Baptisms are glorious events. Looking at the baptism of Jesus, we understand why they are glorious events. Jesus’ baptism provides the archetypal pattern for every subsequent baptism into Christ. Whether infant or aged, when a person is baptized into Christ, heaven is opened, the Father declares the baptizand his loved child, and the Spirit is poured out. Though we don’t see all of these happen with the naked eye we know that they happen to us because they happened to Christ Jesus, the one with whom we share baptism.
But sharing Jesus’ baptism is not where our identity with Jesus ends. In baptism we come to share in the life of Christ, and that life moves from baptism into the wilderness. The Spirit poured out in baptism is the same Spirit that leads us into the wilderness to be tested by the devil (Lk 4.1-2). To be declared “son of God” in baptism is a vocation as much as it is a standing before the Father. Part and parcel to that vocation is to be tested in a world that is hostile to us by a Father who graciously withholds from us good things until the proper time.
This has been the calling of the sons of God from the beginning of time. Adam was tested in the Garden. Israel was tested in the wilderness. Jesus, as the preeminent Son of God, takes up that calling when he is led into the wilderness by the Spirit after his baptism (Lk 4.1ff.). And just as all the other sons of God before him, the devil uses the occasion of the Father’s testing to slander the character of the Father, seeking to lead the son to reject the Father’s calling.
The Father uses testing for his sons as a means to clarify and reveal truth about who you are and what you know; to shape your character and sharpen your thinking about matters. The Father tests us to make us stronger and mature us. Testing is the loving action of a father who gives his son a difficult responsibility to challenge him so that he can become better. He wants his son to think through the situation and learn how to solve problems when they arise. He is challenging his son to become stronger so that he can persevere. He is exposing his son’s limitations so that he knows when he needs help. Our heavenly Father tests us for our good.
The devil, playing on our own sinful inclinations, uses these times of testing to slander the character of our Father. “A loving Father wouldn’t put you through this. He would give you what you want right now so that you wouldn’t have to suffer. Do you really think God loves you? It doesn’t look like it. You don’t deserve this. You shouldn’t have to go through this.” The devil twists God’s testing so that we may start to think that God is holding back on us. He really doesn’t want us to have good things. He delights in seeing us suffer.
Jesus is hungry after forty days of fasting in the wilderness. Surely a loving heavenly Father doesn’t want his son to starve. Even evil fathers don’t give their sons stones when they ask for bread (Mt 7.9). The Father, if he is a loving Father, would want you to turn a stone to bread. Bread is good, after all.
Yes, bread is good. And Jesus knew that one day “the loaf” would come out of the stone as he himself, the bread of life, will be resurrected from a tomb “hewn from stone” (Lk 23.53; cf. also 24.2). But this bread will take time to make. The grain of wheat must fall into the ground and die before this before this bread can be made. The Father will give bread for the life of the entire world, but he will only do so in time and through the death of his son. The son must not seek to find life or give it within the creation as it is. He must trust the character, promises, and will of his Father.
In following Jesus, we face the same temptation as Jesus: avoid the cross, look for immediate satisfaction, and find life in the creation apart from submission to God’s word. Creation is good. God uses it to mediate his life to us. But creation doesn’t have life in itself. Wisdom untethered from the word of God uses the creation to find the life that God promises but only discovers death. If you think that dealing with your problems is best found in the abuse of alcohol, drugs, or food, you have put those things in the place of God. They are idols from whom you are seeking peace and joy. If you think happiness and contentment are found in sexual relationships outside of marriage between a man and woman, you are idolizing sex. If your biological family doesn’t live for the larger purpose of the kingdom of God and order its life accordingly, you are idolizing the biological family.
All of these things are good parts of creation. If ordered properly under God, they are all good for us. Creation makes a good servant but a terrible god.
When tempted to make creation your god, you must do what Jesus did: resist by trusting the character of your heavenly Father, knowing that he loves you and wants the best for you, and submitting your ways to him.
Christian, you are called to a life of testing and to resist the temptations of the devil. Stand strong. Believe God. Resist the devil, and he will flee.
