How Jesus Defeated Temptation - Matthew 4:1-25 (Session 5)

How did Jesus respond when Satan tempted Him in the wilderness? Matthew chapter 4 shows that Jesus was truly tempted, yet He remained without sin and answered each temptation with the Word of God.

In this session, Glenn and Steve examine the three temptations of Christ, how they connect with the desires of the flesh, the desires of the eyes, and the pride of life, and why Jesus’ response gives believers a practical model for resisting temptation. The discussion also considers fasting, why Satan quoted Scripture, and why knowing the Bible matters when temptation comes. 

The session then moves into the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry. He announces, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” calls His first disciples to follow Him immediately, and begins healing throughout Galilee. These miracles function as signs that confirm who He is and validate His message.

Matthew 4:1–25 | The Book of Matthew — Session 5

 Questions discussed in this session include:

• What is the purpose of fasting? 
• What should we do when we are tempted?
• Why would Jesus change His message halfway through Matthew? 
• What does it mean to say “the kingdom is at hand?”
• When Jesus asks people to follow Him, how do they respond?

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:16

And

Setting Up Matthew Chapter Four

SPEAKER_01 0:17

welcome back to another session of Reasoning Through the Bible. We are going through the book of Matthew. We've just finished up chapter three. A little bit of summary. We've been introduced to John the Baptist, who was out baptizing with his message of repentance where the kingdom of heaven was at hand. We saw a little bit of a confrontation between John the Baptist and the Pharisees and Sadducees. And then we also saw that Jesus was baptized and that God the Father recognized him as being the Son and the Messiah. So that's where chapter three ended. Now we're going to start in chapter four today.

SPEAKER_00 0:51

Matthew presents Jesus as the king. He gives in chapter one the genealogy of the king. He gives us the message of the kingdom. Here we are in chapter four is the temptation of Christ. I always think of temptation. I think of Mark Twain who said, I can resist anything except temptation. Jesus did indeed resist all temptation.

Reading The Three Temptations

SPEAKER_00 1:11

So I'm going to read in Matthew chapter four, starting at verse one. And then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he then became hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread. But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God. Then the devil took him to the holy city and had him stand on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to him, If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, He will command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up, so that you will not strike your foot against the stone. Jesus said to him, On the other hand, it is written, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test. Again the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory, and he said to him, All these things I will give you, if you fall down and worship me. Then Jesus said to him, Go, Satan, for it is written, You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only. And then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and began to minister to him. So this is the temptation of Christ. So it just

Why Jesus Faces Temptation

SPEAKER_00 2:24

kind of begs a question, Steve, why would Jesus need to be tempted?

SPEAKER_01 2:27

That actually word tempted that's used there means to experience trial, to try to prove either a good or a bad sense, to tempt, to test by soliciting to sin, generally and in a good sense, in order to ascertain the character, views, or feelings of someone. So here's Jesus, who is fully man, as you noted in the previous session. Here he is being tempted as a man in all ways. So he can relate to us, and we can also take peace in knowing that he didn't succumb to those temptations. And he gives us an example also of how to resist those temptations.

SPEAKER_00 3:07

All of us have succumbed to temptation at one time or another, but Jesus did not. He was like us in every way. And Hebrews 2.18 says he was tempted, therefore he is able to come to the aid of people like us who are tempted. In Hebrews chapter 4, verse 15, our high priest was tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin. It was necessary that he should be tempted so that he could overcome sin. What should we do when we're tempted?

SPEAKER_01 3:32

Well, flee, yes, flee. But then we also have some example here of Jesus is quoting scripture back to the devil as he's tempting them.

SPEAKER_00 3:41

We need to get

Flee Temptation And Use Scripture

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as far away from temptation as possible. When we get to chapter five, the Sermon on the Mount, he's gonna give us some radical instructions on temptation. I've I've mentioned before the old joke about the mother that goes into the kitchen and she sees the little kid with his hand in the cookie jar and she says, What are you doing? And he says, Resisting temptation. Well, that's not the place to resist temptation. We need to be as far away from temptation as possible.

SPEAKER_01 4:06

Before you even get to the cookie jar.

