Grace Church
257 Kendall Street
Burlington, WI 53105

(262) 763-3021

Following Jesus means living with integrity Matthew 4:1-11 Following Jesus without Freaking out Sermon 02 Popular musician, Ani DiFranco said, “I'd rather be able to face myself in the bathroom mirror than be rich and famous.” That’s integrity.   In 1987 Coach Cleveland Stroud coached his Rockdale County High Bulldog basketball team to 21 wins and 5 losses to qualify for the State of Georgia playoffs. They moved through each bracket of the playoffs and capped the season with a come-from-behind win in the final game to claim the state championship. Only later did Coach Stroud discover that he had an ineligible player on his team. The player wasn’t a starter. He wasn’t a regular substitute. In fact, this player only played 45 seconds of one game in which the team was ahead by 23 points. Only after the season did the coach learn that the student had passed only four out of six courses the previous fall, one short to be eligible.   So what would you have done? The 45 seconds the player played didn’t affect the outcome of the season. Yet, rules were broken. Here’s what Coach Stroud did. He wrote the Georgia State Athletic Association to inform them of the infraction. Then, he wrote the local school board. Next he addressed the student body and explained what had happened and why the school had to forfeit the state championship, even though they earned it. Coach Stroud said, “You've got to do what’s honest and right and what the rules say. I told my team that people forget scores of basketball games; they don’t ever forget what you are made of.” Today most people in Rockdale have forgotten the score of the championship game that Rockdale ultimately forfeited, but they will never forget that their high school coach, Coach Cleveland Stroud was a person of integrity…They know what he was made of.   Someone insightfully wrote:   It is not what we eat but what we digest that makes us strong; not what we gain but what we save that make us rich; not what we read but what we remember that makes us learned; and not what we profess but what we practice that makes us Christians.   This morning we’re in our second study of our series, Following Jesus without Freaking out. It’s foundational that we understand that following Jesus means that you and I are people of integrity. That word integrity comes from the Latin integer; meaning wholeness or completeness. Integrity then is the quality of having the reality of one’s life match the claims of one's words. It means walking the talk even when we are hurting and needy, or are under pressure and even when no one else is looking.   At the very beginning of His ministry, Jesus went into the wilderness, into the most extreme situation imaginable. There he spent forty lonely days with no food to eat and no company except the wild animals. The Gospel accounts tell us that at the end of that forty day period, when Jesus was hungry and weak, the Devil came to test Jesus…to see if Jesus was truly a person of integrity. My Bible is open to Matthew 4:1-11 (p. 682).   As we begin our study today, it’s vital that we understand that these temptations were very real. C. S. Lewis made these insightful observations about temptation: “No man knows how bad he is until he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. That is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is....Christ, because He was the only Man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only Man who knows to the full what temptation means.” Only a person of integrity will resist temptation and Following Jesus means living with integrity. So how do we do that? 1. We must be knowledgeable of the Enemy of integrity. A Dad was trying to teach his 6-year old son how to shoot a basketball. The boy would push the ball as hard as he could toward the basket but the ball would always fall short. The father would effortlessly toss the ball toward the basket and say, "Just do it like this, son. It’s easy." The boy would try and fail again. The father would show him how again. Finally the son said, "It’s easy for you up there but you don’t know how hard it is from down here."  It’s easy to think that using Jesus as our model for integrity is irrelevant, after all He was perfect and the Son of God. But while Jesus is God, He is also man. He’s the God-man.   Matthew 4:2 says, “After fasting forty days and forty nights, He was hungry.” These words give evidence that this story wasn’t just a legend created by the early church because it emphasizes the transparency and the humanity expressed by Jesus. There’s always been a tendency among some followers of Christ to strip away His humanity and make Jesus completely unreal. Songs written about Him contain lines such as “The little Lord Jesus, no crying he makes.” That’s the image some people have of Him—Jesus was so divine He never cried as a child or never skinned his knee, when He worked as a carpenter he never drove a crooked nail, because He was divine. He just went through life floating around on a little cloud about six feet off the ground. That isn’t the Jesus of Scripture. He was 100% human and experienced everything just like you and me as well as being 100% divine.   He became one of us—fully human as well as fully divine. “He was hungry” helps us to identify with the great truth that in His humanity, He was able to pass Satan’s tests of His integrity. The temptations of Jesus had to be real for the consoling truth of Hebrew 4:15 to be true, “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet was without sin.” Following Jesus means that we must have integrity. To sympathize with us, Christ had to have fully experienced the Devil’s temptations!   