But Jesus, full of [the] Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness
Luke opens Jesus' public life not with a miracle but with a walk from the Jordan into the desert. One verse holds two things together: fullness of the Holy Spirit, and the place where the devil waits.
The order matters: baptism, the Spirit's descent, the Father's voice — then the desert.
Here we see Jesus move on from the Jordan, "full of the Holy Spirit" (verse 1). He had just been baptized, sealed by the Spirit, and, above all, owned by the Father as His beloved Son. At once He was led in the Spirit in the wilderness. There the devil tempted Him for forty days. The principle is true of us too. We are sons of God by faith in Jesus, and we know it by the Holy Spirit living in us. So we too know what it is to be tempted by the devil. Temptation is hardly the way the devil deals with his own children. But once God delivers us, such conflicts begin.
Two phrases that sound alike are not the same.
"Full of," not "filled with" the Holy Spirit — that is the statement about the Lord. This distinction should be noticed. Full of the Holy Spirit seems to tell us what marked the person habitually, as a rule. So Stephen and Barnabas are described (Acts 6:5; 11:24)... Filled with the Spirit, on the other hand, is used of vessels taken up for God's service, whether for a longer or a shorter time. Instances of this last are Elizabeth and Zacharias (Luke 1:41, 67); the company at Pentecost; Peter too and Paul. Full of the Spirit was characteristic of the Lord throughout His ministry.
There is a reason Luke says this and John does not.
In the opening verse of Luke 4 Jesus is brought before us as the vessel of the Spirit of God, and the vessel is full. John presents the Son as come to bear witness to the Father. Luke shows the Lord as Son of Man, come to do the will of God. All that He does is by the Spirit of God. There is, as it were, nothing of self, but a vessel filled by God to carry out His desires in all things.
Luke's wording differs from Matthew's and Mark's, and our verse keeps the difference.
He who was to baptise with the Holy Spirit must be God to do that. And He returned from the Jordan full of the Holy Spirit, to be led in the wilderness during forty days and tempted by the devil. Luke probably wrote "in," not "into." In Matthew and in Mark we read that He was led by the Spirit into the wilderness. Luke, however, tells us how during all those forty days He was under the guidance of the Spirit.
The first man was tested too. He was not tested like this.
He was going to be tried as Adam was tried — yes, as Adam never was tried. This Second Adam was going to meet the tempter in no Paradise, but in the wilderness. It was in the ruin of this world. It was in the scene of death over which God's judgment hung. Here innocence was not the question, but divine power in holiness surrounded by evil. Here One who was fully man depended on God, and, where there was no food and no water, He lived by the word of God.
The Spirit did the leading. So the test was no experiment with an uncertain outcome.
He enters into conditions that resulted from the fall and stands there for God. He is seen in these conditions as a perfect, sinless, incorruptible, subject Man, and it is as such that He overcomes the devil. The temptation was not to see whether He was sinless or not, but to show openly that He was. The movement was His own in perfect holy Manhood, as subject to the leading of the Spirit.
We measure power by what it does. Here it shows in what it withstands.
Notice how faithfulness in trial and temptation shows the power of the Spirit as much as the energy of action. Jesus was led by the Spirit to be tempted. He overcame Satan by the word through the Spirit. He returned in that power, working miracles and casting out devils. But the power had been exercised all through the temptation, only in standing fast.
- Full — Jesus was full of the Spirit, not filled with Him. The first describes what a person is day by day; the second, a vessel taken up for one task.
- Led — the Spirit who filled Him also moved Him, and kept Him under that guidance for all forty days, not just on the way in.
- Wilderness — Adam was tried in Paradise; the Second Man met the tempter in a desert, with no food and no water, living by the word of God.
- Shown — the test did not ask whether He was sinless. It showed that He was.
- Returned — the power that held firm in the desert is the power that then worked miracles. Standing fast was the victory.
forty days, tempted of the devil; and in those days he did not eat anything, and when they were finished he hungered.
Luke sets the Lord's first public conflict in a desert: forty days there, no food, and the devil at work on Him the whole time. Why did God lead Him to that place, what does the number forty mean, and why did Satan wait until He was hungry?
Where a test happens shapes it. Adam was tested in a garden; this Man was tested in a desert.
Here then is something for us to think about. The perfect Man, the true Israel, is in the wilderness. He is surrounded by the wild beasts, fasting for forty days. He stands in the presence of the great adversary of God, of man, of Israel. There was not a single feature in the scene to speak for God. It was not with the second Adam as it was with the first. He was not surrounded by all the delights of Eden. Around Him lay the dreariness and desolation of a desert. He was there in loneliness and hunger — but He was there for God!
Why forty days? The number turns up elsewhere in Scripture, attached to a time of testing.
Forty days the Lord was in the wilderness, fasting all that time. For forty years Israel was in the desert. God tested them there, to know what was in their heart, and whether they would keep His commandments or not (Deut. 8:2)... He gave the people of Nineveh forty days to repent, or the threatened judgment would fall on them (Jonah 3:4). So it seems that the number forty has to do with the idea of testing. The Lord spent forty days in the wilderness without food. He proved Himself faithful, and truly dependent on God.
Israel had a long version of the same test. The result was not the same.
The Israelites had forty years of trial in the wilderness. All through it they showed how little they had learned the lessons God put them there to learn. The Lord is there forty days, tested to the full. He proves Himself always perfect, and beyond the need of learning — Master and not disciple.
Others had fasted forty days before Him. What made this fast different was who was waiting at the end of it.
So He goes out into the wilderness to fast His forty days. It is a complete contrast with all the surroundings of the first man. He does not go, as Moses or Elijah did, to meet God. He goes in weakness, with the hunger of those forty days upon Him, to meet man's adversary and be fully tested. Did the Spirit of God ever lead up anyone else to be tempted by the devil in such utter need, in all the reality of human weakness?
The hunger at the end was real, and its timing matters.
