ONE FUNDAMENTAL TEMPTATION

What is man that you are mindful of him?" (Psalm 8:4a)

I just realized how truly important and valuable man must be because we are being battled upon. God wants to keep us to Himself because He loves us. The devil wants to lure us away from God because he already fell from God's grace. He does not want others to have what he can't have so he is gathering conquests.

Satan's most effective tool is temptation. In fact, that is how sin began. Satan tempted Eve and she fell.

Temptation is the desire to perform an action that one may enjoy immediately or in the short term but will probably later regret for various reasons: legal, social, psychological (including feeling guilt), health-related, economic, etc. In the context of religion, temptation is the inclination to sin.

Today's reading shows that the devil would stop at nothing. He did not spare Jesus from temptation. His delusion of grandeur and ego is bigger than himself that he was hallucinating and hoping he would defeat God.

Why is Jesus' temptation important to us? Because it shows that there is a way to counter temptation. That is by thinking about and doing what Jesus did when He was tempted. He countered Satan's tempting by quoting the scripture.

My friends, there is one fundamental temptation that we humans face everyday and that is forgetting the Lord and all the ways He has blessed us. It has been proven in history and even recorded in the bible. The people of Israel prayed to God about the oppression and slavery they suffer from the hands of the Egyptians. The Lord heard their prayers and sent Moses and Aaron to lead them out of Egypt into the Promised Land.

When they became hungry, they forget that the reason they were out of Egypt was because of their petition before God. But they remembered that they had food even though they were not treated right in Egypt. So God gave them manna in the morning and quail at night.

It is interesting that Jesus did not forget that the Father would take care of all His needs like He did to the Israelites. He fed them, their clothes never wore out and none of them got sick for forty years in the dessert.

Brothers and sisters, until today, we tend to forget God's faithfulness and trustworthiness whenever we face trials. We whine, complain, and try to solve things our own way. Then when everything else fails, we turn to God for help.

If we would only look back at all the triumphs we had, it is because we chose to trust and obey God. Then the reverse goes for the opposite. When we relied on our weak self instead of trusting the Lord, we fail.

I want you all to remember the many blessings God has showered you with. Concentrate on them and not on the difficulties you had. Sometimes, our trials are blessings in disguise. God is all powerful, all-knowing and ever present especially in times of need. Just call on His mighty name.

"Father in heaven, when temptation comes, help me to choose good over evil. Help me to choose You. Amen"

Meditation: Luke 4:1-13

Filled with the Holy Spirit, Jesus returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the desert for forty days, to be tempted by the devil.
He ate nothing during those days, and when they were over he was hungry.
The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.”
Jesus answered him, “It is written, One does not live on bread alone.”
Then he took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a single instant.
The devil said to him, “I shall give to you all this power and glory;
for it has been handed over to me, and I may give it to whomever I wish.
All this will be yours, if you worship me.”
Jesus said to him in reply, “It is written: You shall worship the Lord, your God,
and him alone shall you serve.”
Then he led him to Jerusalem, made him stand on the parapet of the temple, and said to him,
“If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, for it is written: He will command his angels concerning you, to guard you, and: With their hands they will support you, lest you dash your foot against a stone.”
Jesus said to him in reply, “It also says, You shall not put the Lord, your God, to the test.”
When the devil had finished every temptation, he departed from him for a time.

--that in all things God may be glorified