It’s clear Jesus believed in and Scripture teaches the reality of a personal Devil called Satan (“adversary”). Evil is not some impersonal force. The Devil and his demons are angelic beings who rebelled against God and now are behind the evil in this world. But while the devil is a powerful and intelligent being, he’s not omnipotent, omniscient or omnipresent. While his final doom is secure, for the present he’s a powerful and cunning adversary of the saints. Scripture warns us that we must not be ignorant of his schemes (2 Cor. 2:11).   It’s also not a coincidence that Jesus’ temptation immediately follows His baptism. Many of God’s people have had similar experiences. Right after conversion or some other significant spiritual event, precisely when a certain level of victory or maturity seems to have been attained, Satan attacks more viciously than ever before. You and I are in a battle. Every Christian will face Satanic attacks, seeking to get them to surrender their integrity and succumb to sin. If Satan tempted Jesus, you can be sure that you and I are targets too. Yet every believer also has God’s presence and power so that they do not have to give in to the Devil’s attacks. So what does it mean to have to have integrity like Jesus did? 2. Having integrity like Jesus means that you are not passion-driven, “The tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.’ Jesus answered, ‘It is written: “Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God’” (vss. 3-4). “If it feels good, do it” is the unofficial motto of our culture. Our basic instincts are geared to personal comfort. The siren song of today’s world is to avoid pain and take the easy way.   Satan attacks when Jesus was famished after forty days of fasting. When He was weak and lonely. He was probably emotionally drained and at His lowest point in His thirty years of life on this earth. That’s when Satan comes to test Him. In this encounter we witness Jesus as He faced the first great test of His integrity.   Maybe you’ve seen that Christian poster that says, “With God I can resist temptation…But chocolate chip cookies require miraculous strength”? All of us face this test to sacrifice our integrity because of the drive of our passions. Satan hit Jesus with this temptation at the precise moment when Jesus is probably the hungriest. He always works like that—hitting you when you’re down. He bides his time until you’re vulnerable, and then he moves in with his subtle suggestion of evil.   Recently, I read of a godly man who shared how he’d been ministering in India for a month. On his return flight back, an attractive stewardess was especially kind to him, giving him a lot of attention. Being weary from traveling, he appreciated it. He had to spend the night in Washington, D.C. before catching his final flight home the next morning. As he went to get off the plane, he thanked the stewardess for her service. She responded by inviting him to come to her apartment for the night rather than going to his hotel. He was tired, he’d been away from his wife for a month, and here was a very attractive young woman offering herself to him in a situation where no one would know. This was the opportune moment for Satan to hit! By God’s grace the man declined the offer, but he admitted that there was a brief moment in which it sounded very inviting.   Be alert to when you’re vulnerable. That’s when the enemy will hit! That’s why I’m always concerned when couples have continual tension or unresolved issues in their marriage. After thirty years of ministry and often being called in to intervene with a broken marriage, I’ve witnessed too many times that when the marriage is weak, Satan attacks.   Don’t miss this! Hunger is a legitimate need. Sex is a God-given drive. Satan tempts us to satisfy legitimate needs illegitimately. For Jesus to use His power independently of the Father to meet His need would have been wrong. And this is a very subtle temptation. At first it seems reasonable enough—Christ is hungry, He has the power to change things, why not do it? But Jesus had made a commitment that precluded self-sufficiency and independent decision-making. He was in partnership with God the Father. He had agreed to follow the Father's lead. He didn't have permission from the Father, plus the temptation was also a subtle insinuation that His Father wasn't taking good care of him and was AWOL on this particular assignment. And Jesus would have none of it. He’d agreed to come to earth to represent the Father's interests and be in complete submission to the Father’s authority, plan and timetable. Christ would be the redeemer of all humanity. He would do it the Father's way and only as the power of the Holy Spirit enabled Him.   This test wasn’t just about food but about who was in control of His life. “What does the heavenly Father want for My life right now? Is He capable of providing sufficiently, particularly when things appear so bleak?"   