Luke, as well as Mark, records that He was tempted through the forty days, during which He ate nothing. Matthew and Luke carry us on to the end of that time, when He was hungry. He never used His divine power to relieve Himself from any consequence of the place He had taken as Man. The enemy chose this moment of human weakness. He came against Him with the armour he trusted in.
What He refused was not food, but food obtained apart from God's word.
The Lord at once takes the lowest ground, which is in fact the highest ground morally. Feeding the body is not the first thing. The first thing is living by the word of God. He waits for a word from Him whose will He came to do. He refuses, even in His hunger, to take a single step towards satisfying His sinless wants without divine direction. The true and only right place of man is dependence.
The word "tempted" needs care here. Its meaning changes with the person being tested.
He had to know, not sin, but suffering. He had to be tempted to the utmost, sin excepted, in order to help those who are tempted. Temptation means trial. In Christ's case it never means what it means in fallen man — the inward pull towards evil. This is what the Holy Spirit denies of Him. Had there been in Him the least inward taint of sin, His sense of evil would have been weakened, His sufferings lessened, and His sympathy hindered.
- Place. The trial ran in a desert, not a garden. Not one feature of the scene spoke for God — but the Man in it was there for God.
- Period. Forty is the number of a full test. Forty years left Israel with nothing learned; forty days proved Christ faithful and dependent on God.
- Purpose. Moses and Elijah fasted forty days to meet God; He fasted forty days to meet the devil, in real weakness and real need.
- Pressure. Satan waited for the hunger at the end. Christ would never use His divine power to spare Himself anything that belonged to His place as Man.
- Purity. He was tested from outside at every point. Nothing inside Him answered the appeal. That is why His sympathy is greater, not smaller.
And the devil said to him, If thou be Son of God, speak to this stone, that it become bread.
The Father had just owned Jesus as His Son from heaven. After forty days without food, the devil's first move aims straight at that Sonship — and it turns on one word: "If."
That single word can cut two ways, and the difference matters.
There are two ways in which you may look at that word "if." He is either casting doubt on His relationship to God, or getting Him to act on the fact of that relationship. To the Lord he says here, "If you are really God's Son, command this stone to become bread." That is: God has kept you hungry. Now your opportunity has arrived. Take yourself out of God's hand, for you are able to make those stones into bread and satisfy yourself.
The taunt worked on what the eye could see.
"If you are the Son of God." Our Lord did not look like it. There was nothing outwardly to carry the demonstration of it. If it had been so, there would have been no room left for faith at all. Satan takes advantage of the lowliness of our Lord in the place that He took as man. And indeed nothing could be more remarkable than His being found in the wilderness, and, as we read in Mark, with the wild beasts. If He was really the Son of God, Maker of heaven and earth, what a place to be in! And the Spirit led Him there, after the Father had spoken from heaven and owned Him as His beloved Son!
The devil was not guessing about who Jesus was. So why did Jesus not simply do it?
Satan knew He was the Son of God. So he suggested that He should "command this stone to become bread." As Son He had the right to "command." But He had entered manhood as the dependent Man, and He would not use His power without a word from His God.
The danger here is easy to miss, and it reaches us too.
Satan seeks to turn Him from obedience. Notice how subtle his method is. It is often in this very way that the enemy of our souls catches us off our guard and gets a footing. There was nothing positively evil in what he presents to the Lord. Too often we are drawn away by positive evil, but not always or ordinarily. More often he presents something that no one can call harmful... Where is the harm in turning stones into bread, if one needed it and had the power? It was not possible that the Lord Jesus could entertain such a question. The moment we do, Satan has gained his point.
His hunger was real and sinless. Still He would not move an inch on His own initiative.
The Lord at once takes the lowliest ground, which is really the highest ground morally. Feeding the body is not the first consideration; living by the Word of God is. He waits for a word from Him whose will He came to do. He refuses even in His hunger to take a single step towards satisfying His sinless wants without divine direction. The true and only right place of man is dependence. Having become a man, He would not turn from that dependence on God to follow wishes of His own.
Writers also note the sequence of the three temptations here, beginning with bodily need:
Note the order: body, mind, spirit (the most subtle).
Satan had tried this before, on the first man.
Satan attempted to triumph over the Seed of the woman as he had triumphed over the first man, but discovered that He was quite another kind of Man. The conditions in which the first man failed were in sharp contrast to those in which the Second Man triumphed. The garden of Eden was very different from the desert where Jesus was hungry after fasting forty days. Adam ate of forbidden fruit to be as gods; Jesus refused to satisfy His hunger without a word from God.
That opening "if" did not stop in the wilderness. It returns whenever our circumstances look nothing like what God has said about us.
Here is the echo of the old wilderness temptation, "If you are the Son of God." And here is the constant temptation of the people of God in all ages. If you are the child of God, why is this allowed to come upon you? If you do trust Him, why are you left in this condition or circumstance?
- Declared — Heaven had owned Him as God's Son. The devil's "if" attacks that word. It either casts doubt on the relationship or pushes Him to act on it alone.
- Disguised — There was nothing openly evil in the suggestion. Hunger was real, the power was His, and that harmlessness was the trap.
- Dependent — He had the right to command, but as a man He would not use His power without a word from God. Waiting is the lowliest ground and the highest.
- Different — Adam fell in a garden of plenty, reaching for more. The Second Man stood in a desert, refusing bread without a word from God.
- Directed at you — The same "if" comes to every child of God when circumstances look wrong. His answer is ours: live by the Word of God.
And Jesus answered unto him saying, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.
Jesus has gone forty days in the wilderness without food. The devil tells Him to turn a stone into bread. He answers with a line of Scripture. That reply raises the question the whole scene turns on: what does a human life really run on?
Jesus will not meet a real, sinless need without direction from God. One writer shows what that refusal says about man's true place:
The Lord at once takes the lowest ground, which is really the highest morally. Feeding the body is not the first consideration. Living by the Word of God is. He waits for a word from Him whose will He had come to do. He refuses, even in His hunger, to take a single step toward satisfying His sinless wants without divine direction. The true and only right place of man is dependence. Having become a man, He would not swerve from it... This was the true condition of man, and his right relation to God. Jesus stayed in it under the greatest trial. He is the bright contrast to the first Adam, who left that place when every circumstance was in his favour.
