And he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms
of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, “I will give You all this domain
and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever
I wish. Therefore if You worship
before me, it shall all be Yours.” Jesus answered him, “It is
written,‘You shall worship the
Lord your God and serve Him only.’”
Luke 4:5-8
Has it ever triggered your imagination when
reading this passage to contemplate what actually occurred between Satan and
Jesus when it says Satan “showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a
moment of time.”? How did that
occur? Could you be shown all the kingdoms of the world in only a moment of
time? I can’t explain that because I am
human and finite, but it strikes me clearly that Jesus was divine as well as
human in being able to be shown so much in so little time.
One more big thing about this little
incident: There were just three
temptations Satan chose to target on Jesus at this occasion. It would make sense that they would have been
pivotal issues, not just incidentals of little consequence. In this one, the issue was who would be the
object of worship. Jesus responded quickly
by quoting the eternal word given to Moses and etched in stone by the hand of
God: “Worship the Lord your God and serve Him only.”
Such a headline commandment from God thru
Moses, thru time, and now challenged by Satan and answered by Jesus ought to
resonate with us who read it today as still being the litmus test or yardstick
by which we evaluate our affections, allegiances, and investments of our life resources. Am I worshipping and serving the Lord my God
and Him only? It’s a contemporary as
well as ancient question demanding honest response. Jesus turned down the opportunity to worship
anything else, and so must we.
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