Matthew 4

4
After God's affirmation, Jesus is led into the wilderness to fast and be tested. An interesting point, Jesus fasts for forty days and nights, and then is tempted. I need to bear that in mind and see if there's more correlation between fasting and temptation elsewhere.

Moving on, He is tempted by Satan with bread first. Jesus refuses on the grounds that He would not act outside of the Father's word, using a quote from Deuteronomy. Indeed none of us has the power to feed himself, Jesus could have, but man must rely on the power of God to provide the bread. This highlights His resolve and indentification to humanity.

Second, he is tempted to test the OT words written about Him. Jesus declines quoting another scripture from Deuteronomy, like the first, "You shall not put the Lord your God to the test" DEU 6:16. Going all the way back to Exodus 17:2 (referenced in the full DEU quote, "Massah") we see Israel grumbling against Moses (it seems Moses felt threatened as well) because they were thirsty after escaping Egypt. So it looks like the thread here is not to question God when He leads you. Jesus is constantly led by God, even to this temptation, so trying to test whether God was with Him or not would be essentially the same as Massah, and contrary to the DEU command. Also of note, if He had carried out Satan's suggestion then it's likely that all Israel would have proclaimed Him Messiah and there goes the Plan right off the pinnacle with Him.

Third, and simplest, Satan demands worship in exchange for, essentially, the world. Simple to describe and refute (that's like the First Commandment right there EXO 20:3) yet probably the hardest to decline. My study bible suggests that, had Jesus accepted, He would not have had to proceed with the rest of the plan. I'm not entirely certain of that, but it's a valid thought. If Jesus controlled the world, earlier than intended anyway, there's no doubt that a great many things would have been straightened out. However, being that it's Satan we're dealing with, I'm also certain that things would at some point have gone horribly awry. Nevermind that we wouldn't have the permanent, irrevocable intercession that we currently enjoy, if Jesus had taken a worldly approach to salvation by taking up the devil on his offer, well, we all know how well prohibition worked and how the 'war on drugs' is going. But on the face of it, the offer seems quite nice. A bit of kneeling and you get to fix everything directly without all that suffering nonsense. Hard to resist, and I most likely couldn't have. But Jesus did, and then the Father sent angels to 'minister' to Him, prseumably with some bread and rest.

Of interest is that Jesus takes all three quotes from Deuteronomy, the restating of the Law. Why, when certainly those themes are exposed elsewhere? I'm not sure, but possibly because it *is* a restatement of the Law, He is highlighting the fact that He has not, and will not sin.

Then Jesus proceeded to Capernaum and began preaching there. At this point He begins to call disciples to Him. An interesting point in verse 22, James and John left their father Zebedee directly. Nothing more is said of the father here, but it reinforces that love of Jesus should come before even family.


And that's taken longer than I thought it would. Next time I'll try to gloss the temptations and give the rest of it more though. If I remember. Chapter 5 tomorrow.