The answer puts keeping God's word above food itself:
He lived by the Word as well as kept the Word, and this is exactly the perfection you find in Jesus here. He had no word, and therefore He does not move. He says, "It is written." He appeals to the Scriptures; He kept the Scriptures; He lived by the Scriptures. How blessed to consider Him like this! There is something even more important than finding bread to satisfy hunger... To keep the Word of God. Oh, the moral magnificence of standing fast by the Word of God! To hold fast to it, and not be moved away from that Word by any good on offer! That is more important than life itself.
He could have replied out of His own mind. Instead He quotes what is already written. That puts Him on ground His followers can stand on too:
It could hardly escape notice that the Lord always answers by the word of God. This is the sword of the Spirit, the only weapon we have to face the adversary. The Lord could have answered from His own mind. Yet He always uses the written Word, and openly points to it as Scripture. That is striking, and it speaks to us. We see that He takes exactly the same ground as ourselves, answers as man, and is subject, as we are, to the authority of God.
Jesus quotes words first spoken about Israel's forty years in the desert. God fed them daily with manna. That earlier test ended differently:
Israel went through this same test in their history and failed completely. The daily manna was a constant lesson: they depended on God, and His care for them never failed. They hardened their hearts and would not hear His voice. For forty years that generation grieved the Lord, and He said, "They are a people who go astray in their heart, and they have not known my ways" (Ps. 95:10). But the heart of Jesus was toward His Father. With the full power of the Spirit, He refused to supply even the most legitimate needs of the body except in obedience. "My food," as He said later, "is to do the will of Him who sent Me" (John 4:34).
Older translations add a second half to the verse: "but by every word of God." The writers quoted here use that longer wording. One of them points to the Greek word behind "word":
Where it says the "Word" of God, the word used is logos, which means the whole revelation of God. Here it is not logos but rhema — the specific word for the situation... He met the attack with the particular word for each situation. If I do not have the Word of God living in me, then I will not be able to pick out the Scripture I need at that moment.
What Jesus did in the desert is not only His story. It shows how a believer lives every day:
This brought out the real secret of living in dependence upon God day by day, for the food of the new life is the word of God. This shows how important the written word is, and how important it is to have it as our household bread day by day. We are not to read it as a task or a formal duty. It is really the provision God has fitted to the needs of His child.
- Live. The issue is not hunger but life — a man's real life comes from God's word, not from his plate.
- Depend. Jesus meets the test by staying in man's true place, refusing to move without a word from God.
- Written. His weapon is not His own power but "It is written," the same ground any believer can stand on.
- Every. Not Scripture in general but the exact word for the moment — which only those with it stored inside can find.
- Daily. What He proved in the desert becomes our habit: the Word as household bread, taken as food, not as duty.
And [the devil], leading him up into a high mountain, shewed him all the kingdoms of the habitable world in a moment of time.
The devil lifts Jesus to a high place and shows Him every kingdom on earth in one instant. Two questions follow: why does Luke place this temptation second, and by what right does Satan display kingdoms that were never his?
Luke does not follow the sequence of events. He groups the three assaults by what each one targets in a man.
The first temptation is an appeal to the need of the body. The second in Luke (not in Matthew) is the lure of the world's glory. The third in our Gospel is the religious temptation through the word of God, and therefore morally the hardest of all for one who values that word. This is why Luke leaves the actual order of events and groups them morally, as this writer does elsewhere too. So the tempter attacks the Lord Jesus first about man's life. Then about the power given to man. Then about the promises made to Christ Himself.
This display works on the eye. It stands in the middle of a threefold description of the world found elsewhere in Scripture.
The order here agrees with John's analysis of the world in 1 John 2. The first temptation was clearly designed to appeal to the lust of the flesh, the second to the lust of the eyes, and the third to the pride of life. But no such lust or pride had any place in our Lord, and the three testings only served to reveal His perfection in its details.
The same appeal through the eye had worked once before, in a garden, on the first man and his wife.
The sight of the fruit drew Eve in. But not all the glory of the kingdoms of the world could bring Jesus under the devil, or move Him from His place of subjection to God.
The phrase is more than a detail. It measures how much the tempter really has.
From a mountain top the devil shows Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. (In fact, the whole time these kingdoms will last is really "but for a moment.") Satan can show all he has in a moment. The Lord will take eternity to show us the riches of what He owns.
Commentators differ on how much weight to give the tempter's claim. Some say the Lord never argued with the fact of Satan's grip. They point to how Scripture describes the world elsewhere.
The Word of God sets the world before us as an organised system, with Satan at its head. The devil took Jesus up a high mountain and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. His offer was this: "I will give You all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will." Of course the Son of God does not admit that Satan has a right to this rule. But He does not deny the fact either.
Others read the boast as a lie that exposes who the speaker is.
He claimed something completely untrue: that they had all been handed over to him, and that he could do with them as he chose. How the devil's true character here comes out! For rulers are God's ministers, not the devil's. The authorities that exist are appointed by God.
One writer traces the devil's grip back to the first man.
It is true enough that all these kingdoms have been delivered to Satan. He is a usurper who tricked Adam into handing the world's authority over to him.
What Christ refused from Satan, someone else will one day accept.
Christ refused the sovereignty of the world from Satan (Luke 4:5, 8); here is one who accepts it.
The refusal costs Him nothing. Who finally gets the earth was never the tempter's to decide.
Men forget that God may allow the devil, for a time, to give the kingdoms of this world to whom he will. But God has kept the final disposal of this world in His own hands. Christ has only to ask, and God will give Him the nations for an inheritance, and the ends of the earth for a possession.
- Order — Luke arranges the three temptations by what they target, not by when they happened: the body, then the world's glory, then the word of God.
