If Jesus is God, how can He be tempted? Especially if the Bible outright denies that God can’t be tempted.
When people ask this, they usually do it because they are genuinely confused, or think they have found a contradiction in the Bible, or they want to undermine the deity of Christ.
To understand why Jesus could be tempted, you must know the following:
- There are two types of temptation: external and internal.
- Difference between temptation and sin.
- According to the Bible, God can be tempted externally.
This short article explains all these concepts clearly. After reading it, you will understand that Jesus, as God-man, can be tempted without Him sinning (Hebrews 4:15).
Contents
External and internal temptation
External temptation is something that comes from outside a person. For example, you are out with another person, and both see an unlocked bicycle leaning against a light pole. The person you are with tells you that you should steal that bike because it’s better than the one you have right now. You didn’t even think about stealing the bicycle before he told you to take it. He is externally tempting you to steal the bicycle.
Once this person’s words have externally tempted you, you start thinking that the bike really is better than the one you have now. It would be easy just to take it and disappear with it. Now, you are internally tempting yourself to steal the bicycle.
Difference between temptation and sin
Temptation is not the same as sinning. Suppose you get tempted externally by something or someone or internally by your passions. In that case, you have the ability not to sin (in theory).
This doesn’t mean that you don’t sometimes sin in practice. We all sin and fall short of God’s glory.
James 1:12 says the following: “Blessed is a person who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him.”
If temptation is the same as sinning, then there would be no blessing for someone who endures temptation because he would already be sinning.
James 1:14-15 tells us how temptations become sin.
James 1:14-15
But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Then the lust, when it has conceived, bears sin. The sin, when it is full grown, produces death.
So, when temptation comes to your senses from outside or to your internal “radar” from your thoughts or feelings, it becomes a sin once you start giving it more time, thinking about it more, and desiring it more than that feeble moment when it arrived. When desiring after the temptation goes over a specific limit, it is a sin. Temptation is like a road sign you see, and you start thinking, “Hmm, I could go there.” When you make the turn, you are sinning.
You must also understand that someone’s temptation is not necessarily a temptation for someone else. In the above example, you didn’t even think about stealing the bicycle before “your friend” tempted you with it. It was a temptation for him but not for you. This is why Jesus says the following about people who tempt others: “It is impossible that no occasions of stumbling should come, but woe to him through whom they come! (Luke 17:1)
God can be tempted externally
God can be tempted externally, as shown in the following Bible verses:
- The Israelites tempted God multiple times: Psalm 106:14, Numbers 14:22, and Deuteronomy 6:16 (above in the image).
- The Holy Spirit was tempted: Acts 5:9.
- Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness: Matthew 4.
People and creatures can externally tempt God, but nothing internally moves God to be tempted by anything (James 1:13).
How can Jesus be tempted?
The above section should be already enough to explain that God can be tempted externally. Still, God isn’t enticed by it in any way.
According to the Scriptures, Jesus was tempted but didn’t sin.
Hebrews 2:18
For in that he himself has suffered being tempted, he is able to help those who are tempted.
Hebrews 4:15
For we don’t have a high priest who can’t be touched with the feeling of our infirmities, but one who has been in all points tempted like we are, yet without sin.
Is Jesus God if He was tempted? And what are the “all points” in Hebrews 4:15 in which Jesus was tempted?
1 John 2:16 tells us the points. All our sins fall into one or more of the three categories below.
1 John 2:16
For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, isn’t the Father’s, but is the world’s.
Satan tempted Jesus in all three of the above points, but they didn’t entice Jesus. He saw the road signs but didn’t even start thinking of turning.
The temptations don’t undermine Christ’s divinity, just as they don’t put God’s divine nature under question in the Old Testament.
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