Fight Temptation With Scripture As Jesus Did And The Devil Will Flee From You

Hello and welcome to Social Media Ministries, my name is Spencer Coffman. Today we’re talking about how it’s important for you to fight temptation, so if this is your first time with us, I’m so happy you found our sermons or our messages, our podcasts, our videos, wherever you found it, wherever it is, hit the like button, follow us, subscribe to our channel wherever you can.

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Let’s go on. Jesus provided you with many examples on how it is important for you to defeat evil. Evil is always around us, remember this world is under the control, not really the control, but it is under the reign of the devil. God is in control of everything, but this world belongs to Satan and Satan really can do whatever he wants within reason.

It is kind of like children. You say, “Hey you know, you’re good within these boundaries. You want to go outside the boundaries you gotta come and ask and then we will say yes or no.” Satan can do all kinds of stuff here on this Earth, him, his demons, etc. And then if there are certain things he has got to ask God.

We have seen this time and time again throughout the Bible. The Book of Job is a very very good example of that, where Satan is all roaming to and fro, and then he goes to God and says “All right well let me do this.” “All right do that, but here’s your limitation.”

They have limits, but they will continue to try to wreak havoc on your life every single day. And Satan went after Jesus, so Jesus gave us some great ways to defeat evil. Never forget this, Jesus was human, He was here — fully man, yes He was God as well. He was in the Father and the Father was in Him, but He was human and tempted in the exact same ways that you and I are tempted.

You might say, “Well I am a female so I do not believe it was the exact same way.” Guess what, the human condition of temptation is universal, so it was the same. Jesus was tempted exactly like you are, tempted each and every day. You say, “Well that was thousands of years ago. It’s different today. We have cell phones and technology I can be tempted by TV” — it’s the same.

We just have more opportunity to be tempted today perhaps than Jesus had then, but it’s still the same. Sure maybe we have to deal with more temptation today, but then we would have more practice. So we should be better at defeating it and overcoming and resisting temptation. Two sides to everything.

How did Jesus defeat this temptation? He did so with Scripture. He used the words of God to fight, and not only fight but win. Check out Matthew Chapter 4. That’s where we are going today, so if you have your Bibles, turn with me. If you’re on an app on the phone, sure, whatever works for you.

Matthew Chapter 4, the temptation of Jesus. “Jesus was led by the Spirit’” — what spirit? The Holy Spirit. “into the desert to be tempted by the devil.” So wait a minute, the Holy Spirit led Jesus in to be tempted? Yes, remember this world is under the control of Satan, but every once in a while, God allows things to happen to us.

We have talked about this before, a whole series of why God allows Satan to tempt, torment, attack, all of that to us. God allows it. So He, the Spirit, led Jesus there with the intent of having Him be tempted. You say “Why would He do that?” Well obviously to teach us and to show that Jesus went through the same thing we went through or we will — we do go through.

There’s a purpose, God has a purpose for everything. We said that if you’re going through some trial it could be one of two reasons, either some heavenly battle between good and evil and it’s a teaching moment, or it is a course correction.

In this case, do you think Jesus needed to be course-corrected? No, therefore it was a heavenly battle between good and evil and a teaching moment for us. Let’s continue.

“After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry and the tempter came to him and said, ‘If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread’” — The tempter, who is the tempter? Well, it could’ve been Satan himself, could’ve been one of the demons, it’s most likely was in fact, Satan.

And Satan and Jesus knew each other, remember, they came from Heaven together. They knew each other, so Satan probably knew more about Jesus than — Well, obviously Satan knows everything about us anyway, but it be like being tempted — as far as Jesus, they could’ve been friends, they knew each other, so the betrayer came back and was tempting them again.

I would argue that the dynamic might have been a little bit more difficult than us being tempted by Satan because we know he’s evil. We never knew him as good. Maybe not, maybe it was even easier to resist because He knew He was betrayed and Satan left, but we know that Jesus didn’t hate Satan, He loves him, so that argument I don’t think would work either.

You could argue humanly that if someone betrays you, and then they come back and ask for something, your dislike for them overpowers whatever will you would have to give in. But not with Jesus, so make no mistake, He was tempted and it would’ve definitely been very difficult, but guess what, He resisted and He had victory.

How? Jesus answered, “It is written: ‘Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” What is He saying? He’s saying, “Hey I could turn these stones into bread, but that would only feed my body.” That’s what Satan was tempting Him with. Satan tempts our bodies.

Because what did Jesus say? “The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak.” He told that to His disciples when they kept falling asleep and He kept coming back and He’s like, “Why are you sleeping? Get up and pray.” Then He would leave and then come back and they are sleeping again. The spirit is willing, the body is weak. So what does Satan attack? The body.

What did Satan attack with Jesus? The body. Why? Because he knows he cannot defeat the Spirit, because it’s not our spirit, it’s the Holy Spirit. Satan is no match, so he says to Jesus, “Take these stones, turn them into bread.”

