Christ Formed in You Message #5, “Christ as a Mature Adult”, Ed Miller, Sept. 7, 2024

Listen to the audio above while following along in the transcript below which is also available for download at www.biblestudyministriesinc.com

WELCOME AND OPENING PRAYER

I remind you of that indispensable principle of Bible study which is total reliance upon God’s Holy Spirit.  It’s only as we trust Him that He opens up His precious page to our hearts.  There are two mysteries that the Bible talks about.  When the Bible uses the word “mystery”, it doesn’t mean mysterious; it means that it’s something that needs to be revealed by God.  There’s no way we are going to see it in any other way until He shows us.  Then, it’s not a mystery anymore. 

Two times in the New Testament Paul asks for special prayer before He spoke.  Both times had to do with a mystery.  He said, “God has called me to speak the mystery of the gospel: the good news, and the New Covenant.”  There’s no way that the New Covenant can be known unless God reveals it.  So, he called it a “mystery”.  He said that he was also called to preach the mystery of Christ, and that there’s no way to know Christ except that he is revealed.  These are interesting verses, and only two times in the New Testament do we have the expression “as I ought to speak”.  So, I want to speak as I ought to speak, and Paul wanted to speak “as I ought to speak”.  So, he asked for prayer.  He said, “Will you pray for me that I speak as I ought to speak?”  Ephesians 6:19,

“Pray for me as I preach the mystery of the gospel that I might speak as I ought to speak,” and then he added this, “boldly.”

Pray that as I handle the mystery of the gospel that I might preach as I ought to preach boldly. 

Then in Colossians 4:34,

“Pray for me as I preach the mystery of Christ, that I might preach as I ought to preach,” and then he added this, “clearly,”(simply).

So, I come to the Bible, and I know how I ought to speak.  I ought to speak boldly, and I ought to speak simply, but because it’s a mystery, because you can’t know it until He reveals it, pray for me that I might speak as I ought to speak the mystery of the gospel boldly and the mystery of Christ clearly.  So, let’s pray…

Our Father, how we praise You, that You have not left us on our own when we come to this precious book, that You have given us Your Holy Spirit and have promised that You would unveil the Lord Jesus to the hungry heart.  So, create in us a desire and a hunger, and fill that desire, we pray.  By Your grace we are going to open our mouths wide, and by Your grace fill us.  We ask in Jesus’ name.  Amen.

REVIEW

We come now to the end of our look at the thirty years.  I hope it means more to you now than when you first came.  It’s those preparation years.  As I understand it, there are no other scriptures that give us the progressive revelation of Christ more than these thirty years.  It’s clear by now that the track we’ve been following—that as He came, He comes—God has given us a record of the progressive unveiling of Christ.  He began as a seed, and then as a fetus, and then as an infant, and then He grew and became a child/young adult and so on.  As He once came, He comes.  Exactly the same principles that were true when He came on the earth are true now.  He comes and is conceived in us as a seed by the Holy Spirit.  He is formed in us and He grows in us.  There’s a stage when He’s a fetus in our hearts, and a stage when He’s an infant in our hearts, and a stage when He’s a young adult in our hearts.  As He’s being formed, it’s toward the end that He might be perfected to be the perfect Savior and the perfect priest—preparation for ministry.  We’ve been following as a prayer Galatians 4:19,

“I’m in travail for you and labor for you until Christ is formed in you.”

As we have the gospel record, He’s formed in us, individually and corporately.

Our last message was on Christ as a young adult, illustrated by twelve-year-old Jesus in the temple at Jerusalem.  What does it look like when Christ is formed that much in my life?  At that stage there will be a great involvement with the things of God and the word of God and the people of God; it’s so much so that it has become a custom, a habit which is illustrated by the Passover with God’s people, as a custom, getting together.  But those are also the days where there is the temptation, because we’ve been so used to the presence of God and taking His presence for granted, that we become so involved in the festivities (fellowship, praise and things connected with the Lord, celebrating) that it’s very easy to get our eyes off the Lord Jesus.  We have a growing, but limited view of what He is; we don’t yet see Him in every way.  So, we sometimes have expectations of Him; we expect Him to do things a certain way.  When He disappoints our expectations, then we get into a frenzy and become anxious, and sometimes we even blame Him.

