To obtain, if we can, a clearer understanding of this subject, two points must be kept in view. Christ's was real, though unfallen Human Nature; and Christ's Human was in inseparable union with His Divine Nature. We are not attempting to explain these mysteries, nor at present to vindicate them; we are only arguing from the standpoint of the Gospels and of Apostolic teaching, which proceeds on these premisses - and proceeding on them, we are trying to understand the Temptation of Christ. Now it is clear, that human nature, that of Adam before his fall, was created both sinless and peccable. If Christ's Human Nature was not like ours, but, morally, like that of Adam before his fall, then must it likewise have been both sinless and in itself peccable. We say, in itself, for there is a great difference between the statement that human nature, as Adam and Christ had it, was capable of sinning, and this other, that Christ was peccable. From the latter the Christian mind instinctively recoils, even as it is metaphysically impossible to imagine the Son of God peccable. Jesus voluntarily took upon Himself human nature with all its infirmities and weaknesses - but without the moral taint of the Fall: without sin. It was human nature, in itself capable of sinning, but not having sinned. If He was absolutely sinless, He must have been unfallen. The position of the first Adam was that of being capable of not sinning, not that of being incapable of sinning. The Second Adam also had a nature capable of not sinning, but not incapable of sinning. This explains the possibility of temptation' or assault upon Him, just as Adam could be tempted before there was in him any inward consensus to it. [1462] The first Adam would have been perfected' - or passed from the capability of not sinning to the incapability of sinning - by obedience. That obedience' - or absolute submission to the Will of God - was the grand outstanding characteristic of Christ's work; but it was so, because He was not only the Unsinning, Unfallen Man, but also the Son of God. Because God was His Father, therefore He must be about His Business, which was to do the Will of His Father. With a peccable Human Nature He was impeccable; not because He obeyed, but being impeccable He so obeyed, because His Human was inseparably connected with His Divine Nature. To keep this Union of the two Natures out of view would be Nestorianism. [1463] To sum up: The Second Adam, morally unfallen, though voluntarily subject to all the conditions of our Nature, was, with a peccable Human Nature, absolutely impeccable as being also the Son of God - a peccable Nature, yet an impeccable Person: the God-Man, tempted in regard to all (things) in like manner (as we), without (excepting) sin.'
All this sounds, after all, like the stammering of Divine words by a babe, and yet it may in some measure help us to understand the character of Christ's first great Temptation.
Before proceeding, a few sentences are required in explanation of seeming differences in the Evangelic narration of the event. The historical part of St. John's Gospel begins after the Temptation - that is, with the actual Ministry of Christ; since it was not within the purport of that work to detail the earlier history. That had been sufficiently done in the Synoptic Gospels. Impartial and serious critics will admit that these are in accord. For, if St. Mark only summarises, in his own brief manner, he supplies the two-fold notice that Jesus was driven' into the wilderness, and was with the wild beasts,' which is in fullest internal agreement with the detailed narratives of St. Matthew and St. Luke. The only noteworthy difference between these two is, that St. Matthew places the Temple-temptation before that of the world-kingdom, while St. Luke inverts this order, probably because his narrative was primarily intended for Gentile readers, to whose mind this might present itself as to them the true gradation of temptation. To St. Matthew we owe the notice, that after Temptation Angels came and ministered' unto Jesus; to St. Luke, that the Tempter only departed from Him for a season.'