Fasting And Training The Flesh

SPEAKER_00 4:08

Verse two, Jesus fasted 40 days. What is the purpose of fasting?

SPEAKER_01 4:13

It could be to concentrate on God and to get anything and everything out of your life so that you can focus on God and worship of Him. But it does take a toll on the body if you're fasting with nothing to eat, and especially if nothing to drink as well.

SPEAKER_00 4:29

And I submit there's a good purpose for us fasting. Every time you're hungry, it reminds you to pray and meditate on godly things. So that's one of the reasons why people fast is because of every time your stomach tells you, I need some food, well, it reminds you I'm fasting for a reason, and now I can pray about whatever it is. So it keeps godly things in our focus. Another reason is that if we can deny ourselves hunger, we can try to avoid fleshly sins. It's a way of bringing our body into submission. Fasting is a form of focusing on God and trying to bring the flesh into submission, as Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9 27, I subdue my body and make it my slave, so that after preaching to others I might myself not be disqualified. What we do is whenever we're hungry, we transfer that desire onto God. It reminds us to pray, and we fast for a season, a short amount of time, so that we can then focus on a godly thing and pray

The Three Core Categories Of Sin

SPEAKER_00 5:30

about something. So verse one and three describe the devil as a tempter. Sometimes our temptations are indeed from the devil. Sometimes we do pretty good on our own without the devil. So we have three temptations recorded here, but there could have been many. He was out there for 40 days. It mentions these three. These are significant. What are the three? Just summarize them. What are they?

SPEAKER_01 5:50

One is command these stones to come up if you're the Son of God. If you're the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it's written that angels will come and save you. And the last is that worship me or worship Satan, and I'll give you all the kingdoms.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

One of them is a fleshly thing, stones become bread. Another one, throwing you down from the top of the temple is more of a pride thing. Show off this miracle in front of people. And the last one has a purpose as well. It's more of a something that would only be tempted by Christ.

SPEAKER_01 6:21

So I think this again goes back to first John chapter two and verses 16 and 17. It says, For all that is in the world, the desires of the flesh, and the desires of the eyes, and pride of life is not from the Father, but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires. But whoever does the will of God abides forever or lives forever. So I think that what you just mentioned is the first one is the lust of the flesh, the second is the pride of life, and the third is the lust of the eyes. I think that this was the same thing that was done with Eve back in the garden. And I think that all sin can come down to one of these three temptations that Satan, the devil, uses on us. So I think it's a good, clear summary of the way the devil tempts today, and that we as humans are tempted, and Jesus can clearly identify with us as human beings on how we're tempted through those.

SPEAKER_00 7:21

And these temptations

When Satan Quotes The Bible

SPEAKER_00 7:22

are very sly. Two of them be start with if you are the son of God. Notice how kind of sly and subtle that is. It's a way to get Jesus' attention. What was Jesus' purpose here? Was to demonstrate what? That he was the son of God. That was one of the purposes of why he came, was to demonstrate that. So the devil realizes that and plays on it. If you're the son of God, then do this. What's wrong with he hadn't eaten in 40 days? What's wrong with eating? Why not turn the stones to bread? You've proved you can do it, been out here 40 days. Go ahead and make yourself some food. What's wrong with that? Why would that be a sin for Jesus to do that?

SPEAKER_01 8:00

The scripture says you don't live on bread alone, but every word that comes out of the mouth of God. So, in other words, he's there as part of this fasting to focus on God and to show that he is the Son of God. Making bread, or is it really fasting if at some point in time you can just make the food that you want?

SPEAKER_00 8:16

That's one part of it. The purpose for Jesus miracles comes into play here. Jesus did miracles, he did many miracles, but the miracles Jesus did were for demonstrating to the world that he was indeed the Son of God, that he was the Messiah. So he healed people as a sign, is the word that the New Testament writers called it. He did signs. The sign is to point to the fact that he was the Christ, the Messiah. In this case, if he were to do a miracle, it would have only been for himself. It would have been to only benefit him. It was a selfish thing based on a physical need that he had and not to demonstrate to the world who he was. So it was a physical temptation, but it was also a subtle way of dealing with his pride. Pride is a very insidious thing. What did Jesus respond with about this first temptation? How did he respond?

