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13 -- THE FIRST TEMPTATION OF JESUS

But Jesus answered him, saying,"It is written, "Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God."'

Here, in preparation for his ministry, Jesus is led or sent into the wilderness by the Holy Spirit for an initial confrontation with the Satan the devil, the present ruler of this evil world (Galations 1:4), the one he is destined to depose. The word rendered here as led is used elsewhere to indicate a measure of force or compulsion (verse 29).

There was no food to be had in the wilderness, but Jesus remained there without eating for 40 days, being tempted in various ways by the devil, possibly throughout that period of time as well as on the three occasions detailed here by Luke.

It is said that after a long fast hunger returns with a vengeance, and that collapse and death soon follow, which seems to be the implication of the apparently obvious observation that Jesus became hungry. The implication also seems to be that Jesus had been led by the Holy Spirit to cast himself on the care of God, relying on in Him to provide the food he would need to save him from starvation and death.

We might ask ourselves why Jesus did go out into the wilderness -- and why, with or without the devil's urging, it would have been wrong for him to turn stones into bread in the miraculous manner that he later turned water into wine at the wedding feast in Galilee.

The explanation may be that the journey of the Israelites into the wilderness when they left Egypt was prophetic or "typical", and that Jesus, in the final preparation for his ministry, was required to repeat that experience in order to demonstrate his total commitment to God and to his purpose.

We have just seen, for example, how God confirmed that Jesus was literally his son (Luke 3:22) -- and it seems significant that when commanding Pharaoh to let the nation of Israel go free, God said, using metaphorical language, that: "Israel is my firstborn son" (Exodus 4:22).

The Israelites' wilderness wandering on their way to the Promised Land was also typical of our individual pilgrimages to the Kingdom of God -- which is why Paul explains (1 Corinthians 10:6,11) that their experiences were recorded as lessons and sober warnings for us, just in case we feel like quitting and turning back, as they did.

When Moses led them out of their slavery in Egypt, the Israelites were initially taken straight to Canaan (Deuteronomy 1:8), to inherit a rich and fertile land (verse 25), the land of promise (verse 8) -- a clear type of the Kingdom of God to which Christ's disciples are now being led.

However, after hearing the reports of those sent ahead to scout out the land, the Israelites became afraid of the fierce occupants, some of whom were of giant stature, and so rebelled and refused to enter the land, and turned back, despite the miracles they had seen, and the promise of God to fight their battles for them (verses 26-32).

As a result, they then wandered in the wilderness for 40 years, to humble them and test their hearts (Deuteronomy 8:2-3), sometimes going hungry and being fed with manna from heaven, without which miraculous provision they would soon have perished. It seems that Jesus was also required to be tested -- but with a different attitude and outcome.

The word rendered tempt in Luke's account can simply mean test or try or assess, in a positive sense of finding out how good or effective or satisfactory something is -- except that when the devil is involved, his intent is to test to destruction and destroy rather than evaluate. However, God does promise that he will never let us be tempted to destruction, beyond our strength (1 Corinthians 10:13), and it is interesting that when Paul explains this principle, he does so in the context of discussing the experiences of the Israelites in the wilderness, and warning us to avoid their mistakes.

There can be little doubt that during Jesus' own period of testing and extreme hunger in the wilderness, he must also have contemplated the experiences and failed destiny of the Israelites -- and it seems significant that the scripture he quotes to rebuff the devil was taken from the account of those events in the book of Deuteronomy, namely: Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God (Deuteronomy 8:3). Obedience to God is more important even than life or death, seems to be the message.

We tend to assume that the devil knew precisely who Jesus was, but one commentator says that there is "an air of curiosity" about the devil's question -- and according to scholar Adam Clark, the fact that the phrase "THE Son of God" in the devil's statement should read "A son of God", may well indicate that the devil was not yet sure who this person was. Although Jesus must have said that he was THE son of God, the devil apparently doubted this and wanted to make sure -- which could explain why he challenged him, quite logically, first of all, to prove his divine status by means of a basic miracle, i.e. turning a stones into bread. I suspect that, as a result of earlier events and the voice that spoke from heaven at his baptism, Jesus himself had absolutely no doubt as to his own identity.

Some time later in Jesus' ministry, the evil spirits he cast out clearly knew that he was the Son of God (verse 34), but that was later. Notice also that the term "son of God" was not new and could apply in the scriptures to men (Hosea 1:10) and also to angels (Job 38:7).

The essence of this first temptation appears to have been the desperate urge to stop his suffering, to give up waiting in faith for God to provide the food he urgently needed -- and to obey the instructions of the devil instead.

Since these events marked the beginning of Jesus's ministry, we might assume that he spent the time in the wilderness in preparing for what lay ahead -- praying, studying the scriptures, formulating a detailed plan of action, and developing material, such as the Sermon on the Mount and the numerous parables, possibly also organizing and extending material previously prepared.

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