- Eye — The middle attack targets the lust of the eyes, the same door through which the fruit once drew Eve in.
- Moment — All the tempter owns can be displayed in an instant; the Lord will need eternity to show His own riches.
- Claim — Commentators differ on Satan's boast. Some say Christ let the fact stand without granting the right. Others say rulers are God's ministers, so the claim was false.
- Inheritance — Christ refused the kingdoms from the devil's hand. They remain God's to give, and He will give them to His Son. Someone else will one day accept them from Satan.
And the devil said to him, I will give thee all this power, and their glory; for it is given up to me, and to whomsoever I will I give it.
From a mountain the devil shows Jesus every kingdom of the world and claims they are his to give away. Was that claim true, and why did the Lord refuse a crown that was already His?
The offer rests on the words "it has been delivered to me." Writers do not treat that as a straight lie or a straight truth.
That was false, and yet true. It was false as to title, but true as to fact; for Satan had acquired this by man's sin. As to title, he had none at all. Satan had no title to give glory to anyone. But through his craft he led man to depart from God. He attacked the first Adam and defeated him. He profits by this victory over man, and here sets himself forward as the usurper. "I have all this," he says, "and I give it to whomever I will. If you will own me as the giver" — that is what worship means here — "if you will take it from me, all will be yours."
Notice what the Lord does not say in reply. He never disputes the boast, and elsewhere He confirms it in His own words.
Of course the Son of God does not acknowledge his right to this dominion, but at the same time He does not deny the fact. On the contrary, He more than once acknowledges it. So, when speaking of His death, He says — "Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out" (John 12:31).
If someone handed this authority over, how did that happen? The answer goes back to the first act of disobedience — and to the obedience that undid it.
It has often been asked, how was it delivered to him. In the second chapter of Ephesians we read, "following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience." Satan has gained power over man because man is in a state of disobedience. He has no power over an obedient man, and that is what we see in these verses. He gained his power through the disobedience of man in the garden of Eden, but the obedience of a Man in the wilderness cancels his power.
Look at the offer itself. The devil could display all he had in a single moment.
Satan can show all he has in a moment of time, but the Lord will take eternity to show us the riches of His possession. It is true enough that all these kingdoms have been delivered to Satan. He is a usurper who tricked Adam into handing the world's authority over to him. So he tries also to bring Christ under his authority by his false offer of all these kingdoms, if Christ will only worship him!
The gift had its price: owning Satan as the giver. Who has taken that deal?
Oh, is this not exactly what the powers of this world have done? They have simply taken the devil's bribe. How solemn, how awful, to think of it!
The crown belonged to Christ. He refused the road Satan offered, not the crown.
Satan has profanely taken the crown for himself. During the temptation in the wilderness he actually offered it to Him. He refused it. He did not choose that short and easy way to glory. He took the hard road that lay through death and resurrection — "Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?" (Luke 24:26).
What the devil put before Christ on that mountain, he still puts before His followers.
The character of this last temptation is the world. Let us be warned: whenever this world sets something before us as a prize to chase, it is of Satan. God cannot offer us anything in a world that has cast the Son of God completely out of it. We are heirs of it with Christ. By and by He will put us in possession. When He takes possession, that will be time enough for hearts that love Him to possess it.
- Usurped, not owned. The devil's claim is false as to title and true as to fact — he holds the world's kingdoms, but he never had any right to them.
- Gained by disobedience. He got that hold through man's fall. He has no power over an obedient man, and a Man's obedience in the desert cancelled it.
- Offered in a moment. All he could show took a moment; the Lord will take eternity to display what is really His.
- Refused at the price. The crown was Christ's, but He refused the shortcut. He chose the road through death and resurrection.
- Still on offer. Anything this world holds out as a prize to chase comes from the same hand. The inheritance waits until Christ takes possession and shares it with His own.
If therefore *thou* wilt do homage before me, all [of it] shall be thine.
In Luke's account this is Satan's second move, and it is a straight bargain: the whole visible world for one act of homage. Everything turns on one word — "worship." What was the devil really asking for? And why did the offer have no pull on the Lord?
The demand was not for a religious ceremony. It was for an admission — that the world's power is Satan's to give.
That was false, and yet true. It was false as to title, but true as to fact; for Satan had acquired this by man's sin. As to title, he had none at all. Satan had no title to give glory to anyone. But by his craft he led man to depart from God. He attacked the first Adam and defeated him, and he profits by this victory over man. The result of that victory was that the creature left the place of confidence and trust. So here he sets himself forth as the usurper. "I have all this," he says, "and I give it to whoever I will. If you will own me as the giver" — that is here the meaning of worship — "if you will take it from me, all shall be yours."
The bargain rested on something untrue. Government does not belong to Satan, and God had long since promised the kingdoms to Another.
The tempter was beaten, but not ashamed. He led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. He offered them to Him with their glory as a free gift, if only He would worship before him. His claim was wholly untrue — that they had all been handed over to him, and that he could dispose of them as he chose. How the devil's true character (John 8:44) comes out here! For rulers are God's ministers, not the devil's. God appoints the authorities that exist (Rom. 13). Besides this, centuries earlier God, the Sovereign Ruler, had announced who would receive all the rule the devil was offering (Psalm 2:8). What a bold move this was! All should be the Lord's, he said, if only He would worship before him. All was to be His really, a gift from the Father to the Son.
Notice how fast the whole display was over.
The second temptation (vv. 6-7) is an appeal to pride as well as to greed. But again the Lord has no inclination to give in to it. From a mountain top the devil shows Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. (Indeed, the time all these kingdoms will last is little more than "a moment.") Satan can show all he has in a moment of time. But the Lord will take eternity to show us the riches of His possession.
His refusal was a settled choice about whose hand He would take anything from. That choice set the road He would walk.
So He overcame the tempter. He stayed faithful to Him whose will He had come to do. He refused everything from the hand of Satan, and received only from the Father. The path to His exaltation lay through the cross. There He glorified God in all that God is, and was victorious over death and the grave. He has forever set aside the claim and power of Satan, and has established the rights of God.
