Chapter 8—The Temptation
After His baptism, Christ was led by the Spirit into the wilderness,
to be tempted of the devil.
In going into the wilderness, Christ was led by the Spirit of God.
He did not invite temptation. He wanted to be alone, that he might
contemplate His mission and work.
By prayer and fasting He was to brace Himself for the bloodstained
path He must travel. But Satan knew where the Saviour had gone; so
he went there to tempt Him.
As Christ left the Jordan, His face was lighted with the glory of
God. But after He entered the wilderness, this glory disappeared.
The sins of the world were upon Him, and His face showed such
sorrow and anguish as man had never felt. He was suffering for sinners.
Adam and Eve in Eden had disobeyed God by eating of the forbid-
den fruit. Their disobedience had brought sin and sorrow and death
into the world.
Christ came to give an example of obedience. In the wilderness,
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after fasting forty days, He would not, even to obtain food, depart from
the will of His Father.
One of the temptations that overcame our first parents was the
temptation to indulge appetite. By this long fast Christ was to show
that appetite can be brought under control.
Satan tempts men to indulgence, because this weakens the body
and beclouds the mind. Then he knows that he can the more easily
deceive and destroy them.
But Christ’s example teaches that every wrong desire must be
overcome. Our appetites are not to rule us; we must rule them.
When Satan first appeared to Christ, he looked like an angel of
light. He claimed to be a messenger from Heaven.
He told Jesus that it was not the will of His Father that He should
endure this suffering; He was to show only a willingness to suffer.
When Jesus was struggling against the keenest pangs of hunger,
Satan said to Him:
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