We will all face the same decision. It’s normally not as dramatic, but the issue is the same. If you’re a believer, then you have a contract with God to trust Him, to follow His lead. He’s promised to take care of you and you and I are supposed to trust God to provide. After all, He made the promise; we didn't. The challenge comes when some unexpected event occurs that jeopardizes our welfare. It's tempting to panic and beg, borrow or steal to satisfy our need with hardly a thought to consider what God might have in store for us and how He might provide, guide and instruct. We’re impulse driven and know so little of waiting. We’re the “give it to me now” generation and “what took you so long”? It’s amazing how with a little prayer and patience we can learn God's way of escape without creating another problem by pursuing a wrong solution which Satan sent our way.   And where do we find this answer? The same place Jesus did, from the Word of God. Scripture is always the way we defeat the temptation of our adversary, the devil. Knowing where to go to get the answer is a function of personal Bible study or counsel with a godly Christian. And the answer is always there. God can't deny His own attributes. He is bound by His own reputation to adhere to His own promises on how He will take care of us. 3. Having integrity like Jesus means that you are responsible in your decisions, “Then the devil took Him to the holy city and had Him stand on the highest point of the temple. ‘If You are the Son of God,’ he said, ‘throw Yourself down. For it is written: “He will command His angels concerning you, and they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test’” (vss. 5-7). During the Battle of the Wilderness in the Civil War, Union General, John Sedgwick, was inspecting his troops. At one point he came to a parapet, over which he gazed out in the direction of the enemy. His officers suggested that this was unwise and perhaps he ought to duck while passing the parapet. “Nonsense,” snapped the general. “They couldn’t hit an elephant at this dist—.” A moment later Sedgwick fell to the ground, fatally wounded.   This is the temptation to be irresponsible and let God pick up the pieces from our dumb decisions. I can jump off the temple roof and God will catch me. The world is full of well-meaning Christian folks who jump off roofs and then complain to God that they’re paralyzed for life. At this level we’re tempted to become the spoiled children of God, expecting that God will clean up all our messes.   We do something foolish and when it doesn’t work out, we blame God. Steve Brown has observed that pagans blame bad luck but Christians blame God’s will, “It just wasn’t God’s will.” But what is really taking place is presumption or a lack of discernment or sanctified common sense.   We must not test God’s faithfulness to His Word by manufacturing situations in which we try to force Him to act in certain ways. We dare not put ourselves in a financially risky situation or put our lives in danger as some kind of fleece.   Satan, after seeing Jesus overcome the temptations by relying on the Word of God, throws our Savior a curveball by using the Word of God to tempt Him. The devil challenges Jesus to do a risky thing—jump off the temple in order to prove that God's Word works. But Jesus saw through the devil's misinterpretation of Scripture and quoted another Old Testament passage to correct His adversary. Jesus based his decision on the universal principle that the created are not to presumptuously test the Creator's loyalty.   Satan had misapplied Scripture but Jesus noticed the error. God does tell us that He will protect us, but God doesn't say that He will limit the consequences of our actions when they are in violation of a revealed truth. In other words we all know that the law of gravity reveals the truth that all objects fall to earth, so it would be presumptuous to take a verse that says God will protect us from time to time from inadvertent accidents and twist it to mean that He will enable us to fly after jumping from the top of a tall building. Faith that must depend on signs and wonders is not faith!   And incredibly, we do just that at times. We jump off buildings without parachutes when we enter into financial commitments we can't really afford. Sometimes the risk is in the friendships we keep, believing that we can hang around the wrong people and go to the wrong places, and it won't ultimately affect us. Sometimes we take a risk on a business partner when we really haven't established that we share the same values. Sometimes we risk our kids by not paying attention to their friends, entertainment or Internet access until it is too late.   Our God wants to prevent us from making these and other mistakes. He has given us ample guidance and information in his Word. Also, God will provide warnings by His Spirit throughout the decision-making process, as well as a safety door of escape. But He does not rescue us from foolish decisions or their consequences until we have learned our lesson well—to live by His Word alone. This temptation wants to put the burden of life on God and not on us. If things don’t work out, it’s God’s fault, if things do work out then I did something right. But God is not a puppet master controlling our lives. As Luther says, we have free will to follow the words of grace we read and hear to make our lives full and meaningful. 4. Having integrity like Jesus means that you are not power-driven, “Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. ‘All this I will give You,’ he said, ‘if You will bow down and worship me.