Here is where the Lord differs from us. We measure the offer; He measured the one making it.
Fallen man would like the gift. He would long for the gift, and the more glory it had, the more it would attract him. But the Lord Jesus — the perfect Man — thought of the giver. He thought of who it was that offered it. His heart was in perfect unison with the heart of God, so He says, "You shall worship the Lord your God." He would not take an empire or a kingdom from anyone else. He would not take glory, pleasure, or honour from Satan.
The devil rarely asks anyone outright to bow to him. People still strike the bargain without saying a word.
The devil tried to tempt Christ when he "showed Him all the kingdoms of the world," and promised them all to Him, if He would "fall down and worship him." Everyone who seeks the world's wealth by unrighteousness goes to the devil for it, and worships him in effect. How much better it is to have poverty from God than riches from the devil! A temptation comes on strong when the way out of trouble seems to run through the sin Satan is urging.
- The price — "Worship" here means owning Satan as the giver. His claim was false as to title, but real as to fact, since he gained his hold through man's fall.
- The lie — Rulers are God's ministers, not the devil's. God had already announced who would receive the kingdoms.
- The size — Satan showed all he had in a moment. The Lord will take eternity to show the riches of His possession.
- The choice — He refused everything from Satan's hand and received only from the Father. His path to exaltation ran through the cross.
- The test — Fallen man wants the gift. The perfect Man looked at the giver. Everyone who seeks the world's wealth by unrighteousness worships Satan in effect.
And Jesus answering him said, It is written, Thou shalt do homage to [the] Lord thy God, and him alone shalt thou serve.
In the wilderness the devil shows Jesus every kingdom of the world and offers Him all of it for one act of homage. Jesus answers with a line from Deuteronomy, and it settles the matter by God's plain claim on a man's worship and service.
Older Bibles begin this verse with "Get behind me, Satan." Modern ones leave those words out. One commentator links this to the order in which Luke tells the story:
The best attested text leaves the words "Get behind me, Satan; for" out of the Lord's answer to the devil. The manuscript evidence calls for leaving them out. So does the change of order in Luke, in which Luke was, I have no doubt, guided by God. The commonly received text gives a strange appearance: the Lord tells the adversary to go away, yet Satan stays where he was and tempts the Lord in a new way. Leave these words out, and everything flows on in exact connection with the context.
The offer was not an empty bluff. One writer separates what Satan held in fact from what he held by right:
That was false, and yet true. It was false as to title, but true as to fact; for Satan had acquired this by man's sin. As to title, he had none at all. Satan had no right to give glory to anyone. But by his craft he led man away from God. He attacked the first Adam and defeated him. He profits by this victory over man, and here he sets himself up as the usurper.
The Lord's answer covers both worship and service. One writer names what that shuts out:
The Lord answers the worldly temptations by insisting, according to the written Word, on worshipping the Lord God and serving Him only. Homage to Satan is incompatible with the service of God.
The refusal was not a loss. One writer follows the road that led to His exaltation instead:
He overcame the tempter by staying faithful to the One whose will He had come to do. He refused everything from the hand of Satan, and received only from the Father. The path to His exaltation lay through the cross. There He glorified God in all that God is. Victorious over death and the grave, He has forever set aside the claim and power of Satan.
Jesus does not answer with power. He answers with a text, and one writer notes where all His answers came from:
Notice that in each case Christ does not just quote Scripture; He quotes it as Scripture. Each time He says, "It is written." And it is a very remarkable thing that the Lord answers Satan every time from the book of Deuteronomy. The Lord gained the victory in every instance by the Word of God. It was the outcome of His simple dependence on God, and of having the Word of God in His heart. He proved the truth of the word, "I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you."
The refusal did not come from gritted teeth. One writer traces it to what already filled His heart:
Power and pomp and greatness dazzle and fascinate men. Men will sell their souls and deny their God for them. They had no charm for Jesus… A true worshipper of God is one whose heart is filled with His glory. It was always so with Jesus here on earth, and in that filled heart there was no room for the world; its empty splendour did not attract Him.
One writer sets fallen man beside the perfect Man, and then turns the question on us:
Fallen man would like the gift, and would long for the gift. The more glory it had, the more it would attract him. But the Lord Jesus — the perfect Man — thought of the giver. He thought of who it was that offered it… He would not take glory, pleasure, or honour from Satan… How blessed to hear Him say, "It is written, You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only." Him only! Are you as exclusive as that?
- Only, the claim. The whole answer turns on one word: worship belongs to God, and the service that follows belongs to Him alone.
- Only, and the usurper. Satan's claim to the kingdoms was true in fact but false in title — he holds by man's fall what was never granted him.
- Only, and the giver. Fallen man eyes the gift; the perfect Man looks at who is offering, and refuses everything from that hand.
- Only, and the cross. He took nothing from Satan's hand; His glory came the long way — through the cross, and from the Father.
- Only, and the weapon. Three times "it is written," three times from Deuteronomy — victory came through a heart already stored with God's Word.
And he led him to Jerusalem, and set him on the edge of the temple, and said to him, If thou be Son of God, cast thyself down hence;
Satan's third test moves from the desert to Jerusalem. He sets Jesus on the high point of the temple, and this time he comes armed with a Bible verse. So what is the difference between trusting God's promise and demanding that He prove it?
The Gospels give the three temptations in different orders. Commentators explain Luke's order as a moral one. He keeps the hardest test for last.
The first temptation is an appeal to the need of the body. The second in Luke (not in Matthew) is the inducement of the world's glory. The third in Luke is the religious temptation, made through the word of God. That makes it morally the hardest of all for anyone who values that word. This is why Luke departs from the actual order of events. He groups them morally, as he does elsewhere in his Gospel.
Readers naturally ask where exactly Jesus was standing.
The word translated "pinnacle" has the definite article. It points to one particular raised part of the temple, which is now unknown.
The challenge picks up words spoken a short while before. The Father had declared Jesus to be His beloved Son. The tempter now turns that title into a question.
