Grace, mercy and peace be unto you from God, our Father, and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

Our text is the Holy Gospel reading, the Temptation of our Lord Jesus Christ.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, the more things change, the more they stay the same. This saying is trite but true. Solomon said it even better in Ecclesiastes: "There's nothing new under the sun." And so also for our Scripture readings today, the same old Satan is up to his tricks—in the Garden of Eden, in the desert of Judea, on Mt. Calvary, and right here today—so the more things change, the more they stay the same.

In the garden, the serpent hissed up at Eve, "Did God really say?" The first temptation, like every one since then was the temptation to question the Word of God. "Did God really say______________?" You fill in the blank.

Just see how he baits Eve: "What did God say exactly? Are you sure you heard him right?" God actually had said, "You are free to eat from any tree in the garden except for one." Satan wrongly quotes God: "You must not eat from any tree in the garden." See how Satan tries to take away what God has freely given, by tweaking God's Word just a bit?

And Eve – even though she's perfect, sinless, in need of nothing – she's no match. Satan lies to her, "You won't really die. God's holding back – he's being stingy – he's got more to give, and you need it." Eve swallowed the hook while Adam silently stood by. And could have stopped it – he knew better; he knew God's Word. He could have stepped in and saved his wife from the devil's question. But he didn't, and that's why the Scriptures say that Adam was accountable for the first sin. That sin involves us all, as St. Paul says, "The result of one trespass was condemnation for all men…through the disobedience of one man the many were made sinners". And like Adam and Eve, we can't escape from God's judgment against our sin, no matter how many varieties of fig leaves we try on.

Now zoom forward several thousand years. Many things have changed over that period, but look at what is still the same: Satan's on the attack. "Jesus was led by the Spirit into the desert to be tempted by the devil. After fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry." Note well that Satan would like to get us to doubt this very Word of God, planting a seed of doubt in our minds by saying, "Jesus is the Son of God and God really couldn't be tempted, so Satan's temptation was just a piece of cake for Him." But we must not be led into that temptation. Jesus is true God, but He also is the son of the Virgin Mary, a true flesh and blood man. The Letter to the Hebrews says that Jesus "suffered when He was tempted". This was real suffering, real temptation. Imagine not eating for forty days. You'd better believe that Jesus was hungry and weak. And that's when the devil likes to attack.

And Satan follows his same script from the Garden, starting out by questioning the Word of God. "If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread." What had the Word of God say to Jesus? Right before the temptation, in His Baptism, the Father said from above, "This is my beloved Son." So Satan says, "You're the Son of God, and doesn't your Father want His beloved to have every good thing? Doesn't He care about your health and happiness? He would want you to use your power to feed yourself, right?" Likewise in the next temptation, Satan challenges Jesus' faith in His Father: "Throw yourself down from the temple, for Your Father will surely catch you. Show me that you trust in God. I dare you!" And in the final temptation, Satan offers Jesus a life easier than being the Son of God: "I'll give you all the kingdoms of the world if you worship me. You can ignore the Words of God that say you'll have to suffer and die." One empty promise after another, challenging Jesus' faith in His Father's Word.

Now, again zoom forward two thousand years. Many things have changed, but what's stayed the same? Satan's still at it. This time the assault is on us. His tactics are the same. He asks us the question, "Did God really say?"

• Did God really say, "What God has joined together, let man not separate"? "Nah," Satan says. "What God wants most is for you to be happy. Do what feels right."
• Did God really say, "Children are a blessing from the Lord"? "No way," Satan says. "You could never afford to have another child. In fact, abortion is the best solution in this case; the world doesn't need another unwanted baby."
• Did God really say, "Take, eat, this is my body; take, drink, this is my blood." "Oh, come on," Satan says, "it's just a little bread and wine; there's no way it could be the body and blood of Jesus. And besides, the Lord's Supper isn't important – you can worship God in the comfort of your own home!"
• Did God really say...? Satan deploys his lies everywhere, attempting to destroy our faith in God's Word, just as he did in the Garden, in the wilderness of Judea, at the cross, and in our own lives today.

So I guess the more things change, the more they stay the same, right? True, Satan is always tempting, but there's something else changeless that we dare not overlook. In the Garden of Eden, in the desert of Judea, on Mt. Calvary, right here today—the same victorious Christ is present, and "Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever." He does not give in to temptation, and He always conquers the devil for us.