SPEAKER_01 9:13

Scripture. Quoted scripture. Yeah, from the Old Testament.

SPEAKER_00 9:16

How should we respond to temptation?

SPEAKER_01 9:18

Same thing.

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Same thing, Word of God.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

Word of God, yeah. And if and if we don't have the Word of God in our heart, which means have studied the Word of God and know how to refer to it and what the Word of God says, then we're very vulnerable to the temptations that come along.

SPEAKER_00 9:33

If we just listen to and read and be around the Word of God, then the Holy Spirit will bring these verses to our mind at the point of temptation.

Pride And Self Serving Miracles

SPEAKER_00 9:42

And if we have it in us, then it'll come out of us and help us control our lives. If it's not in us, then we don't have the ability to quote them. But notice he quotes the scripture here, and that's his defense. He doesn't give some sort of a logical argument. He quotes the scripture. Well, after the first one, then verses five and six, the devil says, Okay, you quote scripture, so can I. He quotes scripture too, but what does he do? He mashes together two verses that don't go together, and he puts them together in an illicit way. The next temptation was climb up to the top of the temple and throw yourself down, for it's written, and he says he'll command his angels concerning you. That's one. And then a different passage with a different context was on their hands, they will bear you up. Now, what would that do if Jesus were to climb up to the top of the temple and jump down? He would walk on water at different times. He had the ability to control storms, he controlled nature. Was it possible for him to jump off the top of the temple and and not get killed?

SPEAKER_01 10:42

Well, yeah, yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_00 10:43

Why is that a sin to jump off the top of the temple? Again, it has to do with pride. Who would that have been for? It was this showy outward thing only focused on look at me, rather than demonstrating something to an individual person. All the other miracles were done to show some person. He showed Peter about the fish and he healed people, things like that. Jesus' focus was on other people and not focusing on himself. This was a pride thing.

SPEAKER_01 11:15

And all of these things were in relation to directly with the devil himself. The proof of him yielding to what the devil's temptations are would be, in fact, just that, in a way, in that you're acquiescing to prove who you are to somebody tempting you to do it for the wrong reasons.

SPEAKER_00 11:37

In verse

Worship For Kingdoms And The Cross

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7, what is Jesus' response to the second temptation? He quotes scripture again. That's our main defense, that's our strength, is the word of God. And we can hold on to that because we know what the word of God says and we know it's solid and can hang on to it. So in the face of temptation, we should have memorized these verses or write them down in front of us. There's times where I'm struggling with something, I'll write verses down and carry them around in my pocket or have it available to me on my electronic device or whatever. I have it in front of me to help me fight temptation. Then we have the third one, which is what? What was the third temptation?

SPEAKER_01 12:15

The lust of the eyes. Here, bow down to me and worship me, and I will give you all of these kingdoms.

SPEAKER_00 12:23

So here's a question: Did the devil have those kingdoms to give?

SPEAKER_01 12:27

This is one of those things that have been debated through the centuries. It has been. I personally believe that it wouldn't have been a true temptation if he didn't have the ability to grant it. Number one. Number two is we're told that Satan or uh the devil is the prince of this world. So by the fact that he's the prince of this world, then he has the ability to be able to give kingdoms to somebody.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

So I agree. I don't think it would be a valid temptation if he didn't have them to offer. I think legitimately the devil had been given enough authority to where he controlled a lot of these things. But again, look at the temptation, verse 9. All these things I will give you if you fall down and worship me. Now, if we stop and think for a second, Jesus was the creator of the world. He made all these things, including the devil, including the devil and all those kingdoms. Why is it then a temptation? There's a key thing that Jesus would bypass if he fell down and worshiped and got all these kingdoms, which is the cross. If he falls down here, he'll get all the kingdoms, but it would bypass the cross. And why did he come? He came to die. His main purpose was to pay for our sins. And if Jesus were to fall down and worship the devil, it would have taken away his main purpose for being here, and the devil would have won. Then Jesus, for the third time, says what in verse 10.

SPEAKER_01 13:52

That scripture says, You shall worship the Lord your God and serve him only. So he again quotes to him scripture.

