Monsterlizard - Born Again

Matthew 4 begins with the classic devil/angel on your shoulders that you see in the old Bugs Bunny cartoons. 

The devil tempts Jesus: “The tempter came and said to him, ‘If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become bread.’” (Matthew 4:3) But, Jesus comes back with a quote from Deuteronomy 8:3, “But he answered, It is written, ‘Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’” (Matthew 4:4). The devil then tries quoting Psalms 91:11 quite loosely, but Jesus counters with “…Once again it is written: ‘You are not to put the Lord your God to the test.’”(Matthew 4:7).  Because he didn’t test God, Jesus did not “strike his foot against a stone”.  Both quotes were true.  Then in verses 8 and 9 the devil offered Jesus all the “Kingdoms of the world” if Jesus were to worship him.  “Then Jesus said to him, “Go away, Satan! For it is written: ‘You are to worship the Lord your God and serve only him.’” (Matthew 4:10) The sections ends with “Then the devil left him, and angels came and began ministering to his needs.” (Matthew 4:11)  I think this eludes to Psalms 91:11 that Satan was quoting. 

I think these verse teach us that when we are alone and hungry and Satan is tempting us, that we can find comfort with the Word of God.  Even when Satan tries to use that Word corruptly, we can stand-fast knowing that God’s angels are there to minister to our needs.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 20th, 2007 at 10:01 am and is filed under Footprints, Matthew, New Testament, Old Testament, Deuteronomy, Psalms. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.