DAILY DEVOTIONAL – January 25, 2021
“Taller Falls Harder”
Prayer: Jesus, thank You for living perfectly in our place, dying in our place, and rising again to give us the assurance of eternal life and Your presence with us even now. Through the power of Your Word and presence, help us and lead us in living a life pleasing to You. Amen.
Scripture: Hebrews 4:15
For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin.
Devotional – “Taller Falls Harder”
There was an article published years ago in an airline magazine, Piedmont Airlines, that was written by a professor of business philosophy. The article was on business ethics and whether or not “business” and “ethics” were increasingly exclusive terms. In order to test his hypothesis of this ever-widening gap between business and morality, he tried his own impromptu and rather unorthodox experiment on an airplane; an experiment he later wrote about in an airline magazine!
Noticing an attractive young woman on his flight, dressed modestly and in no way communicating she was the type of character that would prostitute herself, the businessman approached her at the beginning of the flight and propositioned her “services” for later that evening in exchange for one million dollars. Clearly caught off guard by the offer, the woman took some time to think about it and talk about it with her female friend. About halfway through the flight, the woman returned to the man and took him up on the offer. As the flight was nearing its end, the man again approached the woman, but with a slightly different offer. He said, “You know, miss, the truth is I really don’t have a million dollars, would you consider rendering your services for $10 instead?” Appalled and offended, the woman said, “Ten dollars?! What or who do you think I am?!” Calmly, the man replied, “Well Miss, we have already established that. Now, we are just haggling over price.”
Is there a price high enough that someone could pay in exchange for your convictions? A lifetime of riches? The healing of an illness? A promotion at work? The approval of others? Power, prestige, or influence? Is there anything that could prove to be more valuable than our character and Christian convictions? Anything that we would compromise our faith or salvation for?
While I hope this story from an airline magazine may seem a bit extreme or unrealistic to you, the truth is, we are surrounded by this kind of temptation all day, every day. The Devil and this world in which he roams are constantly trying to lure us away from God, away from our convictions, away from faith in the assurance of God’s goodness and provision given to us in the death and resurrection of His Son Jesus Christ, and instead lead us to chase after immediate gratification and temporary satisfaction.
If anyone thinks they are incapable of being lured away or that it is not within our sinful capacity to forsake eternal salvation for earthly, temporary gain, then they have already been deceived by Devil and betrayed by their own sinful nature. Do you think Judas, who betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, thought that would ever be a remote possibility when he first followed Christ? Do you think Peter ever thought he would deny Jesus three times? Do you think Adam and Eve could have ever imagined a better life than what God had given them?
Jesus was led into the wilderness by the Spirit to be tempted in order that He would remain perfectly faithful to God in place of you and I who have all turned our backs on God and given into temptation. Christ proved to be our worthy sacrifice, the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world as John the Baptist declared Him to be, because Jesus overcame temptation perfectly, because He had no sin and thus proved to be the One on whom the sins of the world could be placed and atoned for on the cross.
I am sure Jesus was bombarded with temptations we cannot fathom as He was in the Garden of Gethsemane praying and sweating blood in anticipation of the horrors that awaited Him on the cross where He would suffer the wrath of a holy God against our sins. Jesus was not born to live, but rather to die. Jesus said in Matthew 20:28, “the Son of Man came not to be served but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
The temptations to live a life for ourselves and live a life other than in the holiness to which we have been called are constant. On our own, we are powerless against the Devil, against this wicked world of which he is the ruler and powerless against our own sinful nature. However, God has not left us on our own. Our Lord Jesus who overcame the temptations of the Devil also overcame sin and death through His resurrection from the dead, and He has promised to be and is with us. Through the Spirit of God given to us in Christ’s name, and through the Word of God through which the Spirit works, we have been given the victory over temptation.
Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 10:12-13, “Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.”
If we think we can stand on our own in the face of temptation, we will fall. The ability God has given us to overcome temptation is that same way of escape He has given us – He has given us the Word of God. The same Word Jesus called upon in His temptation. Jesus did not use His power, even as God in the flesh, to overcome temptation and resist the Devil. In response to every temptation Jesus said, “It is written…it is written…it is written.”
James 4:7 says, “Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” The Word of God is the only resistance to the devil and his deception. The only way we cannot be deceived by a lie is to know the truth.
God’s grace in Jesus Christ has been given to us in baptism. We have been marked as children of God, we have been given the presence and power of the Holy Spirit of God. What is the power of the Spirit? Where can the power of the Spirit be found? Jesus told us in John 14:26, “The Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, he will teach you all things and bring to your remembrance all that I have said to you.” The Words of Christ are the Spirit’s power. As St. Paul says in Romans 10:17, “So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.”
The Word of God is not a magic book of potions or individual bits of advice to turn to when we feel we need it. It is not a resource that should sit behind glass and that we only break in case of emergency. We cannot turn to the Word of God only when all else has failed or only in the moment when we find ourselves in the face of temptation and expect to overcome. Jesus said man does not live by bread alone, but he lives by every word that proceeds from the mouth of the Father. Man lives, truly lives and succeeds in the Word of God.
Friends, though we live in a fallen and broken world until the Lord returns in judgement and salvation, we live in the reality that Christ has indeed crushed the head of the devil, He has in fact paid for our sins through His blood and He has assuredly risen from the dead in order to give us new life. By His grace and power, may we live that life of freedom and fulfillment by heeding His call to holiness, resisting temptation, and living in and for the glory of God in His Word.
Thanks for joining me for a time of devotion in God’s Word, and remember, that God has forgiven yesterday, is with you today, and has already taken care of tomorrow. Amen.
