MATTHEW 4
Rem What follows chapter 3 is the temptation in the wilderness, the test which is in the sight of all intelligences created, and brings to light what was incorruptible that was found with Him.
CAC Yes, and it was a necessity with Him that what was there should be tested, as to whether it was real. So that He was “carried” up into the wilderness by the Spirit. He was not sought out by the devil but carried where the devil could test Him. And as a Man He was found in conditions where He would feel human circumstances; He felt what it was to be without food for forty days; it is man reduced to a very low point. It is wonderful that He could be found in circumstances where He could be hungry and weary.
Rem What He speaks of in answer to the temptations is what is available to man, “Every word which goes out through God’s mouth”.
CAC Exactly. That is, man’s relations with God are the principal thing. Our circumstances are not the principal thing, though they are sometimes practically so, but our relations with God as living by every word that goes out of His mouth are positive, living by communications from God.
Ques Would it be something like piety, having a vital link with God?
CAC It says of old, “He suffered thee to hunger”, Deuteronomy 8: 3. If something like that happens to us we become disturbed. We all know, in our circumstances in our small measure, how blessed it is to have some [p. 26] communication that has come out of God’s mouth for us and that is the principle on which man properly lives.
Rem Is there any special significance in the different spheres referred to in connection with the temptation to which Jesus was subjected, the holy city, the very high mountain and all the kingdoms of the world? I wondered if it had some bearing on God’s people in those peculiar relations. The Lord meets the adversary perfectly in relation to each sphere.
CAC Yes. What would be called the natural sphere comes first as presented here and then there is the spiritual sphere, that is the order of things that has to do immediately with God, and finally the sphere of dominion in the world and all that was the subject of prophecy and which comes last in the gospel, having regard to the character of the gospel. It was essential that the One who had proved Himself delightful to God, the beloved Son, should be tempted by the devil; it was part of the divine plan. And so it is with ourselves, we should take account of that. If we take and claim a very high place with God we shall have to encounter great and subtle temptations which will bring out what is real, as with the Lord it brought out how perfect He was.
Rem Would the consideration of this give us strength to stand?
CAC I thought so. The test was allowed to take an extreme form with Him; such happens very rarely with us. It is very rarely that testing comes in such an extreme form to the saints; God sees to that and will not suffer us to be tempted above what we “are able to bear, but will with the temptation make the issue also, so that ye should be able to bear it”, 1 Corinthians 10: 13. That is, it is modified; Satan is never let loose upon the saints. I think in respect of the Lord he was allowed to put forth all his ingenuity; he exhausted every device that he could put forth, (there [p. 27] was no restraint for the Lord) but we have the comfort of knowing that even then he met with absolute defeat.
Ques Would you say that these three temptations were the climax of the forty days of temptation?
CAC Yes, and it is very touching that the Lord was allowed, if we might reverently say it, to be reduced to the lowest point so if Satan could have had any advantage, he had it; but he could not succeed.
Rem We cannot think what it must have been for the Lord to have been forty days in the devil’s company.
CAC No, we cannot. That is quite beyond us. There was an understanding on both sides. It would seem that the devil was aware of what took place at the Jordan. We may depend upon it, he had been giving attention to the course of that blessed One all through and the delight it was to God, but when it was publicly acknowledged from heaven it awakened in the devil the most intense desire to spoil it, if it was possible.
Ques Would there be principles at stake here on which everything turned?
CAC Yes, I think the temptation covers in principle all that the devil can bring to bear upon man. In another gospel it says, “the devil, having completed every temptation, departed from him”, Luke 4: 13. He had ended; he had not a single arrow left in his quiver; that shows the immense range covered by the three temptations. Satan brings forward what the Lord was entitled to in a sense; He was entitled to bread. The Old Testament promises had given that as the portion of man, that bread should be given him. Also a promise was given to the Messiah that the angels should have charge over Him in all His ways. And He was entitled to all the kingdoms of the world, but would He take them on the line of the devil’s suggestion?