At the end of Matthew 3 the Father proclaims Him His Beloved Son. At once the tempter comes forward with the challenge — "If you are the Son of God."
The promise Satan reads (from Psalm 91) is real. What makes it a trap is what he leaves out.
Now, you see, the tempter's aim here was to separate two things that God always puts together: the end, and the way to get to it… He separates the end from the way. He does it by leaving out of the psalm he quotes (Psalm 91) the very words that make up the way to the end. What were those words? "To guard you in all your ways." Mark that: "In all your ways." He boldly cuts out part of the scripture. He leaves out the words that would have shown the temptation for what it was.
Put the missing words back, and the whole suggestion collapses. A leap from the temple was never one of God's ways.
He could quote Scripture too. He could even apply a psalm about the Messiah to the Messiah Himself, though only to twist its truth. But he left out the key condition of such care: "In all your ways" (Ps. 91:11). To cast Himself down from a pinnacle of the temple was no part of God's ways, for Him, or for any man.
The idea offered a spectacle no one had ever seen. It could also look like perfect trust in God.
You may catch attention by some amazing feat that no one has heard of before. "Throw yourself down." To do this might seem to be handing Himself over completely to God. In reality it was distrust — tempting God. It meant that an outward act was needed to show His care. No true confidence in God calls for that. Instead there is an inward peaceful trust.
The Lord's answer names the sin, and people often turn it upside down. Older translations use the word "tempt" where the ESV says "put to the test."
Satan takes up scripture, and says, "It is written," to make Him do His own will. But He says, "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test." People abuse this often; they use it as the very opposite of what it is. When people talk of "tempting God," they mean trusting Him too much. Satan says, "Throw yourself down, to see if God will be as good as His word." "I have no need to throw myself down. I know He will do it when the time comes. Of course His word will be fulfilled. Why am I to see if it will be?"
The sequence in Luke is not only about Christ. It maps the way pressure comes to anyone.
Luke's moral order gives us first of all a personal temptation, then the worldly temptation, and lastly, the spiritual temptation. That is the way Satan gets at us. He knows how to tempt us on the personal side. If he cannot get at us that way, he will tempt us on the worldly side. And if he does not succeed there, he will tempt us on the spiritual side… the spiritual temptation was to test the truth of God's Word, and he gives Him a text.
- Placed last — Luke groups the temptations by moral weight. The religious one comes last because it is the hardest for anyone who values God's word.
- Quoted — Satan can quote a real psalm about the Messiah and still use it against the truth.
- Cut — he dropped the words "in all your ways," splitting God's promised end from God's appointed way.
- Exposed — the leap would have looked like total surrender. In truth it demanded outward proof of God's care.
- Answered — Jesus would not test a God He already trusted. "Tempting God" is not trusting Him too much; it is wanting Him to prove His word first.
for it is written, He shall give charge to his angels concerning thee to keep thee;
In Luke's account the tempter's last approach is his most religious: he sets Jesus on the highest point of the temple and hands Him a verse to act on. The words are real Scripture — Psalm 91 — but Satan cuts a phrase out, and the whole trial turns on what is missing.
Satan now quotes Scripture himself. He reads out Psalm 91 — but not all of it.
Satan did not quote the whole of the verse. He left out those four words "in all your ways." How crafty the enemy is. To the blessed Lord he suggests, in effect: "The Scripture is plain that that promise applies to You. Now is Your opportunity to show that it does apply to You." He suggests that He should fling Himself down from the highest point of the temple. That would prove that the Scripture applied to Him, and would make Him an object of great interest to men.
The angels are charged to keep him — but the psalm says "to keep you in all your ways." Cutting the phrase leaves the promise floating free of the path it belongs to.
The object of the tempter here was to separate two things that God always puts together: the end, and the way to get to it. I believe you will find these two things constantly put together in God's own mind. Satan separates them here. He separates the end from the way by leaving out of the psalm he quotes (Psalm 91) the very words that make up the way to the end. What were those words? "To keep thee in all thy ways." Notice that: "in all thy ways." He daringly suppresses part of the Scripture; he leaves out the words that would have left the temptation open and unmasked. That is exactly what you find him doing at the present time.
The Lord does not deny the promise. He refuses to test it, because He was already sure of God's care.
Here the devil would separate the way from the end, leaving out this part of the psalm he quotes. The Lord replies with the saying in Scripture, "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test." To trust Him and count on His gracious ways is not to test Him. The Israelites put the Lord to the test by questioning whether He was among them or not. They should have counted on His presence, His help, and His care. Jesus did not need to prove God's faithfulness to His own word; He was sure of it and counted on it. He knew that the Lord would give His angels charge over Him, and this not outside, but to keep Him in all His ways.
The phrase is widely misunderstood, and it is often turned upside down.
To cast Himself down from the highest point of the temple was no part of God's ways, for Him or for any man. In those ways He knew God too well to need to test Him to see whether He would be as good as His word. So His simple answer was, "It is written, You shall not put the Lord your God to the test." So we also learn what testing God means. People say that we test Him if we do not do the best we can for ourselves. But this is the absolute opposite of the truth: we test God when we do not trust Him fully in everything.
Jumping from the temple would look like great trust. Commentators call it the opposite.
Third, false security or presumption; it is really unbelief. It shows itself in doubting the Lord's promise. It often shows itself in demanding that God step in, to give unbelief its proof. Satan seeks to make us act on our privileges independently of the life of faith. On the whole, it is a presumptuous claim on our part to God's interventions. He promised them to His people, but we treat them as though they belonged to our will.
If a promise can be twisted like this, are the promises themselves less sure?
You may ask, what do we make of the promises of God? I answer, they are infallible. But the true servant of Christ, who has the Scripture and the truth, keeps them before his eyes — and has all the rest of the word too. So he does not apply them wrongly. Satan applied true promises to Christ without reference to obedience. He used the rest of the word to show that His part was to walk with God, and that He would surely have all that God had promised to the true believer.