In the Garden of Eden God said to Satan, "I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel". Immediately after the war began, God already had declared victory over Satan through the Son of God, the woman's seed, Jesus. Try as Satan might, God's Word can't be changed, it can't be broken, and on that fateful day, God's Word guaranteed Satan's defeat. The woman's seed, Jesus, would come to battle and defeat the tempter.

Zoom forward several thousand years. In the desert of Judea, Satan's temptations failed where they had worked like a charm on Adam and Eve. In the face of the temptation to desert His divine mission, Jesus stuck to His Father's plan, because He knew from God's Word in the Old Testament what His mission was about. Three times Jesus quotes Deuteronomy to rebuff Satan. Unlike the children of Israel in the wilderness who repeatedly gave in to the devil's temptations to forsake the Lord, Jesus does not; He keeps the Word of God straight. When Satan said, "tell these stones to become bread," Jesus responded, "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." When Satan said, "throw yourself down from the temple," Jesus countered, "Do not put the Lord your God to the test." And when Satan promised, "All this I will give you if you bow down and worship me," Jesus said, "Worship the Lord your God and serve him only."

Oh, Jesus suffered the temptation to give in, to quit, but He trusted that God's Word was true. Unlike Adam and Eve and Israel and us, Jesus didn't fall for Satan's tricks. Throughout his life, Jesus was continually tempted by Satan to stop living for us and to start living for Himself. He was tempted to take the easy way out, to reject the saving way of the cross.

Zoom forward three years. Jesus is on the cross, even weaker than He was in the wilderness. Satan knew that God's Son had the power in Himself to come down from the cross by a great miracle, and so through the passers-by the devil shouted, "Come down from the cross, if you are the Son of God! Prove to us that you are God's Son!" But Jesus would have no part of it. He knew that stopping short of death would mean eternal defeat for us and victory for Satan. The love of Jesus for us is stronger than Satan's temptations. And so by perfectly obeying God's Word, resisting all temptations to sin, Jesus obeyed God's Law in our place, so that when Satan accuses us of sin and tells us that we are condemned for it, we point to Jesus and say, "He kept the Law for me." By Jesus' suffering and dying on the cross, He took the punishment for our sins, in our place, and so when Satan reminds us of the wages of sin—eternal death—we can point to Jesus and say, "He died that death for me, so that I may live forever." Jesus has done it all, all to save us.

Zoom forward two thousand years. Satan's still tempting, but Jesus is still victorious. So are we. "We are more than conquerors through him who loved us" wrote St. Paul. Our victory over Satan has nothing to do with fasting or arming ourselves with a bunch of Bible verses. Jesus didn't go into the desert to show us how to have forty days of purpose or to give us a three-step program for overcoming temptation. That's not the point. No, the way we are victorious over Satan is through Jesus' victory over sin, death, and the devil. Now this doesn't mean that we don't suffer temptation, or that we never fall into temptation. In Romans 7, St. Paul describes the struggle all Christians face, describing how we children of God long to do His will but find that sometimes we fail and we let Satan lead us into temptation. At the end of the chapter Paul concludes, "Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!" It is not God's will that we fall into temptation, nor does He just wink and nod at our sin and say "Kids will be kids," but instead He sends us a Savior to give us the victory, by defeating Satan in the wilderness and on the cross, and then by baptizing us into His Kingdom, the Kingdom in which Satan has no share, the Kingdom in which Satan cannot reach us.

St. Paul wrote, "Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes". Jesus protects us against Satan's attacks by placing upon us the armor of God's Word, Water, and Supper, the Gospel and Sacraments that He delivers to us in God's Kingdom. We are held firmly in our Lord's hand through Baptism, by His word of forgiveness in Absolution, and by the true body and blood of Jesus. And so if you want the Lord's divine protection against Satan, you're in the right place this morning. He strengthens you through Baptism, Absolution, and the Lord's Supper, and comes to your aid in the fight against Satan. In one of the catechisms produced at the time of the Reformation in the 1500s, this question is posed: "How is our faith strengthened in adversity and comforted in temptation? Answer: by the Supper of our Lord Jesus Christ." This altar is where we can flee in times of affliction and temptation. Our Lord is there for us with forgiveness, healing, and comfort. The real presence of the body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ in our mouths is the greatest weapon we can wield against the real presence of Satan in this world to tempt us. And so the more things change, the more they stay the same. God's Words and promises are always true: if we are in Christ Jesus, Satan cannot harm us, the Kingdom ours remaineth. In the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

And the peace of God which passes all understanding will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus unto life everlasting. Amen.