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve Him only’” (vss. 8-10). What if you could have it all, would you sell your soul? Satan told Jesus that He could have it all if He would just bow down and worship Him. If Satan walked up to you and said he would make you a billionaire if you’d bow down and worship Him, would you do it? Power is a wonderful thing but it can corrupt. We see power on our jobs, in relationships, in our communities and in our churches. Some people are what we call “natural born leaders,” but with that comes a healthy respect for the use of power.   Madonna made this statement “I won’t be happy till I’m as famous as God.” She’ll never be as famous as God, but she’s done some things in the quest for that fame that have dishonored both God and Madonna. Actor Don Johnson may have been thinking of Madonna when he said “Once you become famous, there is nothing left to become but infamous.”     Satan offered Jesus the world, He could have it all. All He had to do was just bow down and worship Satan. Satan didn’t understand what Jesus already knew – it was already His. Jesus had the power because His Father had the power – He was just waiting for His Father to give it back to Him and He had a lot more to lose if He accepted what Satan was offering. Power was not important to Jesus and for us to be in balance, we cannot be motivated by the power that we may obtain. Abraham Lincoln wisely said, “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power.”   If we want to be like Jesus, we need to reject the easy path to power. We must resist the temptation to sell out to “the dark side” in order to gain power, status, prestige or even control over others. It’s good to lead but we must lead in a righteous way, for the right reasons, in humility and never for the sake of power or ego. Jesus demonstrates a radically new form of true power that is about humility and service to God and others for Him.   There’s an ancient legend about a monk who found a precious stone, a precious jewel. A short time later the monk met a traveler, who said he was hungry and asked the monk if he’d share some of his provisions. When the monk opened his bag, the traveler saw the precious stone and, on an impulse, asked the monk if he could have it. Amazingly, the monk gave the traveler the stone. The traveler departed quickly, overjoyed with his new possession. However, a few days later, he came back, searching for the monk. He returned the stone to the monk and made a request: "Please give me something more valuable, more precious than this stone. Please give me that which enabled you to give me this precious stone!" Having integrity like Jesus means you know and trust that God will give you place or position that fits His plan. You are God’s glory focused, not power-driven! Conclusion: G. K. Chesterton wisely advised, “Don’t ever take a fence down until you know the reason it was put up.” So how’s your integrity? Do you rule your passions or do they rule you? Are you Biblically wise in your decisions? Do you trust God to give you the place or power that He desires for you…or are you power driven? As we tie this up, let me share some integrity protectors.   a) Keep your guard up at all times. Remember that temptation rarely comes to us as an obvious assault.   b) Be especially careful about temptation when you are at an emotional or physical low point. That’s when Satan attacked Jesus and his strategy has not changed.   c) Set clear boundaries and limits for yourself ahead of time. You will not make good moral and ethical decisions under the pressure of temptation. You must have chosen your values before temptation strikes.   d) Avoid situations where you know you are prone to temptation. If certain friends pull you down, make new ones. It certain situations make you more vulnerable, avoid them. Don’t flirt with temptation!   e) Fill your life with good things and godly people so that there is less room for temptation. We’re more vulnerable to temptation when we feel empty and unfulfilled.   f) When tempted recite Scripture and pray. Ask God for strength and know your armor. Jesus combated Satan with God’s Word. You have to be in the Book to fight the Enemy! D. L. Moody said, “When you think sin, think Scripture.” Replace Satan’s lies with God’s truth.   g) When you fail, learn and grow from your failure. When you get knocked down, get right back up. Learn from your failures and walk in a new direction.   A little girl was asked if Satan ever tempted her to do wrong. “Oh, yes,” she replied, “but when he knocks at the door of my heart, I just pray, ‘Lord Jesus, please go to the door for me!’” “What happens then?” she was asked. “Oh, everything turns out all right. When Satan sees Jesus, he runs away every time!” In her simple faith that little girl realized that even the strongest Christian is no match for the devil. Only Jesus has defeated him, so we must be strong in the strength of our Lord.   F. B. Meyer wrote, “There is only one way by which the tempter can be met. He laughs at our good resolutions and ridicules the pledges with which we fortify ourselves. Satan fears only One, He who in the hour of greatest weakness defeated him and who now has been raised far above all principalities and powers to deliver frail and tempted souls. Christ conquered the prince of this world in the days of His flesh and is prepared to do as much again for each of us as we seek His aid.”   Jesus’ victory over Satan proves that He is the righteous Son of God, mighty to save all who call upon Him. If we trust in Him as Savior and walk in His strength each day, we can overcome temptation when it hits, as surely it will. So how’s your integrity? Following Jesus means living with integrity. Are you a person of integrity?