SPEAKER_00 13:58

So each of the three times Jesus' response is exclusively quoting scripture. He always quotes the word of God. Jesus used the word of God to overcome the devil every time.

Is The Devil A Real Person

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So how should we respond to temptation?

SPEAKER_01 14:12

Quoting scripture, going to the word of God.

SPEAKER_00 14:15

From this passage, here's one question that comes up sometimes. Is the devil a person in this? I would submit yes. The devil's not a concept here. They're having a conversation. He uses first person pronouns, worship me. The devil is not some sort of uh concept, he's not a literary device representation of evil. This is a real person that can appear before Christ and speak. It's all indication that it's an actual person.

SPEAKER_01 14:42

And they're also going from one area to another. They go up to the pinnacle of the temple and then they go out to a high mountain somewhere else. So again, this shows another aspect of a dimension that we don't necessarily know. I say a dimension, capabilities that we don't necessarily can experience today, but they are capabilities nonetheless that can be can be had and will be had at some point, I believe, when we have our glorified bodies at.

SPEAKER_00 15:10

So the devil is a person, he's not an idea, he's not a concept. The other thing I notice here is that the devil tempted the first Adam and succeeded. He tempted the last Adam and failed. The first Adam was tempted in a garden, the last Adam was tempted in the holy city. So there are some parallels here. Here's the other thing that I find interesting in verse 10. Jesus dismisses the devil with a single command. Go, Satan, and he's gone. Who's in charge here? Was there ever a contest or a power struggle here with who's in charge?

SPEAKER_01 15:42

No. And it also shows that before the temptations could have even taken place, as soon as the devil showed up, Jesus could have said, No, just go ahead and go. But he didn't. He went through those temptations. Again, I believe, so that we can take uh notice that he has been tempted in every way that we have been tempted. And I think even Paul makes that case in one of his uh epistles that we can have that trust because Jesus has been tempted in every way that we have been tempted and overcame it.

SPEAKER_00 16:10

That to me is key. Jesus allowed the devil to tempt him because he was fully human and wanting to identify with us. But his he also had a divine nature, and the divine nature is fully in charge here. And he says, go and Satan goes. Jesus was always in charge from the beginning, and there's no real power struggle here going on between God and the devil. But I do think it's a valid question. Should

Should Christians Fear Satan

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we fear the devil? And I submit to you that if you're a child of God, if you're a follower of Christ, there's no reason to fear the devil. We should respect the devil and realize his power, but Jesus is in charge here. He snaps his fingers, says, go, and Satan's gone. As long as we are in fellowship with Christ, we have nothing to fear with the devil. We could end up a situation like Job, where God allows Satan to attack us for a purpose, but who's in control? God's in control. As long as we are following Christ, then there's nothing going to happen to us that's not in God's will. That's either for our good or the good of those around us or for the good of God's kingdom, and God will ultimately get the glory for it. If on the other hand, we're not in God's kingdom and we're just out there on our own in the world, then the devil already owns us. We'd have a lot to fear over the devil because he's very subtle. So as long as we're following the true king, we have nothing to fear about Satan or the devil or satanic things. There's no reason to be afraid if you're a Christian of walking around being afraid of the devil. And then in verse 11, it says the devil left. Angels came and ministered to him after the devil left. In Matthew 26, 53, he says that he could get 12 legions of angels whenever he wanted to. Therefore, if anything happened to Jesus, it was because he wanted it to happen to him. So verse 12

John Arrested And Jesus Moves North

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says, When Jesus had heard that John had been taken into custody, he went into Galilee and leaving Nazareth, he came and settled at Capernaum. So a lot of Jesus' teaching and miracles were done at this town of Capernaum. That was where Jesus made his home base during the time of his three-year ministry. And Jesus ultimately later cast judgment on Capernaum in Matthew chapter 11, verse 23, because of the unbelief of the people there, even though they saw these many miracles. Mark 6.18 gives the reason that John was thrown into prison, which is the other little thing that happened here. Do you remember why it was? It says over in Mark that he was thrown into prison. This is the one where John criticized Herod because he had taken his brother's wife. And John said, That's an illicit marriage relationship. You're not supposed to do that. John was rather blunt and he didn't soft shoe around making statements about politics and religion. He was a very direct person. And in verses 15 and 16, Matthew's quoting another Old Testament passage that explains that the fact of making Capernaum

