Text: Mark 1:9–15
Theme: “Get behind me, Satan! I’m baptized!”
Other Lessons: Genesis 22:1–18; Psalm 25:1–10; James 1:12–18
(A) In the Name of the Father…Amen.
(B) The Gospel lesson serves as our sermon text for this morning.
(C) Grace, mercy, and peace be yours from God our heavenly Father through
our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.
(D) Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us pray:
God’s Own Child, I Gladly Say It LSB594:1-2
Introduction
(A) When you experience temptation, say, “Get behind me, Satan! I’m
baptized!”
(1) This saying is often attributed to Martin Luther.
(2) They reflect his teaching on Baptism and resisting the devil.
(3) Even more importantly, they align with God’s Word.
(4) Peter wrote in his first epistle:
1 Peter 5:8–9 (NASB95)
8 Be of sober spirit, be on the alert. Your adversary, the devil, prowls
around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.
9 But resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experiences of
suffering are being accomplished by your brethren who are in the world.
(5) We daily face the evil one in a very real battle.
(6) Saying, “Get behind me, Satan! I’m baptized!” fits with Peter’s call to
resist him and stand firm in the faith.
(B) Peter, in fact, would have known this phrase, because he heard it from
Jesus himself during Jesus’ earthly ministry.
(1) It went like this:
(A) Peter had just given the good confession that Jesus is the Christ, the
Son of God.
(B) But when Jesus said this means he will be rejected by the religious
leaders, be killed, and rise after three days, this is what Peter did:
Matthew 16:22 (NASB95)
Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, “God forbid it, Lord!
This shall never happen to You.”
(C) Then came Jesus’ stinging rebuke to Peter, saying:
Mark 8:33 (NASB95)
But turning around and seeing His disciples, He rebuked Peter and said,
“Get behind Me, Satan; for you are not setting your mind on God’s
interests, but man’s.”
(D) Yes, Peter knew these words, but they came from Jesus’ own lips to the
devil tempting him.
(C) The devil also tempts us to set our mind on the things of man and not
God.
(1) He tempts us:
(A) to sin,
(B) to despair,
(C) to doubt God’s love and mercy.
(2) It’s a battle we face all the time, every day, from a hidden enemy.
(3) It’s why the Lord’s Prayer teaches us to pray, “Lead us not into
temptation.”
(D) “Get Behind Me, Satan! I’m Baptized!” is not a mere mantra or a
rabbit’s foot we hold on for good luck.
(1) It is a confession of faith in the very work of Jesus, who defeated the
devil.
(2) So how can we be so confident in saying this? Here’s how:
(I) Immediately after his Baptism, the Spirit drove Jesus into the
wilderness to be tempted by Satan.
(A) Mark, in his account of Jesus’ temptation, closely connects Jesus’
Baptism with his temptation.
(1) He writes that after his Baptism, the Spirit immediately hurled Jesus
into the wilderness, where Satan tempted him for forty days.
(2) The word “immediately” connects these two events.
(B) Here’s what happened:
(1) Jesus’ earthly ministry began as he was baptized by John in the Jordan
River.
a) It was a Baptism for sinners.
b) That is important, as we’ll see.
c) When Jesus came out of the water, an amazing cosmic event took place.
d) Mark writes:
Mark 1:10-11 (NASB95)
Immediately coming up out of the water, He saw the heavens opening, and the
Spirit like a dove descending upon Him;
11 and a voice came out of the heavens: “You are My beloved Son, in You I
am well-pleased.”
(2) The Father says this because Jesus has set in motion his messianic work
to save sinners.
a) He is baptized with the sinners’ Baptism.
b) He has come to be joined to our sinful condition.
c) This pleased the Father.
d) The Holy Spirit is also intimately involved as he now descends upon
Jesus, anointing him for his messianic mission.
(3) Jesus’ Baptism, therefore, was a huge inaugural event.
a) The Baptism of our Lord is a very significant part of God’s plan of
salvation.
b) Jesus insisted:
1) on being baptized with sinners,
2) and the Father commends him for that
3) and the Holy Spirit anoints him for it.
c) The fulfillment of the messianic covenant, made long ago by Jeremiah and
other prophets, is now being fulfilled!