He never claimed the promise; He received it.
Satan departs from Him, and the angels come to carry out their ministry towards the Messiah. He is the Son of Man, victorious through obedience. What Satan would have had Him test God about, He has in full. They are ministering spirits for us also.
- The way — Satan cuts "in all your ways" from Psalm 91, splitting God's promised end from the path God appointed to reach it.
- The word — a real verse, quoted only in part, becomes a trap; the answer is the whole of Scripture, not one text.
- The test — testing God is not trusting Him too much but too little. It is demanding proof instead of resting on His word.
- The walk — the promise of angelic keeping runs along the road of obedience, not off the edge of it.
- The proof — Jesus would not force the promise, yet He received it. The angels came, and the same ministering spirits serve believers still.
and on [their] hands shall they bear thee, lest in any wise thou strike thy foot against a stone.
The words in this verse are not Satan's invention. They are God's own promise, taken from Psalm 91 and spoken over the Messiah. So why does a true promise become a trap in the tempter's mouth?
Satan chooses this text because it belongs to Jesus.
The Psalm which Satan quotes (Psalm 91) is a Messianic Psalm. He takes Him to the Holy City, Jerusalem, and upon the pinnacle of the temple, because this temptation attacks Him as the Messiah. Standing upon that high place the people below must have seen Him and recognized Him; Satan was hid from their view. Suppose He had come down slowly, the laws of gravity set aside. He lands unharmed on His feet before the astonished crowd. What a test and proof of His Messiahship! Would they not at once accept Him?
Satan stopped quoting one clause too soon.
The object of the tempter here was to separate two things that God always puts together: the end, and the way to get to it. Satan separates them here. He separates the end from the way by omitting from the psalm which he quotes (Psalm 91) the very words which make up the way to the end. What were those words? "To guard you in all your ways." Mark that: "in all your ways." He boldly suppresses part of the Scripture. He leaves out the words that would have made the temptation obvious and unmasked.
With the clause restored, the promise covers a path God appoints, not a leap a man invents.
Scripture did not say, "Cast yourself down, because God has given His angels charge concerning you, lest you strike your foot against a stone." The Lord would not turn aside from Scripture because Satan had misused it. He shows us, in the most instructive way, that we must not leave our stronghold just because the enemy may turn it against us.
The lesson reaches past this one occasion. Satan handles all of Scripture this way.
The devil, as you see here, can quote Scripture, and he can suppress Scripture; he can also pervert Scripture. How solemn to think of the subtlety of the great enemy of God and man! This is how the crafty foe deals with Scripture. He takes it, as it were, in his own hand. He seeks to put out every part of Scripture that would shed its own light on the subject he wants to attack.
Refusing the leap cost Jesus nothing of the angelic care this verse describes. He had that care again and again, at every stage of His life.
An angel announced His birth to simple shepherds, and a multitude of the heavenly host united to tell His praise (Luke 2:8-14). In the wilderness, when tempted by Satan, "the angels were ministering to Him" (Mark 1:13). In the agony of Gethsemane "there appeared to Him an angel from heaven, strengthening Him" (Luke 22:43). At His grave the angel of the Lord was on guard (Matt. 28:2). And in that last scene that closed His path on earth, when He was taken up to heaven, two angels were standing by (Acts 1:10).
Most people get the idea of tempting God backwards.
To cast Himself down from a pinnacle of the temple was no part of God's ways, for Him, or for any man. In those ways He knew God too well to need to test Him to see if He would be as good as His word. And so His simple answer was, "It is written, 'You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.'" This too teaches us what tempting God means. Men say that we tempt Him if we do not do the best we can for ourselves. But this is the absolute opposite of the truth: we tempt God when we do not trust Him entirely in everything.
He refused, not because He doubted the promise, but because He would not act without a word from God.
Satan quotes to Him a promise, but Christ will not abandon the position of obedience... We have indeed the whole word of God, as a means to gain the victory over Satan; but it is in the most simple obedience that we find strength. If Christ has not a word from God, He does nothing.
- The way — God joins the end to the way that reaches it. Satan cuts the two apart by dropping "in all your ways."
- The gap — a quotation can be accurate and still be a lie by omission; the enemy can quote, suppress, and twist the same text.
- The test — tempting God is not missing a chance to help yourself. It is failing to trust Him where He has spoken.
- The kept promise — angels did bear Him up, from the shepherds' field to Gethsemane to heaven. They never came because He jumped.
- The strength — without a word from God, He would not move. Obedience, not spectacle, won the victory.
And Jesus answering said to him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt [the] Lord thy God.
Satan's last attack in Luke uses Scripture itself. He quotes a promise from Psalm 91 at the highest point of the temple and invites Jesus to jump, so that God will have to prove His care. The Lord answers with one line from Deuteronomy, and those few words are easy to misread.
Luke does not tell the three temptations in the order they happened. He groups them by weight.
The first temptation is an appeal to the need of the body. The second in Luke (not in Matthew) is the enticement of the world's glory. The third in this Gospel is the religious temptation, made through the word of God. That makes it the hardest of all for anyone who values that word. This is why Luke does not follow the actual order of the events. He groups them by moral weight, as he often does elsewhere.
Satan quoted Psalm 91 accurately, apart from one short phrase. Leaving it out was the whole trick.
The object of the tempter here was to separate two things that God always puts together; that is to say, the end, and the way to get to it. Satan separates them here. He separates the end from the way by leaving out of the psalm he quotes the very words that make up the way to the end. What were those words? "To keep you in all your ways." Mark that: "in all your ways." He dares to cut out part of the Scripture. He leaves out the words that would have exposed the temptation and shown it for what it is.
So what does this command actually forbid? (Older translations read "you shall not tempt the Lord your God.")
The faithful man can count on God's help while walking in His ways. The enemy wanted the Son of man to put God to the test, instead of counting on Him while walking in His ways, to see whether He could be trusted. That would have been a lack of confidence in God, not obedience. Or it would have been pride, presuming on its privileges instead of counting on God in obedience... People often quote this passage as if it forbade trusting God too much. In fact it forbids the opposite: distrusting Him, and testing whether He is faithful.