Repent The Kingdom Is At Hand

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Jesus' home base is another fulfillment of prophecy. In verse 17, it has the first real message of Jesus. And I think this is uh one of the keys to the book of Matthew. Matthew 4, 17 says, From that time, Jesus began to preach and say, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Now, whenever we study the Bible, we always look for repeated words and phrases. And that's the first thing he's really teaching us as far as his message to when he came into the world. From that time, he began to preach and talk about the kingdom is at hand. The same passage, same phrase from that time also appears later in Matthew 16, verse 21. And this is the passage after Jesus says, Who do men say that I am? And he turns and says, Well, who do you say that I am? And Peter gives the famous response, You're the Christ, the Son of the Living God. And immediately after that, Matthew 16, 21, from that time, Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things and die on the cross and be raised again on the third day. So those two places here in Matthew 4, 17 and again in chapter 16, are outlines of the book. From that time, Jesus began to. And the first one, he began to teach the kingdom. The second one, he began to teach the cross and the resurrection. We then ask ourselves, what happened in between here? What happened in between was the preaching of the kingdom. Repent for the kingdom is at hand. The kingdom of heaven is here. But the Jewish leaders rejected the kingdom. So he goes to the cross. And so that's an outline of the book of Matthew.

SPEAKER_01 20:42

And Jesus is picking up where John the Baptist was. John the Baptist, who's out there declaring, repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Now he's put in prison. We see Jesus picking up that same theme rather than having this herald that's out there. He's now preaching it himself and proclaiming it to the people, offering himself for this kingdom.

SPEAKER_00 21:02

We ask ourselves, why would Jesus change his message halfway through the book of Matthew? Because he presented the kingdom to Israel, but Israel rejected the king and the kingdom. So then he heads to the cross. And all this was planned. Acts chapter 2, verse 23 says that Jesus' death was by the words it uses there is the predetermined plan and foreknowledge of God from all eternity. So that's what we have here. The first half of Matthew, it says four times that Jesus taught in synagogues. And after chapter 16, once he changed his message, there's no record that he went to a synagogue to teach anymore after that.

SPEAKER_01 21:39

And just one distinction is that as we mentioned before, in the Old Testament and even here in the New Testament, there's always been a remnant of people that have believed and had faith in God in the Old Testament. And there's people that have faith in Jesus here. They did believe that he was the Messiah, to your point. You know, Peter declared it, but he had many, many followers. That did believe that he was the Son of God, he was the Christ, the Messiah, and they followed him. When you

Israel’s Leaders And The Book Outline

SPEAKER_01 22:06

say that Israel rejected him, you're speaking of the leadership of the nation of Israel that they didn't accept him and they rejected him. The ones that were in leadership and leading the people, those were the ones that rejected him. Therefore, he turns now and he goes to the cross.

SPEAKER_00 22:27

Jewish leaders as a nation rejected him. Individual Jewish people, some of them accepted him. So that's what he's explaining. Paul's explaining over in Romans, he says, not all Israel is of Israel. And I believe it's chapter 11. He talks about a remnant. There's always a remnant.

SPEAKER_01 22:42

Jesus and even to this day, there's a remnant.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

There is still today. And there is still a purpose for the nation of Israel, but the nation is going to be the remnant.

SPEAKER_01 22:52

I think a key thing to point out in that little discussion there is that leadership matters. Who we have as leadership makes a difference. Oh, yes. We should choose our leaders carefully and choose the leaders that we follow carefully and influence the leaders that we have in a positive way and in the godly way.

