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, [1468] 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 faintness, 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: [1469] 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.
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 reality [1470] - 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. [1471] [1472] 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 succmb: 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 on the other side triumphant, with this expression of His assured conviction of the sufficiency of God.
It cannot be despair - and He cannot take up His Kingdom alone, in the exercise of mere power! Absolutely submitting to the Will of God, He must, and He can, absolutely trust Him. But if so, then let Him really trust Himself upon God, and make experiment, nay more, public demonstration - of it. If it be not despair of God, let it be presumption! He will not do the work alone! Then God-upborne, according to His promise, let the Son of God suddenly, from that height, descend and head His people, and that not in any profane manner, but in the midst of the Sanctuary, where God was specially near, in sight of incensing priests and worshipping people. So also will the goal at once be reached.