(4) “Immediately” after his Baptism, Mark writes, the Spirit literally
“hurls” or “drives” Jesus into the wilderness.
a) The words read like pushing a boxer into the ring to take on his
adversary!
b) Matthew and Luke also make this connection between Jesus’ Baptism and
temptation.
c) But Mark, by omitting the details of these temptations, really
emphasizes the connection.
d) Today’s Gospel helps us see this by putting both events in the same
reading.
(C) If Jesus’ Baptism:
(1) was the announcement that the Messiah had come to fulfill the covenant
God made to save sinners,
(2) that Jesus is who he says he is,
(3) then Jesus being hurled into the desert was a declaration of war
against Satan and the forces of evil.
(4) Yes, God had come to take on and defeat the devil!
(D) Once a declaration of war is issued, it is going to happen.
(1) You’re committed!
(2) In the United States, it takes a two-thirds vote of Congress to declare
war against an enemy.
(3) In the battle against sin and evil, there’s unanimous consent of the
Trinity:
a) Father, Son, and Holy Spirit at the Baptism of Jesus.
b) The evil enemy will be attacked.
c) The Holy Spirit immediately drives Jesus into the wilderness to take on
the devil.
(II) Jesus’ Baptism and temptation reached fulfillment on the cross in
triumph over Satan.
(A) Now this was a very strange battle plan.
(1) Mark’s account simply says that out in the wild Satan was tempting
Jesus for forty days.
(2) Imagine what a spiritually immature Peter might have said.
(3) Perhaps something like:
a) “Come on, God.
b) Knock this guy out!
c) Don’t put up with this.
d) He’s no match for you!”
(B) Yet Jesus suffers Satan’s temptations for forty days.
(1) Why did he do this?
(2) It’s all part of God’s plan to save sinners.
(3) Jesus must suffer temptation with and for us.
(4) He does this for forty days.
(5) He’s the promised Messiah who took the place of Israel, which fell into
sin and unbelief.
(6) The Old Testament records that the people of Israel:
a) yielded to temptation,
b) refused to believe that the Lord really could, really would bring them
into the Promised Land.
c) They had to wander forty years in the wilderness as a result for their
disobedience.
(7) But Jesus never yielded.
a) He never fell to temptation.
b) He trusted that God would provide for him.
c) The writer of the book of Hebrews says it this way:
Hebrews 4:15 (NASB95)
For we do not have a high priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses,
but One who has been tempted in all things as we are, yet without sin.
(C) After the forty days, however, the devil didn’t stop.
(1) Luke writes:
Luke 4:13 (NASB95)
When the devil had finished every temptation, he left Him until an
opportune time.
(2) He would hide his attacks.
(3) He would come at Jesus as he did through Peter during his earthly
ministry.
(4) As he did at the cross, when hecklers taunted:
Mark 15:30–31 (NASB95)
30 save Yourself, and come down from the cross!”
31 In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes, were
mocking Him among themselves and saying, “He saved others; He cannot save
Himself.”
(5) All were still Satan’s attacks, tempting Jesus to abandon his mission
to save sinful humankind.
(D) The final attack by the devil on Jesus was at the cross, where the war
had its crucial battle.
(1) There, Jesus’ Baptism would reach its fulfillment.
Mark 10:39 (NASB95)
They said to Him, “We are able.” And Jesus said to them, “The cup that I
drink you shall drink; and you shall be baptized with the baptism with
which I am baptized.
(2) When Jesus says:
Mark 15:37 (NASB95)
37 And Jesus uttered a loud cry [it is finished], and breathed His last
(cf. Jn 19:30)
a) the battle is over;
b) the war is won.
(3) He descends into hell, as Paul writes:
Colossians 2:15 (NASB95)
When He had disarmed the rulers and authorities, He made a public display
of them, having triumphed over them through Him.
a) After the triumphal procession in hell, Jesus rose from the dead on the
third day.
b) His resurrection announced to the world God’s victory over sin, death,
and, yes, the devil!
(III) As Satan tempts you, let the Spirit drive you to your Baptism into
Christ, who defeated him, so that you confidently say, “Get behind me,
Satan! I’m baptized.”
(A) “Get behind me, Satan! I’m baptized!” is not a mere mantra.
