Think about this -You had a long day, you are hungry, and you are feeling very weak. You had a messy house, so you began cleaning and cooking.

Your family member starts commenting-

you had one job to do and you didnt do it?

you are the most irresponsible person

you cant clean the house.

What would you do?

Would you continue to clean with a calm demenaour or would you snap back with all the built up hurt?

I can imagine, with all the power within us, we would try to defend our hurt with a very raw reactive power.

Temptation works like this – even if you are the calmest person out there – the moment someone touches your identity you lose it.

Every human’s action is centered around his identity, the inner picture of who we think we are and what we feel we must protect – be it for good or bad.

Our identity is fragile in this fallen world. If you look closely, most of us “react” when there is some insecurity around identity.

Jesus, the son of God, came to this earth, carrying the full God and humanness in him, yet he resisted the most severe temptation man faced, the one with his identity, being God’s son.

Mere humans, if we have power in some form, we always try to protect our ego with that power. But Jesus didn’t. He saved us by not succumbing to the same Temptation that resulted in the fallen world.

Jesus lived a sinless life.

In the gospels, there is a story of Jesus fasting for 40 days in the wilderness, and at the end, when his body is severely weakened, hungry, and where his ego could potentially be in a fragile state, Satan entered to tempt him. God allowed the temptation of his own precious son, knowing the fate of humanity rested on Jesus’ reaction.

The first time Satan tempted Him after fasting for 40 days, he tempted Him with food – a kind of convenience trap, urging Him to use His power for Himself.

And when they were ended, he was hungry. The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.”

The second temptation was about what Jesus was going to accomplish -authority in heaven and on earth.

Satan offered Him a shortcut.

Just imagine, while his body was weak, Jesus knew the suffering at the cross was going to be even more painful.

 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, ⁶ and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. ⁷ If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” ⁸

We know that feeling too, wanting the easy way out when the real path feels long or costly.

When the first two temptation didn’t work, Satan tempted Jesus with his very own identity, that could “trigger anyone”. ” if ” you are the son of God.

“If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written, “He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you”

Just imagine someone trying to trigger you “if you are the son of your father or mother”, show the guts man!

Good Friday tells us the story of Jesus on the day he was arrested, tried, mocked, tortured and died on the cross.

At the arrest time, when the disciple Peter tries to protect Jesus from getting arrested and went about cutting the high priest’s servant’s ears, Jesus says,

Do you think that I cannot appeal to my Father, and he will at once send me more than twelve legions of angels?

Just picture this, Jesus has the power of God within his Spirit to call for heavenly forces to aid Him, but He chooses not to.

At the the cross, Jesus hangs in pain, hurt and humiliated, the weakest form of our body, and they called out

“He saved others; let Him save Himself if He is the Christ of God, the Chosen One.”

Can you hear through all this how his identity was never forsaken or used to his advantage.

People break at the taunts, we snap back but the story ends there. We are the sinners.

We all have this temptation to justify our needs – protect our body

We all have the temptation to use the easy way out – the convenience trap

We all have this temptation to show what we are and what we are capable of – protection of our egos

But Jesus didn’t. Jesus saved us by living a sinless life, taking the death we deserve.

God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (II Corinthians 5:21)

But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. (Romans 5:8)

For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 6:23)