This temptation is not theoretical, theological, or philosophic. It is in His stomach which growls and hurts from lack of food. And how can a man pray when he feels these pangs of hunger? How can he think of God and commune with God when there is nothing but that empty gnawing in his stomach?

     Furthermore, what is wrong with turning stones into bread? Satan was saying, "If you really are the Son of God you can do that. After all, you are hungry Jesus. Think how much better you will feel once you've eaten." But Jesus didn't have to prove anything:

Thus ends the first round. Satan goes back to his corner, and Jesus remains unconquered.

     Satan returns, perhaps thinking "If Jesus will quote scriptures then maybe he will also take a stand on scriptures." He takes Jesus to the temple. He places Jesus on a pinnacle of the temple, high above the people and says:

     Satan was saying, "Just think, if you jump God's word will rescue you. After all didn't God say that? You jump, God's angels will rescue you before an open-mouthed, wide-eyed crowd. If you are the Son of God why not prove it to everyone right here and now? Why not win the world with one grandiose, gigantic display?"

     But Jesus knew that He must not trifle with faith. He knew that you should never take the promises of God and use them for your own gratification. He knew that if He jumped that the angels would surely come to His rescue, but:

Round two ends and Jesus still remains unconquered.

     A final time Satan ventures forth to try again. "If that is Jesus' position" he thinks, "then I shall strike him where he will really feel it! Why has Jesus come to earth? Why is He in the world as God's Son? To bring the kingdom of God to mankind. To bring all men to the knowledge of God. To lead humanity to salvation."

     Does not Christ yearn for this? Is He not consumed by a burning desire to win the world? Will He not shed tears of the city of Jerusalem? And not for the city only, but for the world? Satan attackes:

     Satan was saying to Jesus what he has tried to say to us all at one time or another. "Be free of God. Don't you want to be free of God? Don't you believe in yourself? Don't you believe in yourself more than anything else? You may yearn for God, but there is a deeper yearning within you, to be on your own. Be free from any Lord, that is what you really want!"

Jesus can only reply one way:

     The end of round three. Satan has lost and he knows it. The most telling temptations have all failed to conquer the Son of God. He is the unconquerable Christ, so the Biblical account closes with these victorious words:

     Jesus then began His ministry. Many forces were arrayed against Him. His family did not understand Him. His brothers did not believe in Him. In some way Jesus must have experienced the truth of His remark:

But it was more than just that. Inventor Blaise Pascal once said:

     "I assert that if all men knew what each says of the other, there would not remain four friends alive."

     Jesus knew. They did not say things behind His back, but to His face. He had been born out of wedlock, and nothing good could come from Nazareth. He was not a devoted teacher of God, but a fun-lover, a glutton, a drunkard. He was really possessed by a demon, and in partnership with the devil himself.

     Jesus was not preserved from such derogatory remarks. All this slander did not subdue Him, did not conquer Him, even when His witness was denied.

What can be more discouraging than to be rejected in your life-work, in your contribution to humanity.

     You help a man on the Sabbath. You are attacked for helping him. You encourage a paralytic, tell him that his conscience can be at ease, his sin forgive, and you are laughed at for "forgiving sins." You heal a blind man, and you barely escape stoning. You give love. You receive hate. You speak truth. You hear lies. You sow mercy. You reap judgment. You bring salvation. You get a Cross. Even your own friend betrays you.

You are handed over to the government. The government says:

     Still he has you beaten, scourged, and he releases a notorious criminal in your place. He again says that he finds no fault in you. Then he washes his hands of you, exposes you on a cross, seals you in a tomb, and stations a watch in the cemetery.

     Misunderstood, hated, despised, rejected -- in three short years evil forces did their work. But they could not conquer the unconquerable! Even death could not hold Him. Jesus Christ burst the bonds of death and came forth from the tomb on the third day. His triumph is so radical and so complete, that it is obvious -- not friend or foe, not priest or Pharisee, not Judas or Pilate, not life or death, could conquer the unconquerable Christ!

     A victorious Lord Jesus leads His disciples on their journey to spread the good news, the gospel of salvation. So Christianity began.

     But there is more to see in this unconquerable Christ. Ever since Biblical times men have tried to conquer Him. Men of thought. Men of philosophy. Men of letters. Men of knowledge.

     Voltaire, the great thinker and athiest, made the statement that he would show the world, although it took twelve apostles to establish Christianity, it would take only one to tear it down. The Bible would be an antique, he said, one hundred years after his death. "God is dead," says Nietzsche. "Christianity is through," says Voltaire.

     Conquer the unconquerable Christ? How preposterous it all sounds when we are still talking about Jesus Christ today!

