I. There is no falsehood on the face of the earth so dangerous as truth when that truth comes distorted, placed in wrong order, or laid in false proportions. This was exactly the character of the last temptation. All the kingdoms of the would, and all the glory of them, were Christ's; and He was even at that moment at the commencement of the path by which He was going to take possession of them. But to that kingdom there was an appointed time, a prescribed way, and covenanted conditions. And could the time, or the way, or the conditions be violated, even by a shade, the character and the very existence of that kingdom would have been nullified and destroyed.
II. In the journey to heaven, beware of taking the line which seems often the shortest. Whatever bright things are before you, and however near they look, depend upon it you have to go lower before you can go higher. A heaven we could go to at once would not be half as pleasant as the heaven we wait, and strive, and suffer for. And a heaven which we could purchase by our own good works would be as nothing compared to the heaven which we shall owe all to the blood of Jesus Christ.
III. Observe our Lord's mode of dealing with the suggestion which would do an evil that a good might come. He lays down one great fixed principle: "God, only God, must be worshipped." Whatever trespasses on His solitary majesty, whatever detracts in one iota from Him that must never be. Therefore, you are to take this general law: There is something better than the kingdom, and higher than happiness; higher than the highest it is the glory of God. Admit of no possession, no joy, no privilege, no honour, temporal or spiritual, which does not, in some way or other, glorify God. "Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve."
J. Vaughan, Sermons,11th series, p. 100.
References: Matthew 4:8-10. W. H. Hutchings, Mystery of the Temptation,p. 182; W. Landels, Christian World Pulpit,vol. iii., p. 392.Matthew 4:8-11. Homiletic Magazine,vol. vi., p. 152.Matthew 4:8-22. Homiletic Magazine,vol. v., p. 152.Matthew 4:8-22. Homiletic Quarterly,vol. ii., p. 507. Matthew 4:9. J. N. Norton, Every Sunday,p. 135; Homiletic Quarterly,vol. i., p. 249; F. W. Aveling, Christian World Pulpit,vol. xiv., p. 20; G. Calthrop, Ibid.,vol. xix., p. 177.