It’s at this stage that He lays out that principle, the will of God, “I must be about My Father’s everything,” His will, His pleasure, His purpose, His interests, His House, His temple, His people.  It’s about His will.  For the first time, you begin to see that it’s not my will but His will, and I’ve got to be about my Father’s business.  It’s also at this stage where He does a very unique thing.  He says that it’s all about My Father’s will, and then He turns around and submits Himself to His parents.  He lays on us a great burden, because now it’s God’s will, but you must find out what that is.  It’s during this time that we drag Jesus here and there, and He submits; He comes!  But He doesn’t do that forever.

For eighteen years He was submitted to her.  She would say that this is what Jesus will do and He’d do it.  But then one day they ran out of wine, and He said, “Woman, what do I have to do with you?”  It sounds so harsh on the level of earth.  Mary learned in that moment, because God gave her light, and she knew right away what it was, that He was no longer subject to her; now she was subject to Him.  She was not going to take Him on her mission trip.  He’s going to take her on His mission trip.  She was subject to Him now.  That’s Christ as a young adult.

THE BAPTISM AND TEMPTATION OF CHRIST

That brings us to the climax with two stories that wrap up the preparation years.  One is the baptism of our Lord Jesus, and the other is the temptation.  That’s the end of the preparation time.  Some take the temptation of Christ as not the end of His preparation but the first step in His ministry, where His ministry begins.  Humor me, please, at least for now.  There are reasons that make me think that it’s the end of His preparation, not the least of which is Matthew 4:10,

“And Jesus said to Satan, ‘Be gone and depart.”

I think that here the last Adam has the victory that the first Adam did not win.  With that “Satan, be gone”, He’s prepared and then His ministry begins.

What will my life look like when Christ is a fetus in my heart?  What will my heart look like when Christ is an infant in my heart?  What will my heart look like when Christ is a young adult in my heart?  Now what will it look like when He’s matured and ready for ministry, to be a perfect Savior and pour Himself out redemptively?  I know it’s true of me, and perhaps it’s true of you, now that we’re going to touch on the maturity of Christ, who can consider that they have arrived?  You know, if I look at some of this, I feel like I’m looking in a window, longing for that day when He’s conformed.  Don’t try to mature yourself.  That’s His business.  He’s maturing.  He will be formed in you.  That which He has begun, He will complete until the end.

Let me suggest some principles.  What will it look like when Christ is mature, illustrated by the baptism and by the temptation?  Notice that God has linked these two together.  Matthew 4 begins with the word “then”.  Right after the baptism, without intermission, “then” Jesus was led to the wilderness.  It’s almost like they aren’t two stories: it’s like one story.  Luke 4:1 gives the same idea,

“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led in Spirit in the wilderness.”

Mark in his characteristic way uses the word “straight away”.  Mark 1:12, “And straight away, the Spirit driveth Him into the wilderness.”  Kenneth Wuest in his expanded translation says it this way, “And immediately the Spirit thrusts Him into the uninhabited place.”  My point in paying attention to this is to show you that they are one story; the baptism, and then immediately after the temptation are connected.

I believe that these two stories graphically illustrate the whole reality of the thirty years.  The thirty years are now coming to a climax.  The whole point of the thirty years that we called attention to in the introduction lesson is that Christ has come to become the representative man and to obey God; to live perfectly.  All thirty years our Lord Jesus lived a sinless life.  As we come through these stories it gets clearer and clearer.  In the story of Jesus when He was twelve years old, he submitted to His parents.  He also said that He must be about His Father’s business.  When He submitted to His parents, He illustrated that He was rightly related to man.  When He said that He had to be about His Father’s business, He was declaring that He was rightly related to God.  That’s the two tables of the law; to be rightly related to man and to be rightly related to God. 

God doesn’t tell us everything about the thirty years, but He tells us all we need to know, that He was rightly related to man and He was rightly related to God, every hour of every day of every week of every month of every year throughout that whole period.  Just so, I believe these last two stories give exactly the same thing.  The baptism illustrates that He’s rightly related to man.  His victory over the devil illustrates that He’s rightly related to God.  It’s a wonderful climax of the thirty years because, as we come to the end, we see that He is rightly related to man and rightly related to God, that He has perfectly obeyed and passed the test as the representative man, and now His ministry can begin.

