Faith For All Seasons

Luke 4:13

And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from Him for a season.

Jesus was in preparation for entering the fullness of His public ministry. Up until this time, there is very little recorded about His life. He has just been baptized and the Spirit has descended upon Him and even from heaven came the voice of God saying, “This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.” Well, you would think that now Jesus was ready to go out and win the world. He had all the fanfare and accolades, that is what we would do, but that was not what Jesus did. If you read the context of this verse, you will see that Jesus was led by the Spirit to the wilderness for forty days to be tested by the devil.

Some may think that this was a unique time, place and person and you would be right to think so. It truly was unique in all those ways, the time is gone now, the place was far away from us and the person was the Son of God, but the method is still the same today. Whenever one realizes the calling of God in their life for a special life, you will see these same events take place. They will be led into a place of testing. This is God’s way of allowing His child the opportunity to try out and to test their faith, their commitment, and their weapons of warfare. God does not send someone into the battle, without first giving them some basic training. This was true of Jesus and will be true of you. If Jesus himself needed this time, so will you. Too often, because we don’t understand this principle, we mistakenly think that for some reason, God has abandoned us or that we have missed God. Notice in Chapter 4, verse 1, that it was the Spirit that led Jesus to the wilderness. Jesus learned that the faith that He had was good for all seasons, when the devil is violently attacking and when he departs for awhile. After the devil resists, he will depart, but it will only be for a season, remember, your faith is good for all seasons. Keep the faith.