SPEAKER_00 23:12

So here in Matthew 4.17, the message is repent for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. And I submit to you that the reason he could say that the kingdom is at hand is because the king was there. Once the king was there, then the kingdom could be there. Where is the king today? He's seated at the right hand of God. He's not here on earth. Again, the parable in Luke chapter 19 makes this very clear. In our case, Christ has gone off to receive a kingdom. So the kingdom is not here because the king's not here. Someday the king's going to return, and then the kingdom will be here. The parable of the mean is in Luke 19 makes that very clear. And even as late as Acts chapter 3, verses 19 and 20, Peter goes to the Jewish leaders and says that if they repented and convert to Christ, then Jesus might return up to that. Even as late as that. If they were to, it's a hypothetical question, but if if even today the entirety of the Jewish leaders were to repent and come to Christ, it could hasten the return of Christ. But again, speculative question. But there is a very good connection in the Bible between the Jewish leaders accepting the king and the arrival of the kingdom. So, Steve, why don't you read the next section, which is Matthew 4, verses 18 to 22.

SPEAKER_01 24:24

Now, as Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. Immediately they left their nets and followed him. Going on from there, he saw two other brothers, James, the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in the boat, with Zebedee their father mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him.

SPEAKER_00 24:55

So the sense of this passage is that these people were just doing their regular daily activities, just living life. And Jesus shows up and they immediately stop and follow him. In fact, it says twice immediately in verse 20 and 22. And you compare that to the people over in Matthew chapter 8 and again in Luke 9, where Jesus goes up to them and says, Follow me, but they don't come. Remember, one of them says, Oh, well, I'm going to wait till my father dies. And the other wants to go home and tell his family first. They give reasons why they can't do this immediately.

SPEAKER_01 25:26

And I think there's a third one, the rich young ruler. He says, You've got one other thing, sell everything you have and follow me. And he turned away sad.

SPEAKER_00 25:33

And he turned away sad. Jesus implies that if you look back, you're not fit to follow him. You're not fit for the kingdom. Remember the people in the parable about the wedding feast? He invited people to the feast, but they had excuses. One of them had just bought some real estate, and the other had bought some oxen for his farm, and one had just gotten married. These are important things. They're not completely trivial. It's just compared to following Christ, they're much, much less important. The cares of life had choked out the word of God. What happens when we find ourselves in

Follow Me Without Delay

SPEAKER_00 26:05

the middle of just doing our regular activities and Jesus shows up? How long should we wait before we follow him?

SPEAKER_01 26:12

We shouldn't. Again, as we've often said, today is the day of salvation. If we always think that, oh, I'll do that later, or I'll follow Jesus later, or I'll commit later. Later may never come.

SPEAKER_00 26:26

But Steve, he's telling me to follow him, but I've got some important stuff going on here with my job and my house and my family. And I need to take care of this stuff. You you want me to leave now?

SPEAKER_01 26:37

Yeah, that's the implication that's here is that which is really more important, the things that you're doing and the cares of the world, or actually following Christ and the creator of the world. If they had not followed immediately, what might have happened? He might have found uh other people to be his inner circle of disciples.

SPEAKER_00 26:57

Wouldn't have been the apostles who changed the world and turned the whole world side up.

SPEAKER_01 27:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:02

You know, it was already upside down. In verse 19, Jesus says, Follow me and I will make you fishers of men. What's one of the primary jobs of every Christian?

SPEAKER_01 27:10

Is to go out and disciple others, ask others if they want to be saved, give them the gospel, let them know the good news, and ask them to follow Christ as well.

SPEAKER_00 27:22

One of our jobs for every Christian is to throw out a net and see who the Lord catches. So, next couple of verses, Matthew chapter 4, starting at verse 23, says this Jesus was going throughout all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness among the people. The news about him spread throughout all Syria, and they brought to him all who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and pains, demoniacs, epileptics, paralytics, and he healed them. Large crowds followed him from Galilee and the Decapolis and Jerusalem and Judea and from beyond the Jordan. So how many types of diseases did he heal?

SPEAKER_01 28:02

Well, there's some specific ones mentioned here, but various, different ones. Here there's what one, two, three, four, five, six specific ones?

SPEAKER_00 28:10

He mentions those specifically, but really the answer is all he healed everything. There wasn't a kind that he didn't. He healed everyone who came. Nobody walked away non-healed because the great physician was here.

SPEAKER_01 28:22

They were bringing the ones that were ill to him in order to be healed.

SPEAKER_00 28:27

And in verse 25, it doesn't give a number, but it gives us an idea about how many people were coming, how many people were following it.