As you know, if you take a section of scripture, like His baptism and like the temptation, there’s too much material to cover it all.  I’d love to be able to discuss with you when John the Baptizer resisted baptizing, and Jesus had one attitude toward him, and later Peter resisted the cross and Jesus had another attitude toward Peter.  It would be interesting to compare those two things.  I’d love to be able to discuss John 1:33. John says that he was given a sign, and that he wouldn’t know the Messiah until a dove descended upon Him.  But then when Jesus came to be baptized and before the dove descended, He resisted.  It looks like He knew Him already.  What’s that all about?  Matthew 3:15, “Permit this to fulfill all righteousness.”  What does that mean?  And the baptism of fire, what is that all about and how does it relate to Luke 12:49-50?  There’s so much we could talk about.  When you come into the temptation, there are a thousand directions we could go.  In fact, as I was studying it, my head was swimming in so many different directions.

Was He impeccable?  Could He have sinned?  What is temptation?  And what was it that Jesus was tempted in all points as we are?  Is that illustrated in the temptation in the wilderness?  Was it literal or was it figurative?  When He went out into the wilderness, did He then leave the wilderness and go up a mountain?  Did He leave a mountain and actually go into a city?  How did He get there?  Did God allow Satan to carry Him through the air?  Did it happen in His imagination?  What does it mean when Satan shows Him all the kingdoms and all the glory of all kingdoms in a moment of time?  What form did Satan take?  Why does Mark tell us that He was with the wild beasts when He was in that temptation?  Was it a complete test?  Was it bread and any kind of liquid?  Is there significance in the forty days?  What’s the ministry of angels when someone is being tempted?  We don’t have time to look at all of that.  Every one of those things are so instructive and so rich and so full of manna for your spirit.

This morning, I want to step way back and look at those two events in order to see Christ as He matures.  We’ll have to jump over so much.  But if we can lay hold of the essence of what it is like when Christ is mature, that’s what I’d like us to look at, and what our lives will look like if He grows that much in me.  May God help us!  Turn to Matthew 3 and we’ll pick up the reading in the middle of Matthew’s record.  Matthew 3:13,

“Then cometh Jesus from Galilee to the Jordan to John to be baptized of him.  But John inhibited Him by saying, ‘I need to be baptized by Thee, and comest Thou to me?’  And Jesus answering said unto him, ‘Suffer it now, for thus it becomes us to fulfil all righteousness.’ And he suffered Him and Jesus was baptized and went straight up from the water; and the heavens were open unto Him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending as a dove coming upon Him; and, lo, a voice out of the heaven saying, ‘This is My beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased.’”

The gospel of Mark records pretty much the same thing.  Luke 3:21 adds a detail that the others don’t give.  When Jesus was in the water, He was praying.  There were other people in the water at the same time and they weren’t praying; they were repenting; they were confessing.  Jesus didn’t have to repent or confess.  So, He was standing in the midst of a bunch of people who were confessing their sins, and while they were confessing, He was praying to His Father God.  The Apostle John tells us that the coming of the dove was God’s signal to John the Baptizer that this was Messiah. John 1:33,

“I knew Him not but He Who sent me to baptize Him in water said to me, ‘Whomever you see the Spirit descending and abiding, the same is He that baptizes in the Holy Spirit.’  And I’ve seen and born witness that this is the Son of God.”

This is Christ at the end of His preparation, Christ in His maturity.  In order to make it practical, let me give three of the facts and answer the question of what it would look like when Christ is mature.

Jesus chose to stand with sinners in the place of death

This first fact is the dove.  We’ve got to get away from that notion of the “dove of peace” or back to Noah and the dove with the olive leaf in its mouth, and it’s not about the comment of Jesus that we are to be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.  That’s not what’s going on here.  In the gospel of Luke, when Mary and Joseph brought the Lord Jesus for dedication, they came with doves because they knew that in Leviticus 5:7,

“If you can’t afford a lamb, you can bring the substitute for the lamb; doves.”

