Scripture Daily

Context No. 926 of 4322 · Luke

Context · Reflection

Luke 4:1-7: in context

1Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness 2for forty days, being tempted by the devil. He ate nothing in those days. Afterward, when they were completed, he was hungry. 3The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” 4Jesus answered him, saying, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.’” 5The devil, leading him up on a high mountain, showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6The devil said to him, “I will give you all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I want. 7If you therefore will worship before me, it will all be yours.”

This is Luke's account of the temptation. Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, is led into the wilderness for forty days, eating nothing, and at the end he is hungry. The devil moves first on that hunger: if you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become bread. Jesus answers with Deuteronomy, man shall not live by bread alone but by every word of God. Then the devil shows him all the kingdoms of the world in an instant and offers them, along with their glory, on one condition, that Jesus worship him.

Notice the two pressure points the devil probes. First, a real and legitimate need, hunger after forty days without food. There would be nothing obviously wrong with a hungry man eating, and Jesus can turn stones to bread. The temptation is subtle: use your power to meet your own need on your own terms, outside the Father's timing and provision. Jesus refuses not because eating is sinful but because he will not let even a real need pull him out from under the Father's word. Second, the shortcut to the kingdoms, offered with a striking claim, it has been delivered to me. The devil claims a kind of ownership over the world's authority and offers it for a single act of worship. What both temptations share is the invitation to get a good thing, food, the nations, by a route that leaves God out. Jesus meets each not with argument but with scripture, standing on the word of God when his body and his mission are both under pressure.

Where am I tempted to meet a real, legitimate need by a route that quietly leaves God's word and timing out of it?

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