31. It was this which would make the 'assault' a 'temptation' by vividly setting before the
mind the reality and rationality of these considerations - a mental assensus - without
implying any inward consensus to the manner in which the Enemy proposed to have them
set aside.
And this was, indeed, the essence of His last three great temptations; which, as the whole
contest, resolved themselves into the one question of absolute submission to the Will of
God,32 which is the sum and substance of all obedience. If He submitted to it, it must be
suffering, and only suffering - helpless, hopeless suffering to the bitter end; to the
extinction of life, in the agonies of the Cross, as a male-factor; denounced, betrayed,
rejected by His people; alone, in very God- forsakenness. And when thus beaten about by
temptation, His powers reduced to the lowest ebb of faintne ss, all the more vividly would
memory hold out the facts so well known, so keenly realised at that moment, in the
almost utter cessation of every other mental faculty:33 the scene lately enacted by the
banks of Jordan, and the two great expectations of His own people, that the Messiah was
to head Israel from the Sanctuary of the Temple, and that all kingdoms of the world were
to become subject to Him. Here, then, is the inward basis of the Temptation of Christ, in
which the fast was not unnecessary, nor yet the special assaults of the Enemy either
'clumsy suggestions,' or unworthy of Jesus.
32. All the assaults of Satan were really directed against Christ's absolute submission to
the Will of God, which was His Perfectness. Hence, by every one of these temptations, as
Weiss says in regard to the first, 'rüttelt er an Seiner Volkommenheit.'
33. I regard the memory as affording the basis for the Temptation. What was so vividly in
Christ's memory at that moment, that was flashed before Him as in a mirror under t he
dazzling light of temptation.
He is weary with the contest, faint with hunger, alone in that wilderness. His voice falls
on no sympathising ear; no voice reaches Him but that of the Tempter. There is nothing
bracing, strengthening in this featureless, barren, stony wilderness - only the picture of
desolateness, hopelessness, despair. He must, He will absolutely submit to the Will of
God. But can this be the Will of God? One word of power, and the scene would be
changed. Let Him despair of all men, of everything - He can do it. By His Will the Son of
God, as the Tempter suggests - not, however, calling thereby in question His Sonship, but
rather proceeding on its admitted reality34 - can change the stones into bread. He can do
miracles - put an end to present want and question, and, as visibly the possessor of
absolute miraculous power, the goal is reached! But this would really have been to
change the idea of Old Testament miracle into the heathen conception of magic, which
was absolute power inherent in an individual, without moral purpose. The moral purpose
- the grand moral purpose in all that was of God - was absolute submission to the Will of
God. His Spirit had driven Him into that wilderness. His circumstances were God-
appointed; and where He so appoints them, He will support us in them, even as, in the
failure of bread, He supported Israel by the manna.35 36 And Jesus absolutely submitted to
that Will of God by continuing in His present circumstances. To have set himself free
from what they implied, would have been despair of God, and rebellion. He does more
than not succumb: He conquers. The Scriptural reference to a better life upon the Word of
God marks more than the end of the contest; it marks the conquest of Satan. He emerges