Rem Psalm 2 says, “Ask of me, and I will give thee nations for an inheritance, and for thy possession the ends of the earth”. He could have had them for the asking.
CAC And He knew that always. He could have asked His Father and been given twelve legion of angels. It was quite within His power to have escaped the garden and the cross but morally He could not.
Rem Satan leaves out “in all thy ways”.
CAC Satan generally leaves something out or adds something when he is quoting Scripture. Would you not give a prominent place to the feature of obedience here? His perfect subjection shines out here and He will not be turned aside from that by a text of Scripture. I think Satan leads many aside by Scripture who are not in subjection to God. It is the glory of the eternal state; it is the glory of the Head that the Son Himself shall be subject. Well, it has all come out in the temptations; we find God is “all in all” in this chapter. There is a blessed Man come out of heaven and God is all to Him.
Rem It is “the Lord thy God” here, as if looking at God as supreme and His will as paramount.
CAC Is that not most instructive for us? We should not be moved away by anything from giving God His place and glory. It says of some that “knowing God, they glorified him not as God”, Romans 1: 21. We are to glorify Him as God. It is the privilege of the youngest believer to say, He is God to me, whatever anyone else thinks! That is they glorify Him as God. And it is very sweet because it comes down to the lowest capacity; It was so with this blessed One, God was God to Him and He would not glorify Himself even by the fulfilment of a promise. God will not fail in His faithfulness under any circumstances whatever.
Ques What does verse 4 involve? “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that goes out through God’s mouth”. Does it emphasize dependence? It says in Isaiah, “He wakeneth morning by morning, he wakeneth mine ear to hear as the instructed” (chapter 50, v. [p. 29] 4). He would not move without God’s word.
CAC Quite so. He lived upon it. The great thing is to live upon communications from God. The comment on a brother by a worldly man was, ‘This man thinks more of his God than he does of his daily bread’. That is, he had lost his work because he would not compromise his conscience. This man thinks more of his God than he does of his daily bread — that is a fine testimony! Like the children of Israel in the wilderness we have no resource here; the manna came down from heaven. “He ... suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with the manna ... that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread alone”, Deuteronomy 8: 3. It is God’s way of saying, ‘I have My own way of sustaining you’. God has His own way of meeting need. First He delights to meet the inward need of man which is met by His communications, His own word, as He did with the many that brought their bodies to be healed, with no thought of the other, but He met the inward need first.
Ques In connection with the angels ministering to Him, does it suggest the answer from God? It is answered from heaven in that way.
CAC Yes, and He is supported from heaven as you say; that is something infinitely better than anything earth could afford. We have been reminded in this gospel that heaven is opened to Him. It is what Satan had tempted Him with: “He shall give charge to his angels concerning thee” What was a commission given in charge to the angels was really carried out.
Rem Psalm 91: 9 - 13 is worth reading. Verse 13 says, “Thou shalt tread upon the lion and the adder; the young lion and the dragon shalt thou trample under foot”.
CAC Satan did not quote that, did he?
Rem It was just what the Lord had done.
CAC Quite so.
Rem All this is a wonderful background to what came [p. 30] out in His life as recorded in this book.
Rem In reference to giving charge to the angels, it is very suggestive that if we put ourselves in complete dependence we shall be preserved. “The angel of Jehovah encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them”, Psalm 34: 7. Tempting God to do it is quite another matter.
CAC Those who set their love upon God do not need to put Him to the test as to what He will do for them.
Rem “He that dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty”, Psalm 91: 1.
CAC If we have to put God to the test as to whether He will be faithful or not, it shows we are not dwelling under the shadow.
Rem That is what I had in my mind.
CAC I have known the time when I should have been very thankful for some outward manifestation that God was with me and for me; I suppose we all know that. But then the whole position of the dispensation is that it is in faith. Do I need some miracle to prove God is for me? “Unless ye see signs and wonders ye will not believe”, the Lord said (John 4: 48). Signs and wonders are the contrasts to belief. How has God made Himself known to us? In His beloved Son; that is what we fall back upon. He has done remarkable things for us in this life surely, but that is not what we build upon.
