Luke 4:1-4 - Tempting

4:1,2

The wilderness here is the Desert of Judea. Matthew also tells us that the Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted (Matt 4:1), as does Mark (Mark 1:12), Luke tells us that Jesus was full of the Holy Spirit. Now why did the Spirit lead Jesus to be tempted? It is all part of Jesus being our representative. Adam and Eve were tempted and they gave in to the temptation. Jesus was blessed by the Father, He too was tempted, but He did not give in to the temptation. In Christ man overcame temptation. Notice that before the battle there is a time of preparation. Jesus fasted. This of course had the effect of making Him hungry.

4:3,4

We now get the first of the temptations. The order of the temptations in Matthew and Luke is slightly different, this is because the precise order doesn’t really matter. The first temptation is to do with hunger. Satan tempts Jesus to “prove” who He is. Jesus’ answer is that what we need most is the word of God, quoting from Deuteronomy (Deut 8:3). It is significant that in Deuteronomy 8:3 it says God caused the Israelites to hunger, feeding them with manna from heaven. Jesus was feeding on the real manna from heaven. The thing we need more anything else is the Word of God. Whatever our circumstances today, the word of God will sustain us. We should read it eagerly, devouring it and searching within the word. Some are keen on saying it is Jesus we must know, and that it is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, not Father, Son and the Bible. This is true enough in one sense, but the Word is vital. For the Word was breathed by God, it is His personal communication to us, and in it we find the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.