Full of the Spirit
What a great opening line for today’s passage.
Jesus, son of God, has just stepped out of the waters of baptism, receives a very public blessing from the Father and then the Holy Ghost, in the form of a dove settles on Him. He is filled with the Holy Spirit in a fresh way.
Not only was this a beautiful sight for all to see, but also a confirmation of who He was. The Son of God, beloved of the Father and full of the grace and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
From a human perspective, it would appear as if this is Jesus’ moment! He is poised and ready for ministry. Would this now be time to step into His calling? He was appointed and anointed and there was even the beginnings of a public platform from which Jesus could have begun to preach from. None of us would have expected any less.
Yet, when it seems as if the stage is set for Jesus to enter His calling, the Bible says that He ‘was led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness’.
The wilderness is a solitary, lonely and desolate place. An uninhabited place. A hard place.
Perhaps, like me, you would normally equate the Holy Spirit’s leading to places that are vibrant and heaving with life! The outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2 comes to mind.
So what happens when your expectation does not line up with your reality?
Yet clearly the Holy Spirit led Jesus to this place and in this place Jesus then faced great temptation from the devil. What’s more, it wasn’t just for one or two days, but Jesus endured a sustained period of testing for forty days!
Forty is a number often used in the Old Testament to indicate a time of probation, separation or even judgement and in a way Jesus’ 40 days in the wilderness hark back to Israel’s 40 years in the desert.
At that time Yahweh led His people out of slavery and out of Egypt – the destination was the promised land but they had to go through a time of separation. Separating themselves from all they had known in Egypt so that they could become God’s holy people.
But this is where the parallels stop. And when we compare Jesus’ time in the wilderness to the Israelites 40 years in the desert, we can find some keys as to how we should respond when the Lord also leads us into the wilderness.
Because when we are in hard places, in between the past and the promise, temptations will come.
Will we be like the Israelites who complained and grumbled as they looked back with rose-coloured glasses about how good it was in Egypt? (Had they forgotten they were slaves?)
Or will we be like Jesus and submit to the leading of the Holy Spirit, even in the hard places. Will we choose not to run from the pain but instead remain in the place of prayer and fasting and lean on the Father for strength.
Will we do like Jesus who when tempted by the devil, does not respond with His own words. Instead He only speaks Gods words prefacing each quote with ‘It is written’ and ‘It is said’.
Where the Israelites succumbed to sin, allowing their confession to be shaped by their perception of reality. Jesus overcame temptation by standing strong and declaring the word of God.
Where the Israelites repeatedly murmured and complained, Jesus repeated only His Father’s words.
The Israelites were stubborn and slow to learn their lesson and what should have only taken a couple of weeks, became a 40-year journey.
Jesus submitted to the leading of the Holy Spirit, overcame temptation and walked out of the wilderness in 40 days in the power of the Holy Spirit.
In wilderness places and in times of testing and temptation let us choose not to speak out of our feelings like the people of Israel did. Instead, let's resolve to do as Jesus did and declare God’s words into our situations, believing that by doing so we will also be empowered by the Spirit of God.
- Marissa Knott
Jesus, son of God, has just stepped out of the waters of baptism, receives a very public blessing from the Father and then the Holy Ghost, in the form of a dove settles on Him. He is filled with the Holy Spirit in a fresh way.
Not only was this a beautiful sight for all to see, but also a confirmation of who He was. The Son of God, beloved of the Father and full of the grace and the gifts of the Holy Spirit.
From a human perspective, it would appear as if this is Jesus’ moment! He is poised and ready for ministry. Would this now be time to step into His calling? He was appointed and anointed and there was even the beginnings of a public platform from which Jesus could have begun to preach from. None of us would have expected any less.
Yet, when it seems as if the stage is set for Jesus to enter His calling, the Bible says that He ‘was led by the Holy Spirit into the wilderness’.
The wilderness is a solitary, lonely and desolate place. An uninhabited place. A hard place.
Perhaps, like me, you would normally equate the Holy Spirit’s leading to places that are vibrant and heaving with life! The outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Acts 2 comes to mind.
So what happens when your expectation does not line up with your reality?
Yet clearly the Holy Spirit led Jesus to this place and in this place Jesus then faced great temptation from the devil. What’s more, it wasn’t just for one or two days, but Jesus endured a sustained period of testing for forty days!
Forty is a number often used in the Old Testament to indicate a time of probation, separation or even judgement and in a way Jesus’ 40 days in the wilderness hark back to Israel’s 40 years in the desert.
At that time Yahweh led His people out of slavery and out of Egypt – the destination was the promised land but they had to go through a time of separation. Separating themselves from all they had known in Egypt so that they could become God’s holy people.
But this is where the parallels stop. And when we compare Jesus’ time in the wilderness to the Israelites 40 years in the desert, we can find some keys as to how we should respond when the Lord also leads us into the wilderness.
Because when we are in hard places, in between the past and the promise, temptations will come.
Will we be like the Israelites who complained and grumbled as they looked back with rose-coloured glasses about how good it was in Egypt? (Had they forgotten they were slaves?)
Or will we be like Jesus and submit to the leading of the Holy Spirit, even in the hard places. Will we choose not to run from the pain but instead remain in the place of prayer and fasting and lean on the Father for strength.
Will we do like Jesus who when tempted by the devil, does not respond with His own words. Instead He only speaks Gods words prefacing each quote with ‘It is written’ and ‘It is said’.
Where the Israelites succumbed to sin, allowing their confession to be shaped by their perception of reality. Jesus overcame temptation by standing strong and declaring the word of God.
Where the Israelites repeatedly murmured and complained, Jesus repeated only His Father’s words.
The Israelites were stubborn and slow to learn their lesson and what should have only taken a couple of weeks, became a 40-year journey.
Jesus submitted to the leading of the Holy Spirit, overcame temptation and walked out of the wilderness in 40 days in the power of the Holy Spirit.
In wilderness places and in times of testing and temptation let us choose not to speak out of our feelings like the people of Israel did. Instead, let's resolve to do as Jesus did and declare God’s words into our situations, believing that by doing so we will also be empowered by the Spirit of God.
- Marissa Knott
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