Ques Does this scripture emphasize a need of a knowledge of Scripture as containing a divine record of what God has said, so that we have intelligence in regard to God’s thoughts in connection with man and what has come to light in the Lord Himself in taking up the position of Man here?
CAC The Lord moved through the temptation, we might say, in the blessed assurance of the voice from heaven, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I have found my delight”. That sufficed Him.
Ques “Though he were Son, he learned obedience from the things which he suffered”, Hebrews 5: 8. Is this part of it?
CAC Yes. We are told He “suffered, being tempted”, Hebrews 2: 18.
Rem With reference to the kingdoms of the world, in Luke Satan says they were given to him and the power and glory of them, and the Lord does not seem to challenge that. It puts a different complexion on them, though God has them in view in connection with Christ.
CAC The Lord does not dispute it though it was not strictly true. The Lord speaks of Satan as the prince of this world.
Rem The kingdoms (in the plural) bring to mind the kingdoms of the world under Satanic influence.
CAC They are represented in Daniel’s vision as beasts; that is, they are unintelligent. God may use them, as He does, and dispose of them in His wisdom but they are not to be relied upon in any way; the saints are not to rely on them. Paul found himself in the position of relying upon them; he appealed to Caesar. The result was he got his head cut off!
Rem Verses 12 - 17 have the wide sphere of the nations in view. It says, “Naphtali is a hind let loose” (Genesis 49: 21), and “full of the blessing of Jehovah”, Deuteronomy 33: 23.
CAC As if the Spirit of God would give prominence to that at the very beginning, the prophetic word having spoken definitely of it.
Rem The reference to John shows it is connected with rejection here.
CAC Yes; yet God’s movements in sovereignty are always to enlarge the sphere of His operations. People think of sovereignty as if it were shutting things up but I [p. 32] think it is presented in Scripture as opening things out in a much wider character than would be otherwise. If God moves according to Himself it must have a very wide bearing. It is as though the very conditions on the part of man that seemed to shut Him out make Him break out — it is like trying to stem a mighty river resulting in its overflowing all its banks. And the Lord was acting on His own initiative in leaving Nazareth. His being there was not exactly His own course; He found Himself there in the sovereign disposal of God but in leaving Nazareth and going down to Capernaum He acts on His own initiative.
Rem When God moves from Himself there is nothing to hamper Him at all.
CAC It was so from the beginning. Adam and Eve had not the slightest idea He would come in in blessing but He came in blessing really in the sovereignty of His love, in spite of all that they were. It was as much as to say that though the outward expression of things was limited to Israel in the course of the gospel it is God saying it is all going to be available to the Gentiles. It was shut up dispensationally to Israel in a way, for the Lord said, “Go not off into the way of the nations”, Matthew 10: 5. It was, as it were, getting a barrier out of the way. It is well to notice that in Scripture it is God acting from Himself to secure that many should be saved. So there is a great light — it is remarkable — a great light arises. Well, it is intended it should rise for us as we read the gospel and shed its wondrous radiance upon our spirits.
Rem The great light refers to the Lord Himself. There are two lights and the assembly comes in.
CAC Yes, still it is as a lesser light, is it not? And it is good that we should see the pre-eminence of the Lord while the second is a reflected light. It takes on a subordinate character in a creature vessel but the One in whom the great light shines is not a creature vessel.
[p. 33] Rem It speaks of the light drawing near to them. Without Him we Gentiles would have nothing. Everything hangs upon His coming in in this way.
CAC In calling on men to repent it is really opening the door for men to turn away from everything here and themselves to Jesus.
Ques The kingdom of the heavens drawn nigh was Himself, in Himself really?
