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TOPIC: Gordon, Samuel Dickey - Quiet Talks About the Tempter (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 030. A Running Fight
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A Running Fight
In that obedience He was cutting straight across the character and life of the traitor-prince of this world. He was holding the title to all the Father had given Him by His obedience. He was undermining Satan's hold upon the race and the earth. His obedience was the defeating of Satan.
The one temptation, that came in a thousand differing ways, was to turn aside, if only by so much as a hair's breadth from the Father's will. The one answer was unflinching, unfailing obedience. And in that He was laying the foundation for the final defeat of the traitor-usurper-prince.
In His Nazareth life our Lord reveals His utter humility, His rare simplicity, His warm sympathy with men, and His spirit of sacrifice for others. And each of these is in direct contrast to the character of Satan.
But the chief thing underneath all the rest, the thing that controlled Him was the obedience to His Father's plan for His life. That was the basis of the defeat of the evil one. If Jesus had diverged by so much as a hair's breadth, the tempter would have been victorious. By remaining true He was defeated so far.
Then follows the great Wilderness temptation. His public ministry was prefaced with this terrific, though subtle, onset by the tempter. But again, our Lord held true and steady to the Father's will. The touchstone of the Nazareth life is the touchstone of the Wilderness victory, namely, full obedience to the Father's will and the Father's time. The Wilderness temptation ended in victory for Jesus—and so in defeat for the tempter.
And following that came the three years and a half of public ministry. They were years of temptation, subtle and stormy, of attack in every conceivable shape by the enemy; of sharp struggle and conflict with the evil one and his forces. Behind demons, behind human leaders, even behind ignorant friends and followers, the enemy came, ceaselessly, day and night, doing his best and his worst, with his subtlest devices and his greatest resources.
It awes one greatly to draw near our Lord at certain stages, and note by the tensity of His spirit, how fierce the onset was. One can almost hear the deep-drawn breathing, and see the moist brow, and the firmly locked jaw, and hear the earnestly breathed prayer.
He never flinched and He never failed. He was a Victor at every step, by His full following of the path marked out for Him. And His victory spells out the defeat of the tempter. Each advancing hour of continued, steady ongoing was a deepening and intensifying of the defeat of the tempter. So our Lord defeated Satan in and by His life.