Temptation and the Word

Jesus teaches us how to respond to temptation. Before he began his public ministry, Jesus goes out to the wilderness to be tempted. Picking up in Matthew 4:1,

“Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And after fasting forty days and forty nights, he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.” But he answered, “It is written,

“‘Man shall not live by bread alone,
    but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Vv. 1-4)

Jesus was at the tail end of a very long fast, and so like any man, he was hungry. It’s an interesting fact that it wasn't until Jesus was hungry that Satan came to tempt. It’s a helpful reminder to be aware and on guard in times when we know that we are hungry, or tired, or worn out, because that’s when the devil often does his best work.

The devil tempts Jesus to make a meal for himself from stones. This doesn’t seem like a temptation, as at first glance, it doesn’t seem paricularly sinful. But Satan was testing Jesus, calling on him to prove himself the son of God. Such a statement from God’s adversary is equal to a taunt. Secondly, Jesus came to do the will of the Father, not Satan, and the Father’s plan was for him to complete his fast, not give in to his hunger. There’s much more we could say about this, but it’s interesting how Jesus responds.

He acknowledges our need for bread, but he emphasizes that what sustains a man is God’s words. He quotes Deuteronomy 8:3, which reads:

“And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that cman does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word1 that comes from the mouth of the LORD.”

We may wonder why Jesus went to the wildness to be tempted by the devil. One important reason was that he was identifying with God’s people who wandered in the wilderness. He’s demonstrating that where Israel was tested with hunger in the wilderness and responded by rebellious grumbling, Jesus responded by trusting and obeying God. The wilderness generation, we might say in the words of Paul in Philippians, worshipped their belly as God. They were controlled by their senses in the wildness, and when the rubber met the road of hunger and thirst, they gave priority to their body and its desires instead of God.

So, how does Jesus respond to being tempted by the devil? He quotes scripture. And not just any scripture. He quotes scripture that highlights the sufficiency of scripture in the life of a believer. We will be tempted and tested daily—Jesus’ answer to temptation should be ours, and it is this—God, His Spirit, and His Word are enough. We may be hungry, but God has supplied us with the bread of heaven, Jesus, who nourishes us unto eternal life. We can trust God to fill our bellies and provide all the rest, as he did the manna in the wilderness. It might not have been luxurious soups and choice cuts of beef that Israel enjoyed in their time of tempting. But they had all they needed, and so do we.

So how do you respond to temptation? The Scripture exhorts us to flee from it, to cry out to God for help, and to put on the armor of God. But we learn here in Matthew 4, that recalling, perhaps even quoting out loud God’s Word, is an effective way to resist temptation.