If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread

 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.  And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry.  Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, "If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread."  But He answered and said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.'"

Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down.  For it is written:

'He shall give His angels charge over you,'

and,

'In their hands they shall bear you up,

Lest you dash your foot against a stone.'"

Jesus said to him, "It is written again, 'You shall not tempt the Lord your God.'"

Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.  And he said to Him, "All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me."  Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan!  For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.'"  Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.

- Matthew 4:1-11

On Saturday, we read that Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan to be baptized by him.  And John tried to prevent Him, saying, "I need to be baptized by You, and are You coming to me?"  But Jesus answered and said to him, "Permit it to be so now, for thus it is fitting for us to fulfill all righteousness."  Then he allowed Him.  When He had been baptized, Jesus came up immediately from the water; and and behold, the heavens were opened to Him, and He saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting upon Him.  And suddenly a voice came from heaven, saying, "This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."

 Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.  My study bible says that to be tempted is to be testing in fundamental areas of faith.  As in Mark, the Spirit leads -- or more literally "throws" -- Jesus into the wilderness after Baptism to be tested in a struggle with the devil.  This is not an accident nor merely a volitional choice by Jesus.  It is something important and essential.  My study bible says that as we are aided by the Holy Spirit as well, we need not be defeated by temptations.  The wilderness is a kind of battleground, an image of the world -- both as dwelling place of demons and also a source of divine peace and victory.

And when He had fasted forty days and forty nights, afterward He was hungry.  Jesus' time in the wilderness is a kind of reversal of the experience of Israel's falling to temptation in the wilderness.  The Israelites were tested forty years in the wilderness, says my study bible, and proved disobedient and disloyal.  God humbled them by first letting them go hungry and then feeding them with manna, helping them learn dependence on Him (see Deuteronomy 8:2-5).  Jesus is now tested with hunger for forty days, but doesn't sin.  All of His answers to Satan in today's passage are also from Deuteronomy, and they all call for loyalty to God.  My study bible teaches that Jesus fasted to overcome temptation, giving us an example of our own power and limitations in the face of temptation.  The hunger of His flesh does not control Him; rather, He controls our flesh.  Our Lord's fast of forty days is the foundation the traditional Church forty-day fast of Lent.

Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, "If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread."  Here my study bible challenges Jesus' relationship to the Father.  "If You are the Son of God" calls into question the declaration of the Father at Jesus' Baptism (see yesterday's reading above, specifically 3:17).   It's an attempt to push Jesus to act independently and detach Himself from the will of the Father.  In Christ's divine nature, He shares one will with the Father and the Holy Spirit, and He can do nothing of Himself (John 5:30), apart from the Father.  However, in Jesus' humanity He possesses free will, and must choose at all times if he is to remain obedient to the divine will of the Father.  We note this is a temptation to use power as Son, attempting to prey on Jesus' hunger.

But He answered and said, "It is written, 'Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.'"   Jesus rejects this first temptation, and thereby rejects an earthly kingdom.  My study bible says that it shows us not to pursue earthly comfort in the "food which perishes (John 6:27).  It says that Adam disregarded the divine word in order to pursue passions of the body (Genesis 3), but the New Adam, who is Christ, conquers all temptation by the divine word, giving human nature the power to conquer Satan.  Jesus quotes Deuteronomy 8:3.  All of His quotations are teachings for the rest of us, as well.

Then the devil took Him up into the holy city, set Him on the pinnacle of the temple, and said to Him, "If You are the Son of God, throw Yourself down.  For it is written:  'He shall give His angels charge over you,' and, 'In their hands they shall bear you up, / Lest you dash your foot against a stone.'"   Here, the devil quotes from Psalm 91:11-12.  My study bible tells us that seeing that Christ had defeated him through the power of Scriptures, Satan vainly tries to use the Scriptures to put God's power of protection to the test.  (See also 2 Peter 1:19-21.)

Jesus said to him, "It is written again, 'You shall not tempt the Lord your God.'"   My study bible tells us that trials and temptations will come on their own, and we're never to intentionally expose ourselves to danger in order to test or prove God's protection.  To do that is to tempt the LORD.  Quotation is from Deuteronomy 6:16.

Again, the devil took Him up on an exceedingly high mountain, and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world and their glory.  And he said to Him, "All these things I will give You if You will fall down and worship me."  Then Jesus said to him, "Away with you, Satan!  For it is written, 'You shall worship the LORD your God, and Him only you shall serve.'"  Then the devil left Him, and behold, angels came and ministered to Him.   My study bible tells us that God's Kingdom isn't one of earthly power and possessions.  This is an important teaching for us, as it tells us about ourselves, that our own connection to God isn't dependent upon such things!  In the devil's test, says my study bible, Jesus was being asked to choose worldly power over the Kingdom of God.  The devil is the "ruler of this world" (according to John 12:31), "the god of this age" (2 Corinthians 4:4), because the whole world is in his power (1 John 5:19).   What Jesus refuses is this path of "earthly glory" -- such a choice would lead Him away from suffering and death for the redemption of the world.

What does it mean to be tempted?  I believe that it is very important that we recognize Jesus' temptation as something essential to His mission, something made possible through the Holy Spirit's action of "throwing" Him into the wilderness.  My study bible suggests that the wilderness represents the world, where we are torn between the tranquility and beauty of God's creation, and also dwelling place of demons.  Thereby, it's traditionally seen as a battleground, a place both of temptation to weakness and also of victory.  The earliest monastics went into the deserts, the wilderness such as the one into which Jesus went, in order to live lives within such a battleground, to pray without ceasing, and to depend upon God, in a life devoted to such practices and spiritual dedication.  There are many stories about them, all of which are surprising and enlightening.  But what we learn from Jesus' experience is that He goes there before us, and that none of us are exempt.  And it doesn't matter the site of the battleground, the city or the wilderness, we all face temptation to our weaknesses.  I believe the most important thing we can learn and understand is really our dependence upon God.  We have the failure of Peter, a seasoned apostle by the time of his temptation to deny Christ three times while Jesus is on trial, just outside the building as he warms himself on a fire, and in the face of a servant girl of the high priest.  It tells us that of ourselves, even the "best" of us, we can't really do this alone; everything depends on our relationship to God for this kind of strength.  Failure isn't an obstacle but rather a stepping stone, a way of learning better, understanding ourselves with greater honesty, and turning in greater faith back to the One upon whom we depend, in the love and mercy and help of both Christ and the Spirit.  We pray to Our Father, as taught by Jesus, "Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil " (or the evil one, as can also be interpreted from the Greek).   If we think about it, a "worldly" perspective seems to offer us two choices:  dominate or be dominated.  Both lead us into a failure to live a good and healthy life in terms of spiritual choices, and they leave us with a false dilemma.  To be dominated is to be led away from what we might think is best, following a false god, giving away our soul.  To dominate is to be tempted to use power in service to the worst of our hidden inclinations and weaknesses.  Both can capture us in temptation.  The hidden solution is really dependence upon God, a life lived outside the box of the worldly perspective, serving the image God gives us of ourselves, and learning and growing as we go, negotiating the worldly on His terms.  And that is our goal as Christians, and the Way that Christ has taught.  We are all sons of God by faith, inheritors of the Kingdom, and we follow Him to become such as fully as possible.  To fail to do so is to lose His promise of being with Him.