The Other Side of the Desert

The Other Side of the Desert.

How do you use your power?
While studying on Matt. 4 about Jesus’ 40 days in the desert this was brought to mind. It said that after fasting and being alone in a barren place, Jesus was hungry. While the story leaves to our imagination what Jesus endured in the desert, one can only imagine what must have gone through his soul.
The story suggests that the Tempter came along at what appeared to be a moment of weakness in Jesus’ life. The goal was to get Jesus to use his power to save himself.
Evil used sustenance, beauty and power to tempt Jesus.

How often are you tempted by sustenance, beauty and power?

I know there are times when I am feeling lonely, tired, hungry and weaker than usual that I want to use my power to save myself. I want to depend on myself to relieve myself of what I am facing or have just faced.

But the story teaches that Jesus never used his power to save himself, rather he used it to resist the temptation to save himself.

He used his power to continually trust God.

He used his power to resist the voice that wanted to take him down and chose to listen to the Voice within that reminded him of who he was as God’s son.

He allowed God to sustain him.

Imagine if we used our power in the same manner. Imagine if we used our power to resist the temptation to save ourselves from what the world tempts us to think is the right way. Imagine if we used our power to simply trust God.

Imagine if we used our power to listen to the Voice within that reminds us that we belong to God.

I am not suggesting that we are Jesus, I am suggesting that we need to silence and resist the voices in the same manner he did.

In order to do that, we must know who we are as children of God.It is when we are tired, hungry, alone, and weak that we need to speak out against those things that want to steal away God’s desire for us.

The story ends by telling us that the devil left him and the angels came and attended him.

This story ultimately reveals Jesus’ identity, and it can remind us of our identity.We always need to be reminded of who we are as God’s beloved. Our fear and pain may tempt us to seek sustenance, beauty and power, but the truth is that by holding on, God will not leave us alone, but will send his angels to attend to us-- especially when we have just walked through the desert.