Journey Through The Bible
     Old Testament Reading: Psalms 25-30
     New Testament Reading: Luke 4

Then Jesus left the Jordan, full of the Holy Spirit, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness for forty days to be tempted by the devil. He ate nothing during those days, and when they were over, he was hungry (Luke 4:1-2).

Jesus was about 30 years old, the age that a Jewish Levite would become a priest. He had been baptized by John and was ready to begin His public ministry. But before He could, He had one more hurdle to accomplish, a final exam of you would. This exam was not to see if Jesus could fall to temptation and sin, but to prove once and for all that He could not and provide an example for us all.

The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness for 40 days of tempting by the devil, concluding with the 3 great temptation questions recorded here in Luke, in Matthew, and Mark. Jesus responded to the devil’s temptations by quoting from Deuteronomy (the book He quoted most often). Here Jesus quoted Deut. 6:13, 6:16, & 8:3. These passages are from the commandments that God gave to the nation Israel as they were finishing forty years of wandering in the wilderness. They were statutes and ordinances God’s people were to follow in the promised land they were about to enter and possess.

Jesus redeemed in forty days what the children of Israel could not in forty years of wandering, murmuring, and idolatry. What a great example we have in Jesus. Wilderness times will occur in our lives. When they do, it serves as an opportunity to trust God, rest on His Word, and rely on the leading of the Holy Spirit.

Even though He was fully God, Jesus was also fully man and when He did not eat, He got hungry, and His tummy growled just like ours does. Yet He confounded the devil through four power resources—Prayer (Luke 3:21), God’s Love (Luke 3:22), the power of the Holy Spirit (Luke 4:1), and Scripture (Luke 4:4).

In Christ, we have at our disposal the same four spiritual resources. Plus, we have in heaven the interceding Savior who has defeated the enemy completely. During trials, in times of wandering in the wilderness, we can experience that same victory. Temptation is Satan’s weapon to bring out our worst, to try to defeat us. But we have an overcomer showing us the way. God can use these difficult experiences to build us up, to bring out our best.