Doct. Tempting of God may be a usual, but yet it is a great and heinous sin. In speaking to this pinnt, I shall show : — I. What this tempting of God is.
II. The heinousness of the sin.
288 Christ's temptation. [Ser. IV.
I. What is this tempting of God ? And here let me speak : —
1. To the object.
2. To the act.
First, The object, The Lord thy God. To us Christians there is but one only true God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Now some- times we are said to tempt God, and sometimes Christ, and sometimes the Spirit of God,
[1.] In scripture we are said to tempt God, as Ps. xcv. 9, ' When your fathers tempted me, proved me, and saw my works.' We tempt God either explicitly or implicitly.
(1.) Explicitly, by plain and direct words, which tend to God's dis- honour ; or a doubting of his prescience, power, and providence, if they have not all things given them according to their fancies and humours. As Ps. Ixxviii. 18, 19, ' They tempted God in their hearts, by asking meat for their lusts. Yea, they spake against God, and said, Can God provide a table in the wilderness ? ' So Exod. xvii. 7, ' Is the Lord in the midst of us, or no ?' They doubted whether God's presence were among them, when they had continually such pregnant proofs of it. The words may either bear this sense. Who knows that God is present ? or. Now see whether God be present, or takes any care of us, yea or no.
(2.) Implicitly, or by interpretation, which is a more secret way of tempting God, when the act speaketh it, whatever be the intention of the doer. As those who were about to lay the burden of the rites of Moses's law on the new converts of the Gentiles : Acts xv. 10, ' Now, therefore, why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the necks of the dis- ciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear ?' That is, why do you not acquiesce in the will of God, apparently manifested, as if ye did go about to try whether God did require anything of his servants besides faith in Christ? His will was clearly evident in the case by what happened to Cornelius ; or as if ye would try whether God will take it well that ye should impose upon his disciples a yoke that he approveth not.
[2.] We are said to tempt Christ ; and he may be considered either as in the days of his flesh, or in his state of glory, and with respect to his invisible presence : —
(1.) In the days of his flesh he was frequently tempted by the scribes and Pharisees, who would not be satisfied in his mission, notwith- standing all the signs and wonders that he had wrought among them ; or else sought to accuse and disgrace him, and prejudice the people against him ; so Mat. xvi. 1, ' The Pharisees with the Sadducees came, and tempting him, desired him that he would show them a sign from heaven.' So Mat. xxii. 18, 'Why tempt ye me, ye hypocrites?' when the Pharisees and the Herodians came to question him about paying tribute. So Luke x. 25, ' A certain lawyer stood up, and tempted him,' &c.
(2.) In his state of glory, and with respect to his invisible presence. So the Israelites in the wilderness tempted him before his coming in the flesh, and Christians may now tempt him after his ascension into heaven. Both are in one place : 1 Cor, x. 9, ' Neither let us tempt Christ, as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpent^;.'
Mat. IV. 7.] Christ's temptation. 289
What was their tempting of Christ in the wilderness ? If he be con- sidered as God, he had a subsistence before he Avas incarnate of the Yirgin ; and in this sense, as they tempted God, so they may be said aIso to tempt Christ ; for all the affliction, shame, and disgrace done to that people are called the reproach of Christ : Heb. xi. 25, 2G, ' Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season ; esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt.' So their murmur- ing might be called a tempting of Christ. Christ was the perpetual head of the church, Avho in his own person did lead the people, and was present in the midst of them under the notion of the angel of the covenant. The eternal Son of God guided them in the wilderness : Exod. xxiii. 20-23, ' Behold, I will send an angel before thee, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have pre- pared. Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not ; for lie will not pardon your transgressions ; for my name is in him. But if thou shalt indeed obey his voice, and do all that I speak, then I will he an enemy to thy enemies, and an adversary unto thine adversaries ; for mine angel shall go before thee, and bring thee in unto the land of the Amorites,' &c. This angel can be no other than Christ, whose office it is to keep us in the way, and to bring us into the place which Ohrist hath prepared for us ; he it is that must be obeyed by the people of God, and pardon their transgressions; in him is God's name, for he will not communicate it to any other that is not of the same substance with himself : God is in him, and he in the Father, and his name is ' Jehovah our Eighteousness.' So Exod. xxxiii. 14, ' My presence shall go with thee, and I will give thee rest.' My presence, that is, my angel, spoken of before, called ' the angel of his presence :' Isa. Ixiii. 9, ' In all their affliction he was afflcted, and the angel of his presence saved them.' This angel is called Jehovah : Exod. xiii. 21, 'And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud,' &c. This angel of God's presence was no other than Jesus ■Christ, the conductor of them in the wilderness, who safe-guarded them, and secured them all the way from Egypt to Canaan. And we Christians may also tempt Christ, for the apostle warneth us against it: we tempt Christ, now he is ascended into heaven, when we disobey his laws, question his authority, doubt of his promises, after sufficient means of conviction, that he is the Messias, the Son of God ; grow weary of his religion, loathing spiritual manna, and begin to be glutted witli the gospel, and are discouraged in the way to our heavenly Canaan, whither we are travelling.