He probably didn’t just say that, he probably said, “Ph you’re hungry, oh I bet you’re really hungry, I can hear your stomach growling.” He probably went on and on, take these stones, turn them into bread, satisfy your hunger.

But Jesus recognized in that instant, now of course the tempter might not have looked like the devil, maybe the tempter looked like one of Jesus’ friends, we don’t know. But Jesus recognized in that instant, that hey this is not my friend, this is not my friend saying “Oh go ahead, you can turn these into bread and feed both of us, I’m hungry too.” Maybe it wasn’t His friend, maybe it was some guy He found in the caves who was starving to death, we don’t know.

Jesus recognized though that this was more than physical, it was more than earthly. He recognized it as a spiritual battle and what did He do? Did He say, “Yeah I’m really hungry, but I’m on a cleanse, a diet”? No, He took it to the next level as Jesus often does. He says “We don’t live on bread alone, but on every Word that comes from the mouth of God.”

He says, “I recognize this as a spiritual battle, this is spiritual warfare.” So He engaged in the spiritual level. He didn’t fight here on Earth, He engaged in the spiritual level. He says, “No, bread alone will not satisfy the Spirit,” we need every Word of God, the whole Bible.

The devil is like, all right I cannot win. “So he took him to a holy city and had him stand on the highest point of the temple and said, if you are the son of God, 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.”

He said, “If you are the Son of God,” — as in a little bit of doubt bringing in there, kind of like when someone wants you to buy something, well if you cannot afford it? No big deal. Then what happens? Pride steps in — Oh, I can afford it, and you pull out your checkbook.

The devil was playing on the worldly things. He was playing on the human nature of Jesus. He was saying, “If you are this,” — trying to lead him in — enticement, entrapment, playing on His emotions, playing on the human condition, ego, pride, vanity. “If you are the son of God, throw yourself down.”

And then what does he do? He uses Scripture. So the devil played on the human part, but also realized, “All right, I need to take it up a notch. I need to start fighting not only in the physical realm of this Earth but also the spiritual realm.” Because He, Jesus, instantly recognized what was going on and started fighting back spiritually.

So the devil says — quotes Scripture, Scripture from the Old Testament, from Psalm 91:11 and 12. “He will command his angels concerning you so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” Basically, it was a prophecy that Jesus would never be hurt. That His angels would protect Him.

And so the devil is using that. He’s using the spiritual — he’s using Jesus’ knowledge of the spiritual realm. The angels concerning Him that it refers to, could it be friends of Jesus? We don’t know, but he is saying “Hey throw yourself down if you are the son of God, prove it to me. Throw yourself down, for the angels will come and save you.

“We know this, we know this from Heaven, we have been there together, we have talked to them, they were our friends. We know they will come save you, just go ahead, throw yourself down.”

Now of course that might not have been what they said exactly, but we can guess. But the point is the devil took this fight to the next level. He said physical — if you are the son of God. — played on His human emotions. Spiritual, we know that it is promised that you will be taken care of.

“Jesus says, ‘It is also written: do not put the LORD your God to the test.’” So He countered Satan’s scripture reference with a reference of His own. Obviously, Satan says, “All right, fine, whatever.” He knew he was defeated there.

“So again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor.”

So they went to a mountain and Satan through what? Magic or dark arts or whatever — somehow showed Jesus every single kingdom in the world and all the splendor. Now we’re not talking just about that day and age, Satan probably showed him New York, Russia, wherever, you name it. Satan showed Him all the kingdoms of the world. Showed Him everything and all the splendor that they had at once.

Remember they are outside of time. They can show them and say “Look at all this, isn’t this incredible?” “‘All of this I will give you,’ he said” — why would he give it to Him? Well because it has been given to Satan and he will give it to Jesus, “if you bow down and worship me.”

Wow, Satan is really just taking it to the next level here. He says “I will give you everything, everything.” Now Jesus was already in Heaven. Jesus knows He is ruler but Jesus also knows that Satan rules the Earth.

And so he — Satan — is giving Jesus an opportunity, saying “Hey you can have this world back, I will give it to you. You can have it all. You could change this world. It could be peace on Earth again, there could be no more greed, no more nothing. We could live in a perfect world. All you have to do is bow down and worship me.”

And you might say, “Well wait a minute, if Jesus had the opportunity to eliminate all evil on this Earth and have this Earth truly be a Garden of Eden, a paradise again, why would He turn it down?” Because Satan said the condition was that “You are to bow down and worship me.” Jesus says, “Away from me Satan. For it is written, worship the LORD your God and serve him only.”

And we see this all throughout the Old Testament. No idols, no worshiping other Gods, nothing before God. Jesus said that, “Away from me” and He used Scripture and He fought in the spiritual realm.