(1) It’s a confession of faith that Jesus defeated the devil.
(2) A Christian can confidently say this because Baptism gives the promise
of that victory to you.
(3) The Baptism of Jesus resulted in the defeat of Satan.
(4) Your Baptism into Jesus’ death and resurrection promises that same for
you (cf Rom 6:3–4).
(B) This is why telling Satan to get lost, that you are baptized, is a good
strategy. It’s why singing a hymn like “God’s Own Child, I Gladly Say It”
(“I am baptized into Christ!”) is a good practice.
(1) Stanza three of that hymn declares:
Satan, hear this proclamation:
I am baptized into Christ!
Drop your ugly accusation,
I am not so soon enticed.
Now that to the font I’ve traveled,
All your might has come unraveled,
And, against your tyranny,
God, my Lord, unites with me!” (LSB594:3)
(C) In his book Grace upon Grace: Spirituality for Today, John Kleinig
describes the devil as a “hidden enemy” and the spiritual warfare the
Christian endures as “the hidden battle.”
(1) He compares the attack of Satan on the conscience of a believer to the
sneak attacks endured by United States soldiers in the war in Vietnam,
where the enemy often hid from sight in tunnels underground.
(2) He writes [quote]:
a) They were often confused and frustrated because there was no clear line
of battle.
b) The soldiers never knew who their enemies were and where they were
located.
c) Enemies would appear as if from nowhere, emerging from secret tunnels
and disappearing in them once they lost their cover.
d) This meant that the U.S. soldiers could rarely take the offensive;
mostly they discovered the enemy only when they came under attack.
e) That’s how it is with us.
f) There are no clear lines of battle that join us with our allies and
separate us from our enemy.
g) The enemy is hidden from us.
h) The attack comes from inside us, our conscience. (John Kleinig, Grace
upon Grace [St. Louis: Concordia, 2008], 224) [end quote]
(D) But Jesus took on this enemy.
(1) His presence drew the devil out of hiding.
(2) Jesus encountered the devil directly in the wilderness and successfully
endured his temptations, remaining holy and without sin.
(3) Jesus’ death on the cross to pay for the sins of the world disarmed the
enemy, enabling the Christian who trusts in the saving death and
resurrection of Christ to have a clean conscience, protected from the sneak
attacks of the enemy.
Conclusion
(A) You need such a strategy because the devil, though defeated, is still
on the prowl.
(1) When an enemy is defeated in war, the leaders of the defeated country
are to meet with the victor to acknowledge defeat and ask for terms of
peace.
(2) In John 8:44 (NASB95), we hear this of the devil:
“You are of your father the devil, and you want to do the desires of your
father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and does not stand in the
truth because there is no truth in him. Whenever he speaks a lie, he speaks
from his own nature, for he is a liar and the father of lies.
(3) The devil acts as though he is not defeated, even though God has
declared it to be so.
(4) For now, God allows this.
(5) So Satan still goes about prowling and seeking whom he may devour with
his temptations, accusations, and lies.
(B) But when he tempts you to doubt that Jesus completely paid for all of
your sin, say, “Get behind me, Satan! I’m baptized!”
(C) When the devil tempts you to despair, thinking life is hopeless, when
he tempts you to indulge your sinful nature, say, “Get behind me, Satan!
I’m baptized!”
(D) When you fall and he accuses you of guilt before God, say, “Get behind
me, Satan! I’m baptized!”
(E) Therefore, when you face any of these attacks, you can confidently say,
“Get behind me, Satan! I’m baptized!”
(F) Now, though, a time is coming when you’ll no longer need such a
strategy.
(1) Jesus has promised to rend the heavens again and come down a second
time.
(2) When that happens, the devil will no longer be on the prowl.
(3) The devil will be cast out from the earth and:
Revelation 20:14 (NASB95)
Then [he and] death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire. This is
the second death, the lake of fire.
(G) Until that time, you and I would do well, in the face of Satan’s
temptations, to look to the promise of Jesus’ victory in our Baptism and
say, “Get behind me, Satan! I am baptized!” Amen.
(H) Let us pray:
God’s Own Child, I Gladly Say It LSB594:4-5
(I) The peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, guard your hearts
and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
(J) In the Name of the Father…Amen.