
Now it has been said, and, I think, well said, that what proves our
Lord's three temptations to have been very subtle and dangerous and
terrible, is this--that we cannot see at first sight that they were
temptations at all. The first two do not look to us to be wrong. If our
Lord could make stones into bread to satisfy His hunger, why should He
not do so? If He could prove to the Jews that He was the Son of God,
their divine King and Saviour, by casting Himself down from the pinnacle
of the temple, and being miraculously supported in the air by angels--if
He could do that, why should He not do it? And lastly, the third
temptation looks at first sight so preposterous that it seems silly of
the evil spirit to have hinted at it.
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