The lamb was the substitute for the sinner and the dove was the substitute for the lamb.  In fact, there was another substitute.  If you were too poor to bring a dove, you could bring a pinch of flour, and the flour would be a picture of the dove, and the dove would be a picture of the lamb.  God was saying that nobody has an excuse; all could come.  That’s the grace of God.

When our Lord Jesus identified with sinners, He didn’t have to.  John makes that clear.  Jesus came to a place in His maturity that He knew that He didn’t have to, but He wanted to, to stand and identify with sinners.  “I don’t have to do it.”  There’s a double symbolism in the dove.  It’s not only a picture of the lamb of death and the cross and dying, but it’s linked to the Holy Spirit.  It’s a picture of the Holy Spirit.  The Holy Spirit descended like a dove.  And it’s a picture of death.  I’m suggesting that in that hour when He is mature, one of the first characteristics will be death and the cross; how selfless He was in that moment.  He didn’t have to do that.  He wanted to do it. 

And so, He deliberately identified, and yet was separate from them, but He stands with the sinner.  He pours His life out, and the Holy Spirit enables Him to die, and anoints Him with death.  That’s one of the main characteristics of the mature Christ. Now, it’s no longer about me dragging Him here, and where is He going to take me, and my will and His will.  That’s all done.  Now it’s just a pouring out of His life, and He stands with sinners in the water, and gives up His life and His own ambitions, and lets the Holy Spirit come down on Him with death.

Jesus spoke to His Father under an open heaven

The second characteristic illustrates the open heavens.  As He stood there in the water identified with sinners, willingly having chosen it by the power of the Holy Spirit, the heavens were opened.  You’ve heard the expression, “Living under an open heaven.”  Under that open heaven He was praying, and God spoke from heaven.  The open heaven is a two-way conversation.  There’s a fellowship there.  Do you want to know what it’s like when Christ is mature in your life?  You are going to let the Holy Spirit bring death on your life and you’re going to live under an open heaven.  You’re going to communicate with Him; He’s going to communicate with me.  That’s what it looks like. 

That’s why sometimes I think that I’m just outside looking in the window.  I long that God would work that in my heart; I long for Christ to be so conformed that I can choose to stand with the world that He came to save and allow the Holy Spirit to bring me into death, and not try to kill myself or die to self but allow the Holy Spirit to anoint me with death.  What a precious thing, isn’t it, to live under an open heaven?

God is satisfied

And then the third principle, a voice out of heaven.  Matthew 3:17,

“This is my beloved Son in Whom I am well pleased.”

God is satisfied and happy.  When Christ is mature, He stands in death, under an open heaven and God is pleased.  That’s the sign of maturity; a precious, precious place to be.  That’s when He stands before man.

THE WILDERNESS

Let’s see when He stands before the Lord.  Luke 4:1-13,

“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led around by the Spirit in the wilderness; and for forty days was being tempted by the devil.  He did eat nothing during those days.  When the day had ended, He became hungry and the devil said to Him, ‘If Thou art the Son of God, command this stone that it become bread.’  And Jesus answered unto him, ‘It is written that man shall not live by bread alone.’  He led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time and the devil said to Him, ‘To Thee I’ll give all this authority and the glory of them for it has been delivered unto me and I’ll give to whomsoever I will.  If Thou, therefore, will worship before me, it shall all be Thine.’  Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘It is written that thou shall worship the Lord thy God and Him only shalt thou serve.’  And he led Him to Jerusalem and set Him on the pinnacle of the temple and said unto Him, ‘If you are the Son of God, cast Yourself down from thence, for it is written that it is the angels’ charge to guard Thee, and on their hands they will bear Thee up, lest haply Thou shalt dash Thy foot against a stone.’  Jesus answering said to him, ‘It is said that thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.’  And when the devil had completed every temptation, he departed from Him for a season.”