SPEAKER_01 28:34

The way I'd look at this is it said, or read it says, large crowds followed him from Galilee and from the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judea, and from beyond Jordan. So there were large crowds that were following him from all areas. It wasn't just a crowd from one small area. It went from the north part to the eastern side of the Jordan. The decapolis was ten cities that spread from the northern part through there. And then again, all the way down from

Healings As Signs Then And Now

SPEAKER_01 29:07

Jerusalem and Judea, which was the southern part of the nation of the land there.

SPEAKER_00 29:11

So he's giving a regional area here. The idea is that this is a wide area. There's people from all over the place. There are all types of people from all types of places were following him.

SPEAKER_01 29:20

And one of the cities was Damascus. So that's currently the same one as up in Syria. Another one was Philadelphia, which is modern-day Amon Jordan. So that's kind of the north and the south to give a little of the perspective of how wide this was.

SPEAKER_00 29:34

So he was healing all these people. What are the purpose of Jesus' healings?

SPEAKER_01 29:38

It says that they were uh testing miracles, meaning that they were testifying to the fact that he had power over all of these types of illnesses, and only God had the power to heal these types. So it was the testing miracles as to who he was, that he was actually God.

SPEAKER_00 29:59

Exactly. The miracles were there to attest to him, showing he was God. The term that the Bible uses in many places is a sign, signs and wonders. So it was a sign that the person and the message were true. A sign points to something. So does God heal today?

SPEAKER_01 30:15

Yes, yes, he can.

SPEAKER_00 30:17

God's just as powerful today as he was then. Do we have people running around doing miracles and signs and wonders today? Is one of the questions. And I would submit that if it's in the same sense as back then, a sign, we don't have a need for a sign anymore. The reason why the signs were there is because the message was new. And the messenger. And the messenger was new. If people did sign miracles today, I would ask, what's the new message? What's the message that we didn't have before? God can heal today as much as he always did. I've seen people that were healed in a way that I can't explain any other way than a miracle. God today is fully capable of healing as much as he ever did. God heals today as he wills, not as we will. And I would caution our listeners to be very careful following these guys who lead their ministry with miracles and signs and wonders, because many of these people are indeed fraudsters. I remember one famous Christian lady that was in a wheelchair that went to one of these healers, and there were people on the stage in wheelchairs that were supposedly getting quote unquote healed. And she said, I don't know where those people came from, but they didn't come from the wheelchair section because everybody that came there in the wheelchair section went home in a wheelchair. There at one point there was a stage magician who followed some of these guys around and proved some of the tricks they were using. So again, if somebody's leading with a miracle ministry, be very, very cautious of these people because even in Jesus' day, Jesus nor the apostles led with this idea of miracles. They led with the message. I encourage people if you need healing, go to the great physician and God will heal as He wills and not as we will. That's the real message here.

SPEAKER_01 32:07

Most of those people as well, their ministry is focused on them, not really. When you start listening to what their messages are, it's related to them and their ministries, and that they claim that they're healing. So the attesting is that they are legitimate people, supposedly. And to your point, there's no need for that today.

SPEAKER_00 32:29

In verse 24, just a minor note, he makes a distinction here between people that are demon-possessed and those who have epilepsy. The people back then knew the difference between demon possession and an epilepsy. They make a distinction here in that. That wraps up that chapter.

Final Thoughts And Next Session

SPEAKER_00 32:44

Any last thing, Steve, before we close?

SPEAKER_01 32:46

Only one thing is that so far he's called four of his twelve disciples. As we go through here, we'll see that he calls his disciple, his inner inner circle, at different times. He's not calling them all at one time. It's over a period of several days that he goes and calls them. And so he's called his first four, and we'll see as we pick up in our next session.

SPEAKER_00 33:08

So that gets us to the end of Matthew chapter four, and we'll stop here for today. Next time we are going to start Matthew chapter five, which is the Sermon on the Mount. It lasts for three chapters. It's very rich. This is Jesus' first major teaching in the book of Matthew, and there's a lot of facets and aspects to this. It's very profound. So we'll get to that next time on Reasoning Through the Bible.