Setting up a test for God treats Him the way you would treat someone you suspect.
Putting God to the test does not mean some ordinary sin of the flesh, as many suppose. It means doubting Him, as many — indeed all of us — are apt to do. The true Israelite does not need to put God to the test. Suppose you think a dishonest man is working for you. You may test him by marking a coin, to see whether he steals it. Am I then going to mark something for God, to see whether He will keep His word? I know God will do it.
With those words cut out, Satan's offer asked the Lord to claim God's protection in a place God had never sent Him.
He was not going to leave the path of duty to prove God's care of Him. In this He teaches us a most valuable lesson. We can always count on God's protecting hand when we are treading the path of duty. But suppose we are walking in a path we chose ourselves, seeking our own pleasure, our own interest, our own ends. Then to talk of counting on God would be wicked presumption.
Jesus does not argue. Luke records His answer as "It is said," and all three of His answers come from one book.
Notice that in each case Christ does not only quote Scripture, He quotes it as Scripture. Each time He says, "It is written." And it is very striking that the Lord drew all His answers to Satan from the book of Deuteronomy. The Lord gained the victory in every instance by the Word of God. It was the outcome of His simple dependence on God, and of having the Word of God in His heart.
The same test comes to us in everyday words.
Have you never found your heart attacked in this way: "Now let me see whether God is as good as His word"? Is that trusting Him? Is that resting in Him? ... You are not sure, then, are you? You are trying whether God will be as good as His word. That is putting Him to the test. But faith, confidence in God, says, "It shall be done."
- Placed last. Luke groups the temptations by moral weight. The attack made through Scripture comes last, because it is the hardest for anyone who loves God's word.
- Cut short. Satan quoted Psalm 91 but dropped "in all your ways." He split the promised end from the path God gave to reach it.
- Not caution. The command forbids distrust, not strong trust. Testing God to see if He is faithful is unbelief dressed as boldness.
- Path or presumption. You can count on God's protecting hand in the path of duty. Claiming it in a path you chose yourself is presumption.
- Word answers word. Every reply came from Deuteronomy, quoted as Scripture. The victory went to a Man who depended on God and kept His Word in His heart.
And the devil, having completed every temptation, departed from him for a time.
The wilderness testing ends with both a victory report and a warning. The tempter has run out of material. He leaves — but not for good. So the question hangs: what happens when his pause runs out?
The verse does not say the devil ran out of time. It says he finished the whole list.
People always underestimate the power and cunning of Satan. But the Lord knew him fully, and He had measured the strength of the "strong man" by experience. He went out to meet him and to endure from him every form of temptation. Though He came "in the likeness of sinful flesh," He was "without sin," and He "knew no sin." So the temptations came to the Lord only from outside. That was true of Adam before he fell, and of no one else on earth.
Luke sets the three trials in an order that covers the whole range of human desire.
Luke clearly gives us the temptations in their moral order, not the historical one. Matthew gives the historical order... The order here agrees with John's analysis of the world in 1 John 2. The first temptation clearly aimed at the lust of the flesh, the second at the lust of the eyes, and the third at the pride of life. But no such lust or pride had any place in our Lord. The three testings only showed His perfection in every detail.
Scripture is the weapon that sent the tempter away, and every believer holds it. Notice too who gets tempted.
Satan retires beaten, and he is always beaten when we quote Scripture as the Word of God. Young men, study it; treasure it in your souls; make it your adviser and the helper at your right hand... We must meet temptation. I do not think the devil tempts sinners — he already rules them and drives them into evil. He only tempts God's children... He places temptation before the man who is out of his power. The man who is in his power he leaves alone.
Older translations read "for a season" where the ESV has "until an opportune time." Either way, the wording promises a return — and a new title for the enemy.
The devil has now ended all the temptation, and he leaves — but only "for a season." He will return as "prince of this world," with the men of this world behind him. He comes to show the sad reality of the rule over them that he has boasted about. He comes to win an apparent victory that will in the end be his complete overthrow.
Commentators differ on how long the pause lasted:
Wesley (like the Expositor) takes this as pointing to the scene in Gethsemane. Others hold that our Lord faced Satan's subtle hatred in this way more or less all through, and they base that view on Luke 22:28.
The wilderness defeat had limits, and the enemy's next weapon was fear.
The victory in the wilderness left the strong man "bound," not "destroyed." So at the close we find him allowed once more to try his hand. Having "departed for a season," he came back in another character, as the one who held the power of death to terrify the soul of man. What a solemn thought! Satan pressed that power, in all its terrible intensity, on the spirit of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane.
Some have treated the wilderness as the place where salvation was won. Commentators reject that.
It is an utterly false notion that this defeat of Satan in the wilderness was the basis of our redemption... this theory makes victory, and not suffering, the means of our deliverance from God. So it gives all the importance to living energy, instead of to God's infinite moral or judicial dealing with our sins on the cross. It puts life in the place of death, and it shuts out or ignores expiation. The real point and connection of the temptation is clear once we see this: it comes just before the Lord's public life here below, and in that life He kept acting on His victory over Satan.
But the wilderness did settle one thing: who could now plunder the enemy's house.
If the Lord is to deliver men from the power of Satan, then He must Himself win the victory over Satan. Later the Lord speaks of binding the strong man in order to destroy his goods. We judge that this "binding" took place here in the wilderness.
- Complete — the devil finished every form of temptation. It covered the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, and found nothing in Him to answer it.
- Clean — the attacks came only from outside Him, as they did to Adam before he fell, and to no one else on earth.
- Conquered — He beat the tempter with the written Word, the same weapon that still sends Satan away beaten.
- Bound — the strong man was bound, not destroyed, so the ministry that follows is the plundering of his house.
- Coming back — the pause is not a peace treaty. The tempter returns at Gethsemane with the power of death, and loses again.