You’ll notice that Matthew’s and Luke’s order of the temptation are not the same.  Some think that Matthew’s is probably the correct order because of the words, “Be gone Satan!”  I think that Luke’s order is the spiritual order.  So, we’ll follow here Luke’s order.  The fact that God gives us two different orders, at least tells us that we aren’t to argue about which order is correct in fact; it doesn’t matter because God has given us both.  In Luke’s order He’s tempted in the wilderness, He’s tempted on the mountain, and He’s tempted in the temple.  No doubt you’ve had wilderness experiences in your life.  He’s tempted in the wilderness and He’s victorious.  No doubt you’ve had mountain experiences in your life, and He’s victorious as the representative man.  No doubt you’ve had temple experiences in your life, and He was victorious as the representative man.

Almost all who study this portion of scripture point out how those three temptations are representative temptations.  There is no doubt that Jesus was tempted these three times but also before this.  Hebrews 5:7-8 tells us that He was tempted all of His life.  Luke 4:2 tells us that He was tempted all forty days.  Verse 13 says that after this, Satan left Him until an opportune time.  He was tempted after this, too.  He was tempted all of His life and all forty days, and He was tempted after this.  But God says that He wants you to see this.  So, God focuses in on these three representative temptations.  Some say that it’s the same as Genesis 3:6, the three areas where Eve saw that it was good for food, a delight to the eyes, and the desire to make man wise.  Some say it’s 1 John 2:16, “All that’s in the world; the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, the pride of life.”  They believe it’s the same three.  I don’t know if it is or not.  Some say it’s three temptations because it’s body, soul and spirit.  Another says it’s mind, emotion and will.  Another says it’s the three natural desires: the desire to enjoy, the desire to acquire and the desire to achieve.  I don’t know about all of that, but I don’t think that’s the bottom line.  It misses the point.

Satan tempts Jesus to doubt His Father’s love

In our introduction lesson, I quoted 2 Corinthians 11, and I tried to show you how Paul was so concerned for the Corinthians because He was afraid Satan would do to them what He did to Eve.  Then he labels it and calls it, “Losing the simplicity and devotion to the Lord.”  It’s all about the Lord.  All these temptations, whatever else we can see in them, Satan was concerned that Jesus was in fellowship with His Father.  That’s what he was after.  On the level of earth, if we are talking about temptations, this is a little different.  Have you ever been tempted to turn a stone into bread?  Satan isn’t tempting Christ to chase skirts or to be addicted to a substance that would hold Him in bondage.  That’s not what this is about.  He’s not trying to get Him caught up in some shady deal or some fraud or something like that.  He’s not trying to get Him discouraged so that He’ll throw Himself off the temple to kill Himself.  It’s deeper than that.

Jesus was walking in simplicity and devotion to His Father, and Satan wanted to destroy that.  Do you know why?  It’s because that’s the sign of maturity, but nothing is going to destroy this.  I’ll give you what I think is God’s heart on each temptation.  What’s true of the Head, is true of the members.  I don’t really think that Satan’s concerned if you run away with your secretary, either.  He’s after your relationship with the Lord.  That’s what he wants and that’s what he’s trying to get.  He takes you up to the temple just to cast you down.  That’s what it’s all about.

Let me make this practical and give the heart of each one.  I believe the first temptation in Luke’s order is this; Satan tried to get Jesus to doubt God’s love, to doubt the Father’s love.  Our Lord Jesus had just stood under the open heavens, the Father had just anointed Him with death, and He was standing before man as God created man to stand before men, in love and willing to identify with them and pour Himself out for them, and He heard a voice, “This is My beloved Son.”  Immediately He goes into the wilderness fasting, and Satan begins in verse 3, “If You are the Son of God…,” implying that Jesus had reason to doubt that; “Look at where you are – in an uninhabited wilderness.  If God loved you, would He allow that?  You’re in a dry place, a barren place, a waste place.  If He loved You, would He allow that?  You are all alone.  It’s very lonely out here, Jesus.  He’s Your Father and He allows that?”  See, the angels didn’t come until the end.  “There’s a lot of wild beasts around you, huh, Jesus?  I thought you were His child!  Would He allow that?  My, You look tired, Jesus.  You look run down and hungry.  Would He allow You to get tired and run down and hungry?”

