After His baptism by John, Jesus heads out to the Wilderness (desert) to be tempted by Satan. In this narrative, we see once again Matthew’s fondness for connecting his story about Jesus with the history of Israel, in this case, with the 40 years of wandering. I truly doubt that God was, as some might suggest, testing Jesus to make sure that He could be fully trusted; it was a little late for that. Instead, it seems to me that God was drawing a contrast between the faithfulness of Jesus His Son, and the people who for forty years wandered in the Wilderness because of their lack of faithfulness to God. In fact, we will see this tendency in Jesus all through the story of His life.
Satan plays an interesting role in all of this, but then he played a behind the scenes role in the original story as well, as seen by the constant grumbling and complaining of the Israelites. In our story, Satan interacts with Jesus in the role of tempter; yes, he seems focused on pulling Jesus away from his Father and into Satan’s orbit and service. I can’t say whether or not Satan really though he could succeed in this; he must have known it was a long shot, but he tried.
The drama begins after Jesus has fasted for forty days and forty nights. Now that Jesus is really hungry and physically weak, Satan drops in to taunt Him saying “If you are the Son of God, tell these stones to become bread.” Jesus relies by quoting Deut. 8:3: “It is written: ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God.”
If Jesus can quote the Scriptures, it might interest us to know that Satan can as well, and in His second taunt, that is exactly what he did, after transporting the scene to the highest point of the Temple: “If you are the Son of God,” he said, “throw yourself down. For it is written:
“‘He will command his angels concerning you,
and they will lift you up in their hands,
so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.” (cf. Psalm 91:11-12)
Jesus isn’t buying Satan’s twisting of the Word of God, this time quoting Deut. 6:16:” Jesus answered him, “It is also written: ‘Do not put the Lord your God to the test.’”
At this stage in the story, Satan is about to get to his actual point; it was never his mission to test Jesus to see if He was really the Son of God; he knew exactly who Jesus was, after all, why else would old Herod have been so anxious to kill Jesus as an infant? No sir, Satan knew exactly who he was talking to, and his whole reason for being there was to try and “turn” Jesus, to gain His worship, just the way he had “turned” Adam and Eve, and so he comes to his point:
Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. “All this I will give you,” he said, “if you will bow down and worship me.” (4:8-9)
When we think about this, it seems a little strange for Satan to make such an offer as though he actually held the power to deliver on his promise, but then he is a liar and the father of lies. Jesus, as God’s Son is heir to the entire universe and beyond, but His path to His destiny is not by stealing or betrayal, it is the path of service, a path that, as we will see, leads to the cross. This is the path that Matthew is leading us on through the rest of His account of Jesus’ story, but even more than that, it is our path as disciples of Jesus today, for we too have become co-heirs with Christ to everything, but our path to inheriting everything is not through stealing, scheming or conquest, but by the path of service.
At this point in the story, Jesus is done with Satan:
Jesus said to him, “Away from me, Satan! For it is written: ‘Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only.’”
Then the devil left him, and angels came and attended him. (4:10-11)
Quoting Deut. 6:13, Jesus equates Satan’s “offer” with idolatry and dismisses him. An obvious, but often overlooked aspect of this is that even in His weakened condition, Jesus told Satan to leave, and Satan obeyed.
Interesting isn’t it?
So here we are, followers of Christ, indwelt by the Holy Spirit, and we think we have so many problems and that the devil is so strong, unstoppable and alluring, but all of that is the devil’s lie! What did we study in James so recently?
Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
James 4:7
Life Project Blog 
During this temptation, Satan always began by saying, “IF you are the Son of God…” It happened again at the cross when Satan once again through the observers said, “IF you are the Son of God.”
Very true…
I will be honest, I don’t buy this story at all, it just doesn’t make sense to me. This is the Son of God, the second person of the Trinity. Lucifer knew that, he was in heaven with the Trinity before the fall. He knew that there way no way you could separate Jesus from the Father, that you could get Him to go against the Father, to revolt as Lucifer did. It seems more like an allegorical narrative to drive home the point of just who Jesus was rather than a factual tale.