     Now in this day and age we have something new to occupy us on the earth. Psychology. For all the ills of men, psychology and psychiatry have the answers they say. If you are depressed, the psychiatrist will analyze you. If you are disturbed, the psychologist may discover the causes of your disturbance. If you feel guilty, self-understanding will help you overcome such guilt feelings.

     Psychology is a noble science, and undoubtedly, many are helped. Analysis can lead to an understanding of yourself, but it cannot lead you to a new relationship with God. As one psychoanalyst has put it, there is a new version of the "Ugly Duckling" story. The ugly duckling never discovers he is a swan. He just undergoes analysis and adjusts.

     But this is precisely the responsibility of the Christian faith, to show us what we really are, where we have gone wrong, and how we can renew our relationship with God. Nothing can become a substitute for Christ. Salvation does not come to man apart from the Saviour. Forgiveness does not come without the forgiveness of sin through the cross.

     They may attempt by modern means to conquer Christ, that is, to find some way to cure our ills, to bring salvation, to 'redeem' man -- but man cannot be redeemed without the Redeemer, Jesus Christ.

     This is true, of course, for any other field as well -- science, medicine, economics, education, etc. Professor Emile Cailliet once said,

     "In drawing attention to the character of modern frustration ... we may ascertain the true nature of our problems. They all are spiritual problems, that is to say, primarily theological."

Then the eminent psychiatrist Dr. Carl Jung once said:

     "There has not been one of my patients during the last thirty years whose problem in the last resort was not that of finding a religious outlook on life."

     This is why Jesus remains the unconquerable Christ. Only the Saviour of the world can "save" the world.

     There is another way that we today try to conquer Christ. A more popular way -- "pleasure." Through diversion, through entertainment, we still our restlessness, we fill our solitude, we escape from ourselves. Why do we have to have a radio or cd player along when we go for a walk or run? Why do we have to have "background" music. Why are we constantly banishing boredom through entertainment? We allow ourselves to be pushed around by noise, lights, pictures, stories, laughter, rhythm. We want to laugh. We want to be "sent"!

     What then is really happening to us? We are outer-directed. We are constantly being filled with amusements from the outside. And that means we really "become emptier and emptier on the inside". The more impressions have to be made on you from the outside, the less you have to show for yourself from the inside. "The more you become an object of entertainment, the less you are an individual, a person."

The words of our Lord Jesus become more and more true:

     In trying to save our lives with amusements and diversions, we only lose them. We end up with nothing. Only the God who created us can fulfill our deepest needs. "There is within the soul of man a God-shaped vacuum, and only the God who put it there can fill it!"

     We cannot displace our need for God. We cannot resolve our own hungers. To anyone who thirsts to be free, to find fulfillment, to come to God, Jesus says:

     The world has tried to conquer Christ. When He was here, and since His coming, they have tried -- devil and demons, friend and foe, priest and Pharisee, Judas and Pilate, philosophy and psychology, pleasure seekers and pleasure finders.

     And you have tried also! Yes, we all have tried at one time or another. We have tried to conquer our hunger for Christ, our thirst for the Saviour. We have tried to conquer the unconquerable! We have at time pushed Him to the outer edges of our existence. We have all refused at times to let Him guide in our decisions. We have all at times stubbornly shoved Him away from our conscience. And many of us, Christian and non-Christian alike, have even gone so far as to say:

     "Hands off Christ! Hands off my personal life, my thought life, my sex life. It's none of your business what I do with myself, how I spend my time. It's my life to live, not yours. I'll give you a little time on Sunday. I'll pray when I'm in need. Now that's enough Christ. That's enough."

     But He is still there, "isn't He"? He refuses to be held at arm's length. He is unconquerable. He claims you through His Cross. He has died for you already. And you cannot change that fact with all your arguments, with all your unbelief, with all your rebellious attitudes.

     He keeps coming into your life, "doesn't He"? He wants to win you to a closer walk with God. He comes just where you keep saying "no" to Him. Just once say "Yes"! Open the door a crack. Let Him in. See what wonderful things He can do for you. He can remove your guilt. He can control your passion. He can regulate your thoughts. He can change your actions. He is the unconquerable Christ!

     And once He comes into you, He can make "you" unconquerable too! Unconquerable by all the forces of evil, the foes of life, the fears of this temporal existence on earth. Unconquerable, not because of your ability, but because of His power in you. Unconquerable because He has overcome the world. Unconquerable because He has burst death's bonds and is alive forevermore. Unconquerable because He, the unconquerable One, is in "You"!

     One final note and scripture reference ... It will then be true of you, as it was of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is:

Next:
" The Challenging Jesus "
Coming Soon!

Table of Contents for - "Shattered Dreams"

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