Luke 4:1-151And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, 2Being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered. 3And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command this stone that it be made bread. 4And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God. 5And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, showed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. 6And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it. 7If thou therefore wilt worship me, all shall be thine. 8And Jesus answered and said unto him, Get thee behind me, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve. 9And he brought him to Jerusalem, and set him on a pinnacle of the temple, and said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence: 10For it is written, He shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee: 11And in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone. 12And Jesus answering said unto him, It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God. 13And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from him for a season. 14And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee: and there went out a fame of him through all the region round about. 15And he taught in their synagogues, being glorified of all. (Luke 4:1‑15)
In Luke 3 we see Jesus taking His place as servant with the excellent in Israel. Then the heavens open and He is owned by the Father as His beloved Son. His delights were with the sons of men, and He is traced not only up to Abraham, the root of Jewish promises (as in Matthew), but to Adam and God Himself., Independent of His proper divine glory as Son of the Father, Jesus is called the Son of the Highest, the Son of God. As man on earth, He was sealed with the Holy Spirit. He took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men. His entire perfectness now was to fulfill, as a servant, the will of Him who sent Him, for a servant doing his own will is a bad servant. Dependence, waiting, and obedience, are the characteristics of this place, and they are found to perfection in Him. Hence, as in the Psalms, "I waited patiently for the Lord." He would not ask for power, but waits on God. "Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to My Father, and He shall presently give Me more than twelve legions of angels?" Put thoroughly to the test, He would do nothing but His Father's will. He was to learn obedience. Having taken the place, He would go through it wholly, experiencing the force of that expression, learning obedience, surrounded by enemies without one comfort here. He had to learn obedience where obedience always included suffering, even to the yielding up of His life. Every single step was humiliation till the end came at the cross where the wrath of God was borne in love to us. No doubt in His rejection He found fields white for harvest, and so shall we, in our measure, when walking in the same path. However, the cross was always before Him. He went on, patiently waiting, and not asking for deliverance. 'He presented God perfectly to man, and also presented perfect man to God.
In chapter 4 just as He begins this walk of suffering obedience publicly, He is led by the Holy Ghost into the wilderness where He is tempted of the devil. There are two ways in which the enemy has power: first, by allurements; second, by terror. In the one, he works upon us through our lusts, presenting what is calculated to attract, and so he rules over us naturally. In the other, he has the power of death. For example, Satan suggests the occasion to Judas and gets him, a covetous man and without the faith that purifies the heart. Satan has no right to rule over men, but he acquires dominion through the lusts of the flesh and through the terror of death. In both he assailed the Lord, but found nothing in Him.
Here we have the devil meeting man in the power of the Spirit of God. Jesus does not say, "I am God, and you are Satan; go away." That would not have glorified God nor have helped us. But as the Lord was led into the wilderness by the Holy Ghost, so in His blessed grace He puts Himself in the place where man was. He has help from none. There was, rather, all that might have stumbled, had it been possible, yet He goes through it all as man. He must be tempted, and must overcome where man not only had failed, but was lying under the power of wickedness.
In verses 2 and 3 He is tempted through hunger. There is no harm in hunger; it is no sin. He could have commanded stones to be made bread, but to do so, save at His Father's word, would have been doing His own will, and then He would not have been the perfect man. Satan tries to introduce into His heart a desire which was not according to the Word. He succeeded in insinuating a lust into the heart of Adam; he fails with Jesus, though He was forty days exposed to his presence and power. Jesus had to know by experience what it was to have the devil working at Him in solitude, without a single support, without a friend. Thus He measured the power of Satan. The strong man was there, putting forth all his weapons, but the stronger than he overcame; Jesus bound the strong man. He was abstracted from human condition for forty days, not like Moses to be only with God, but as the One who was always with God, to be exposed to Satan. None other man needs to be abstracted in order to be tempted; he has only to go on along with men. In this case, this extraordinary separation was to be with the devil. To be with God He did not need anything out of His everyday path, for it was His natural place; but to be with Satan, He needed it. Others are strangers to God, and at home with Satan. He, in the most adverse things, is a stranger to Satan, and dwells in the bosom of the Father. But He emptied Himself as God to become a servant as man, and there He waits in dependence on the word of Him whom He serves. The living Father had sent Him, and He lived by the Father. He was as man under His authority, and His meat was to do His will. "By the word of Thy lips I have kept Me from the paths of the destroyer."
