"Jesus saith unto him, Get thee hence, Satan."--Matt. iv. 10.
There is an awful intensity of meaning in the words, as applied to
Jesus, "He _suffered_, being tempted!" Though incapable of sin, there
was, in the refined sensibilities of His holy nature, that which made
temptation unspeakably fearful. What must it have been to confront the
Arch-traitor?--to stand face to face with the foe of His throne, and His
universe? But the "prince of this world" came, and found "nothing in
Him." Billow after billow of Satanic violence spent their fury, in vain,
on the Living Rock!
Reader! you have still the same malignant enemy to contend with;
assailing you in a thousand insidious forms; marvelously adapting his
assaults to your circumstances, your temperament, your mental bias, your
master-passion! There is no place where "Satan's seat" is not; "the
whole world lieth in the Wicked one." (1 John, v. 19.) He has his
whispers for the ear of childhood; hoary age is not inaccessible to his
wiles. "_All this will I give thee_"--is still his bribe to deny Jesus
and to "mind earthly things." He will meet you in the crowd; he will
follow you to the solitude; his is a sleepless vigilance!
Are you bold in repelling him as your Master was? Are you ready with the
retort to every foul suggestion, "Get thee hence, Satan"? Cultivate a
tender sensitiveness about sin. The finest barometers are the most
sensitive. Whatever be your besetting frailty--whatever bitter or
baleful passion you are conscious aspires to the mastery--watch it,
crucify it, "nail it to your Lord's cross." _You_ may despise "the day
of small things"--the Great Adversary does _not_. He knows the power of
_littles_; that little by little consumes and eats out the vigor of the
soul. And once the retrograde movement in the spiritual life begins, who
can predict where it may end? the going on "from weakness to weakness,"
instead of "from strength to strength." Make no compromises; never join
in the ungodly amusement, or venture on the questionable path, with the
plea, "It does me no harm." The Israelites, on entering Canaan, instead
of obeying the Divine injunction of extirpating their enemies, made a
hollow truce with them. What was the result? Years upon years of tedious
warfare. "They were scourges in their sides, and thorns in their eyes!"
It is quaintly but truthfully said by an old writer, "The candle will
never burn clear, while there is a _thief_ in it. Sin indulged, in the
conscience, is like Jonah in the ship, which causeth such a tempest,
that the conscience is like a troubled sea, whose waters cannot
rest."--(_Thomas Brooks_.)
"Keep," then, "thy heart with all diligence," or, (as it is in the
forcible original Hebrew,) "keep thy heart _above all keeping_," "for
out of it are the issues of life." (Prov. iv. 23.) Let this ever be your
preservative against temptation, "How would _Jesus_ have acted here?
would _He_ not have recoiled, like the sensitive plant, from the
remotest contact with sin? Can _I_ think of dishonoring Him by tampering
with His enemy; incurring from His own lips the bitter reflection of
injured love, 'I am wounded in the house of my friends'?"
He tells us the secret of our preservation and safety, "Simon! Simon!
Satan hath desired to have thee, that he might sift thee as wheat; _but
I_ have prayed for thee that thy faith fail not!"
"ARM YOURSELVES LIKEWISE WITH THE SAME MIND."
Twenty-fifth Day.