CAC Yes. I think that the kingdom of the heavens did not exactly come into being until He took His place in the heavens. In Matthew He was just passing through on His way to heaven, and everything was really going to operate from heaven. Do you not think that we only know what He is in heaven by knowing what He was on earth? We have no other means of knowing the Lord Jesus in heaven but by tracing His pathway here. But He has not changed; what He is has not changed one bit though His circumstances have changed wonderfully.
Rem We trace some of His glories in the details of His path here as given in the gospels.
CAC I think they are given to us for that purpose. It strikes me as the most wonderful part in Scripture because by the gospels we become “eye-witnesses of and attendants on the Word”, Luke 1: 2. We move with Him, seeing every action and hearing each word and by the Spirit we can enter into it far more deeply than the disciples did. So the assembly is composed of a vast number of persons who have followed Him here and are formed in His character so as to come out like Him, formed in its affections and morally by what we find in the gospels. We are occupied with the epistles first; they are fundamental, Romans for instance is fundamental.
Rem Romans teaches us how to get rid of ourselves!
Rem It is “beyond the Jordan” here and the Lord would secure us for that region.
[p. 34] Rem Till one is ready to dispense with oneself, one cannot be feeding on the Lord in His pathway in the gospels.
CAC We are occupied with the side of our experience. ‘I came to Jesus as I was, weary and worn and sad’ — that is me! What is most striking is that you do not get the experience of souls in the gospels, you get hardly a trace of it. It is one of the most marvellous things in the gospels. We are not told about the exercises of Peter and James and John. And that is characteristic of the gospels; persons appear on the scene with an appreciation of Christ and the Spirit says nothing about their exercises because He would fill our vision with Christ Himself.
Ques These two men come to light, both fishermen. Were they suitable men?
CAC Yes, with the operation of fishing in view. It is the Lord’s own action here; He saw them; He says to them, “I will make you ...”. There is no doubt about it; men were to be caught for God. I suppose the full result is seen in the last chapter in the commission there.
Rem “Come after me” is a good instruction for us so that in the power of the Spirit, in the following pages, we see Him livingly in movement.
Ques Would the two sets of brothers mentioned here portend the thought of brothers in the assembly?
CAC As if the testimony would be set up in that connection? I think that is so. It would show the importance of retaining the brother, would it not?
Rem Though the gospel is individual work, there is fellowship in the gospel.
CAC It would suggest it is not exactly a single man’s service. At Pentecost Peter stood up with the eleven. Peter was the spokesman but the eleven were committed to it.
Ques They left their nets and so on. What does that signify?
CAC [p. 35] Are we not measured in service very largely by what we are prepared to leave? “On account of whom I have suffered the loss of all”, the apostle said. We are not told historically how it came about but it comes out that Paul had lost everything for the Lord.
Rem “To all I have become all things” (1 Corinthians 9:22), he said.
CAC He is a true fisherman, is he not? There are two parts of service, the catching of men first and then knitting them together. They are to be held together, as those who are complete. It is the same word used of the saints, when he says, “Be perfected” (2 Corinthians 13: 11); it is really ‘Be mended’. That is, there were certain rents at Corinth; it is a question of mending nets at Corinth. I think it covers the two great parts of service, the evangelical first, which takes the first place, catching men; but after that you want them to be held together, so that there is no rent in the system that encloses them. I remember Mr. Stoney used to say that a man’s natural calling always had some reference to his service; God so ordered it that the experience a man gets in his business or trade or occupation of any kind, in the sovereignty of God, has some bearing on the service that he would render. So Paul is a tent-maker. That is, when he was called in grace he became a true tent-maker to set up the assemblies here in tabernacle form, that is, provisionally, not permanently. So we have the true elements for our service in our natural calling. I remember once when Mr. Stoney was at my father’s table he said, ‘I was training for the law, intending to move in a circuit, and that is what I am now doing!’ My father replied, ‘I was a shepherd’. ‘Exactly’, said Mr. Stoney, ‘And you are a shepherd still!’. It served to remind us there are no loose ends in God’s ways.