That is certainly possible; many see it that way. Of course it that turns out to be true, nothing changes since either way the message is the same. To be honest, I have harbored the same suspicions myself, but I haven’t presented it that way because it lacks the usual textual clues such as a dream, a parable, the angel of Lord coming to someone…
I guess we’ll find out one day for sure.
The same is true for Job, we have not angel coming to Job, just the interaction between God and Lucifer. This actually does remind me of that,negative temptations for Job to turn against God versus positive temptations for Jesus to revolt.
Well you may not ‘buy’ it but Jesus had to be tempted as Adam & Eve were tempted and win. Jesus faced Satan as a man not as the Son of God. The 40 days of fasting made Him very weak. Jesus as a weakened man beat Satan at his strongest and this was the start of the road to recovery for mankind.
Where you make your mistake discounting the fact that Satan owned the world then. Jesus owns it now but has not taken possession yet.
Careful, Steve, I know you don’t mean to, but you are dangerously close to Apollinarism or Nestorianism by separating Jesus human and divine natures. I don’t doubt that Jesus went through temptations, such as at Gethsemene, I just don’t think it was as neat and clean as presented here. I see this as a synopsis of the temptations he went through to show us that Jesus, though divine, had the same worldly concerns pulling at him as we do, but he did not give into them.
As to your second post, I will put that to exuberance, and not really an desire to paint me as Satan.
Mr MT you do not seem to understand the spiritual battle going on in this world in which case you are not an MT at all. You have labeled me with labels which are not applicable to bring me down. As for caqlling you Satan I did not. Read what I wrote. If you doubt the Word of God then you are being used by Satan as anybody else who goes against or brings doubt to the Word of God. Jesus’ Words holds the Universe together.
Col 1:15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.
Col 1:16 For by him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things were created through him and for him.
Col 1:17 And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.
Matt, Mark & Luke all testify that Jesus went into the desert and was tempted by Satan. 3 Witnesses is good for solid truth. It happened so deal with it. Jesus mission on earth was to recover the earth from Satan, the first plan was to tempted as a man. What was the first temptation? It was for Jesus to turn a rock into bread therefore using his Godly power to usurp His Fathers will. How hungry was Jesus? Heck 40 days without food. The 2nd temptation was to make Jesus feel that he was unwanted by the Father and that He should prove the Fathers love by jumping off the temple. How many Christians fall for this trap that God does not love them? The 3rd temptation is pretty simple and that is to worship Satan himself. We don’t have the full conversation here but I can bet that Satan was very compassionate, loving and caring (all false) about what he would promise if Jesus bowed down to him. Of course many people in the world today bow down to Satan whether knowingly or unknowingly. There is coming a time when Satan will make himself known to the world and the choice will be unforgiving.
So MT I would suggest that you investigate the spiritual world and throw all that worldly theological knowledge away cause it is of zero use to you.
I will be interested to see MT’s reply; I hope he sees this…
Also Mr Modern Theologian you do realize that you are doing exactly what Satan did in tempting Eve. Satan said, “DId God really say……”. You say, “Does the bible really say…..”. You cast doubt on Gods Word making yourself a tool of Satan.
I’ve got to jump in at this point… Steve, you’re laying it on a little thick here. Whether this story is understood literally as you do, or figuratively as MT does, the message and application are the same and understanding it figuratively doesn’t make anyone Satan’s tool.
How many never say what we should, “Away from me Satan. “
Exactly.
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What has always been interesting to me, Don, is how Satan tempted Jesus with what we seem to always be tempted with: pride, ego and greed. And whether this was literal or allegorical, the lesson is the same for the first century as it is for us now.
It appears to us in so many forms and in unique and individual ways. The temptation is ever so subtle, but anytime we think we’re better than somebody else, are certain we’re right and someone else is wrong, or want more than we need, we’ve succumbed to the same temptation Jesus overcame.
Susan, I think you’ve said it very well!
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