In verse 4 it is the written Word He ever uses, and Satan is powerless. What amazing importance Jesus gives the Scriptures! God now acts by the Word, and Satan is resisted morally in this way. A man cannot be touched by Satan while the Word is simply used in obedience. "He that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not." It was not as an exercise of divine authority He dismissed Satan, but the enemy is proved unable to grapple with obedience to the Word of God. If he cannot take one out of the path of obedience, he has no power. What could be more simple? Every child of God has the Holy Spirit acting by the Word to keep him.
Jesus does not reason with Satan. A single text silences him when used in the power of the Spirit. The whole secret of strength in conflict is using the Word of God in the right way. One may say, I am not like this perfect Man. It might be so with Christ, but how can I expect the same result? True, we are ignorant, and the flesh is in us; but God is always for us, and He is faithful, and will not suffer us to be tempted above that we are able. Temptation may be simply a trial of our obedience, as in Abraham's case, not a snare to lead us astray. Satan presents what has no appearance of evil. The evil would be doing one's own will. It solves every difficulty to ask, not, What harm is there in doing this or that? but, Why am I doing it? Is it for God or myself? Am I to be always under this restraint? Ah, there the secret of our nature comes out. We do not like the restraint of doing what God will approve. It is restraint to the flesh to do God's will! We want to do our own will. To act merely because one must, is law, and not the guidance of the Spirit. The word of God was the motive of Christ and such is Christ's guidance. Not the fencing in of the old man, but the new man living on the Word is our defense against Satan.
The first temptation is an appeal to the need of the body. The second temptation recorded in Luke is the inducement of the world's glory. The third is the religious temptation through the Word of God, and therefore morally the hardest of all to one who values that Word. This is the reason why Luke departs from the actual order of the events in order to group them morally, as is his habit. Thus we have the tempter assailing the Lord Jesus, first, as to man's life; second, as to the power given to man; and third, as to the promises made to Christ Himself.
The Lord might have argued with the devil, but He does not even tell him that the dominion of the world would be His by-and-by. He takes His stand on that which settles everything, and is a perfect example for us. He stands to God's Word and God's worship. He awaits His Word; He worships Him; He serves Him only. How simple and how blessed! It was the immediate link of an obedient heart with God. The question was one of relationship to God. So of old, Eliezer receives blessing, but before he begins to enjoy it, he gives thanks. He had the word first, then the blessing, and what follows? He bows his head and worships. God is the first thought of his heart (Gen. 24). Arid this is still more fully shown out with the Lord here. The last and subtlest temptation was grounded on the promises to Messiah (vv. 9-11). If Thou art the Son of God, why not try? But why should He try, who knew that God was for Him? Why should He be like presumptuous Israel of old, who would go up the hill in disobedience to prove whether the Lord was among them. Not even when Lazarus was sick would He stir till it was the Father's will, though all nature would have moved. For He well knew the great sorrow in the house of Lazarus.
The Lord did not listen. Who would? you say. But you do listen to Satan every day of your life that you seek even a very little bit of the world. But was there not a promise? Doubtless there was, yet why should He throw Himself down to see whether God would be as good as His word? Did He not know that God was with Him? And so with us; let us only have the Word behind us, no matter what may be before us. We should never question whether God is with us. If He does not send us, let us not move, but let us never question His presence. If we are in the simple path of His will, the Holy Spirit will act in us to guide, and not merely on us to correct.
Thus, according to the moral order of Luke's gospel, we have the progressive exercises of a man-first, natural lusts; second, worldly lusts; and last, spiritual temptations. The Lord Jesus was tempted here, not in Eden, but in the great system where we are. He put Himself, by the will and wisdom of God, in the place of our difficulty in the world, where man is. He has gone through all the difficulties that a saint may go through, sin apart, and can now offer help and sympathy to each saint in his own path. We are to walk according to the new nature. Satan cannot touch the new man, but he tries to entice him out of the path of godliness. We need His help to walk as obedient ones where Christ walked.
"And Jesus returned in the power of the Spirit into Galilee... And He taught in their synagogues, being glorified of all." (vv. 14, 15) In all things His obedience is shown. Untouched by Satan, He goes forth in unhindered power, and so shall we in the measure in which we, like Him, pass through temptation subject to the will of God and obedient to His Word.