He didn’t fight in the earthly realm by questioning saying, “Well wait a minute, you’ll give it all to me? Like I will have it here on Earth?” He didn’t ask him any questions about anything on earth, He immediately took it to that spiritual realm and fought and won.

It says, “Then the devil left him and angels came and attended him.” Satan left Jesus alone because he realized Jesus would not give in to temptation. James 4:7, “Submit yourselves to God. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.” We talked about this before, about resisting the devil a long time ago. Check it out if you have not seen that message, it’s excellent. Resist the devil and he will flee from you.

So Jesus resisted. Not, not only did Jesus resist though, He fought back and the devil then left. The devil fleed and then something amazing happened, angels came and attended Jesus. Angels came and now with angels around Him.

Do you think the devil is going to attack again? Doubtful — not anywhere else that we see this temptation of Jesus. Any more temptation I should say, it’s written about in other gospels as well.

Satan is not stupid. He’s really not. He’s very clever and he is very devious and his demons are clever and devious. Satan’s not going to waste his time tempting people with things that are not effective. For example, if you are rich, he’s not going to say, “I will give you money.” Well maybe if you are motivated by greed it would work.

He’s going to go to someone and say, “Oh you are trying to have a child and you can’t, I will give you a child.” Or he’s going to say, “You desperately want this, I will give you this.” He’s going to tempt people with what they need here on Earth.

And that’s what you have to recognize when you are tempted. It’s an earthly thing that you are going after. Fight spiritually and the spirit will overtake the body. The body is weak, the spirit is willing. You start fighting spiritually, your spirit will overpower the needs of the body, and guess what, you will no longer give in or need that temptation.

Satan’s not going to waste his time tempting people with things that are not effective. He’s not going to go to a recovering alcoholic and say, “Hey you need some whatever, drugs, pain meds?” No, he’s going to tempt them with alcohol, going to use what works.

We have a whole series about when and how Satan and demons attack. You can check out the sermon specifically on when and how demons attack right here because you gotta know how they attack. Satan sits through your life and finds the one temptation that you can’t resist the next time. Does he tempt you with something else this time?

Maybe he tempted you when you were alone when you were feeling sad, when you were feeling overwhelmed, when no one else was in the house. Next time when you have two other people around you, is he going to try to tempt you? Next time when you are really happy, is he going to try to tempt you?

No, he’s going to wait until the next time you are alone, you’re sad, you’re overwhelmed and you’re alone in the house, and bam — he will come on you like a full force. He’s going to tempt you with the same thing, he’s going to use what works. He’s going to attack the weakest link.

But if you fight with Scripture like Jesus, if you recognize that hey this temptation is an earthly thing, this is of this world — whatever he is tempting you with, some kind of addiction, drugs, alcohol, substance abuse, pornography, anything, whatever he’s tempting you with, it
s of this world. Start fighting with Scripture.

Any type of addiction could be fought with Scripture of no other Gods before me, no idols. What is taking the place, you’re seeking that more than you are seeking God. Fight with Scripture. Find Scripture to help you through whatever it is you are fighting with.

When the temptation happens, start fighting on a spiritual level like Jesus, and eventually guess what? Satan is going to stop spending time on you. He will leave. Why will he leave? Because he’s not going to waste his time. He is going to go after someone else.

Now we do not wish that upon them, but guess what, I really wish that he would not attack you. So fight with scripture. Fight in the spiritual realm. Use scripture. What is scripture? It is the sword of the spirit. Come on, use your sword, use your sword.

When you fight with Scripture, Satan is going to leave you, angels will attend you and you will be closer to holiness. You will have achieved holiness and you will no longer be tempted. Now, of course, we can’t be completely holy, because we are still sinners, but we can strive to be holy. We can get closer and closer and closer to God.

1 Peter 1:16, “For it is written: be holy, because I am holy.” Where is it written? Back in Leviticus 11:44-45 and also Leviticus 19:2 which we are going to read right now. 19:2 says, “Speak to the entire assembly of Israel and say to them, be holy, because I the LORD am holy.”

Be holy. How do you be holy? Fight with Scripture. Do what Jesus did. It worked for Him, it’s going to work for you. When Satan starts tempting you with things of this world, take the battle to the spiritual realm. The spirit is stronger than your flesh, your flesh is weak, it will give in, you will fail. Call on the Spirit, use your sword, and fight back. Angels will come and attend you and the devil will flee.

Let’s pray. Lord Jesus thank you so much for this time together, for these encouraging words. I ask that whoever is out there being tempted, that they will fight with the Spirit. They will use their sword, that they will study and learn Scripture that can be used to fight in the spiritual realm.

That whenever they are tempted here on this Earth, that they would instantly recognize that it’s a worldly temptation like Jesus did and that they will take it to the next level. That they will take it to the other realm, the spiritual realm, and that they will fight and be victorious, and that the devil will flee from them. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

Be inspired. You have the Word of God. You have the spirit within you. Use it and be victorious. God bless.