That’s the power of Satan’s temptation; “If God loved you, would He do that?  Let me rescue You to provide Your needs.  Why are You waiting for Him?  Why are You waiting for Your Father?”  There’s such a destructive element in this suggestion that if God loves me, He’ll deliver me, and if He doesn’t deliver me, He must not love me.

I knew a dear saint; how we prayed and wept with her and how we cried over her.  She was suicidal.  When she was normal, we could talk, but then she’d get into these deep depressions.  She had rheumatoid arthritis like I’ve never seen.  Her joints were so swollen and massive.  Somebody told her that if you are truly God’s child, He will heal you, and if He doesn’t heal you, you are not God’s child.  She was convinced that she was not God’s child.  We were able to save her the first time from the coat hanger in the closet as she tried to kill herself.  We prayed and longed for her, and she finally took her own life.

Satan whispered the same temptation into the ear of our Lord Jesus as He hung on the cross, “If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” If He delights in Him, then deliver Him.  So, there’s that idea that if He doesn’t deliver, He doesn’t delight.  Satan would love you to judge God’s love by your circumstances.  He would love me to judge God’s love in my life by my circumstances—when the bread fails, and the strength fails, and the health fails and when the opportunities dry up.  Satan doesn’t want us to believe that the problem is love; he wants us to doubt God’s love, and he chooses those tracks. He waits until you are in the wilderness to come after you on that.  He waits until you are alone.

You single men and single women, widows and widowers who are alone, there is a special temptation for those who are alone and lonely to be vulnerable to his attack, as Jesus was when He was so tired from doing God’s will.  He’ll come to question you, “Does He really love you?”  Adam and Eve fell before food, and they weren’t even hungry.  Our Lord Jesus was victorious after this fast.  Do you have beasts coming against you?  We all have our little set of hyenas and jackals.  Your beast may not be my beast, but I’ll tell you that it’s all the same.  Bottom line—God loves you.  Do you want to know what it looks like when God is fully mature?  He loves me, and I don’t care what happens.  That’s a mature Christ. 

Jeremiah 31:2-3,

“Thus says the Lord, ‘The people found grace in the wilderness.  Israel, when it went to find rest, the Lord appeared to him from afar saying, “I have loved you with an everlasting love.”’”

They found grace in the wilderness.  Brothers and sisters in Christ, don’t ever doubt God’s love for you.  Whatever circumstance you are in, whatever the wilderness or however alone you might be or however many beasts come at you or however tired you are, however hungry you are, don’t doubt for a moment that He loves you with an everlasting love, and that there is grace in the wilderness.

Satan tempted Jesus by suggesting His Father was not enough

In Luke 4:5-8, Christ as our representative had this temptation in the extreme; all the glories of all the kingdoms were offered to Him in a moment of time.  At best, we’ll be offered probably a wedge of gold and a seat of honor and our own glory, and that will be it.  He was offered everything.  What’s the bottom line of that?  You see, to the Lord Jesus, His Father was everything; His Father was sufficient, and His Father was enough.  In His Father He was satisfied and happy and content, and when Satan dangled all that before Him it was for this one purpose—to say, “God is not enough.  There must be something here that you can desire and want because God is not enough.”  He’s going after His relationship with God.  If he can get Him to believe that God doesn’t love Him, it’s over.  If he can get Him to believe that God is not enough, it’s finished and over.  That’s what this temptation is all about. 

In the wilderness we almost automatically run to Jesus.  On the mountaintop, that’s where we get this temptation where we think that maybe He’s not enough, maybe we can have some of these other things.  David said in Psalm 30:6-7,

“I said in my prosperity I’ll never be moved; Thou hast made my mountain to stand strong; Thou didst hide Thou face, and I was dismayed.”

When the world is laid out for us in all of its vain glory, when some opportunity of authority and Lordship is put before us, is He enough?  He came to see that in a moment of time.  The closest that I came to that is daydreaming.  Do you ever daydream?  Sometimes in a moment of time you can get all these grandeur ideas about what I can be and what I can have and what would happen.  Is He enough when you are daydreaming?  Satan would love you to doubt God’s love; he’d love for you to doubt His sufficiency.

