Philanthropy in the Desert...

First Things

by Hans Boersma

2/23/24

It is meet and right that Lent should start with Matthew 4. Its first sentence sums up not just Lent but the entire Christian life. “Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil” (Matt. 4:1). We may apply this to ourselves: “Then was I led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.” Our brief span of life is the wilderness. The Spirit himself has led us here. His purpose is that we be tempted by the devil.

This sentence contains a great mystery: Why would God himself—the Holy Spirit—lead us into this world so that we might be tempted by the devil? I cannot solve this mystery, for God's mysteries are not like puzzles. They cannot be solved; they are meant to be lived instead.

When Jesus comes into the wilderness and the devil tempts him, he does not ask, “Why does the Spirit lead me here? What rational sense can I make of this?” What he does instead is fight the devil, with the Scriptures as his weapon. Read it all...