Satan tempted Jesus by doubting the faithfulness of God

Luke 4:9-12, what was the devil trying to accomplish by inviting Him to the temple, the spiritual place to throw Himself from the pinnacle of the temple?  I think this is the most subtle of all because it’s the most spiritual; it takes place in the temple.  Once again, the target is the same; it’s His relationship to God.  Satan thinks, “If I can’t get Him to think that God doesn’t love Him, and I can’t get Him to doubt the sufficiency of God, maybe I can get Him to doubt the faithfulness of God.”  It’s so clever; he quotes a promise from Psalm 21, that, “God promised He would be with You and give You angels as charge over You and watch over You, so much so that You won’t even stub Your foot against the rock.  He’ll watch over You.”  Here’s the temptation; “Jesus, Your Father has given a promise.  You trust Him.  Is He faithful?  Will He do it?  There’s only one way that you will find out, Jesus.  You are going to have to take Your eyes off His faithfulness and put them on Your faith.”  Do you see what he did?  How subtle is that!  If he can get Him to take His eyes off the faithfulness of God and put them on His own faith, He’s done.

Can I suggest to you what it looks like when Christ is mature in your life?  When He’s mature in your life, by an act of your will, and you don’t have to do this, but you want to pour your life out, and you will identify with them.  You’ll step in the water, you’ll be separate and different, but you are going to allow God in His Holy Spirit to allow you to die.  And you’ll live under an open heaven and talk to Him, and God is going to be happy and satisfied and pleased.  And nothing is going to shake you from your union in Him and your walk with Him, no matter what circumstance comes into your life.  It doesn’t matter what wilderness or what spiritual temple or what mountain comes into your life, you will never doubt that He loves you.  You will never doubt that He is enough and never doubt that He is faithful.  You see, at that point you are ready for ministry.  When God can bring you to that place where before men you are dead, but before God you are alive, that nothing will make you doubt His love or sufficiency, and nothing will make you look to your own faith rather than His faithfulness, and you know He’s enough and that He’s faithful, He’s ready then to begin His ministry.

Maturity is the Lord and us being one – the exchanged Life

We’ve talked about the fact that He’s a representative man, and so I don’t want you to get confused.  He’s come into your life to do it again.  He was not tempted as your example, to be tempted first to show you how to be tempted second.  He did it once so that you don’t have to.  And now He’s come in to live it again.  When you are in the wilderness, it is Christ Who rests in the Father’s love.  There’s not a chance that we aren’t going to make it.  I’m going to look at the wilderness and the beasts and that hyena that’s coming at me, and I’m tired and weak, and I’m not going to make it, but He IS!!  He’s the representative man and He’s the substitute Life.  It takes God to be a Christian; it’s the Lord Himself that’s going to trust the Father’s love.  It’s God Himself Who will trust the Father’s sufficiency.  It’s the Lord who is going to constantly show that He’s the One maturing.  When He comes that far in Your life, then He begins to live through you. 

It’s not a surprise to me that when I come to the end of this, that I just see Jesus living in devotion and simplicity.  That’s how it’s got to end.  Maturity is not confusing; it’s you and the Lord being one, the exchanged Life, and nothing is going to change that—ever!  That’s how simple it is!  Here’s a Bible verse from the New Testament, Romans 7:18,

“I know in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing.”

For years I thought that verse said, “In me dwelleth no good thing,” but it doesn’t say, “In me dwelleth no good thing.”  It says that I know in me dwelleth no good thing.  Happy is the man who knows it!  Happy is the woman who knows it.  It’s true of all of us.  There’s no good thing in us, but happy is the person who knows that I know in me dwells no good thing, because then He can live.  He wants to be formed in you.  Honestly, probably not to the intensity that it is in Paul, God has begun to put it in my heart.  I labor and travail until Christ is formed in you.   Let’s pray…

Our Father, we thank You so much for this little look at such a great thing.  We just pray that as You continue to mature and grow and develop to the place that You can finally minister through us, maturing in us to grow into our part and our willingness, that we would not hinder Your growth or maturity.  We know You want to live redemptively through us.  We know that means death for us and Life for them.  Work it in us, we pray.  For those who are in some wilderness or on some mountain or find themselves in some spiritual pinnacle, will You be victorious in them?  We pray in Jesus’ name.  Amen.