In the Gospels we see that, before starting his public ministry, Christ goes into the desert for 40 days and 40 nights, praying and fasting as he prepares for all that is to come. At the end of his sojourn, he is tempted by Satan. Jesus came among us to be like us in every way but sin. He too undergoes the experience of temptation so as to enter into the human condition fully and also to show us a model for how to resist such spiritual attacks.
Jesus is presented with three temptations - food, power, and glory. Each temptation is a warning to us about a specific spiritual danger and brings to the fore an idol we might be drawn to worshipping in the place of God. Each temptation is furthermore designed to derail Christ's mission as the Messiah in a specific way.
All three temptations also resemble the temptation of Adam and Eve. In Genesis, the serpent asks: “Did God really say, ‘You shall not eat from any of the trees in the garden’?" (Genesis 3:1) -- thereby sowing doubt. In the temptation sequence in the Gospel of Luke, Satan starts the first and third attacks by saying "if you are the son of God" (Luke 4:3,9), thereby trying to get Jesus to question himself and his mission. In Genesis, Adam and Eve are tempted to take by force a gift God plans to give them freely in the fullness of time. Likewise, Satan tries to get Jesus to reach out for desirable things in the wrong way, before the right time.
In the first temptation, Satan urges Jesus to turn a stone into bread. On the one hand, the temptation involves literal bread. On the other hand, the bread also symbolizes material fulfillment in general. The danger for us is to put material fulfillment in the center of our lives, to make an idol out of earthly satisfaction, worshipping our material well-being in place of God, loving the created realm more than the Creator.
The complete fulfillment we will receive will not be in this life, but in Heaven. Our temptation is to seek that absolute satisfaction now, rather than accept God's divine timeline. While we are in this life, we will always experience some form of suffering, through which we can grow and become more loving persons. We must not seek to try to take true fulfillment by force. That is what leads to addictive behaviors and many crimes. We must wait until the fulness of time. The joy we will experience in God's time will be beyond description.
The first temptation also seeks to derail the messianic mission of Christ by trying to get him to use his miraculous powers for himself rather than in service of others. All the miracles of Jesus in the New Testament were done to help others, with one exception, the walking on water, which was done to reveal his divinity. If Jesus were now to use his divine powers to serve himself by miraculously making food for himself, he would be turning away from his mission to be like one of us, to live like one of us, until he offers himself up as the sacrifice for us. He will use his miraculous powers to make bread to feed others, not himself. He will use his divine powers to become the Bread of Life for all of us himself.
The second temptation in the Gospel narrative is about gaining power, getting control not granted to us in this life, rather than trusting God's all-loving Providence to order our lives in our best interest. The lure of witchcraft today is, as it has always been, to enlist the power of superhuman spiritual beings to exert control over life. But that is a deadly trap. Those who seek such control will instead fall under the influence or dominion of evil spiritual powers. Instead of being in charge, they will end up worshipping an idol, a spiritual being other than God. The evil spirits make false promises that they cannot and do not intend to keep to entrap us and destroy us.
In the second temptation, Satan seeks to derail Christ's mission in yet another way. Jesus came to serve and give himself up in sacrifice for humanity. He will relinquish all power as he allows himself to be stretched out upon the Cross. He will then receive all power and dominion in the fulness of time, but first he must be crucified. Satan tries to get him to claim the power now, before the right time, to choose the easy way and bypass the suffering that awaits him, to push aside the self-sacrifice that is necessary for our redemption. We too are often tempted in the same way, to flee from the Cross and seek the easy way. But we must allow ourselves to experience the Cross, as Christ had done.
The third temptation focuses on glory. The Evil One seeks to get us to seek glory for ourselves, rather than giving all the glory to God. If we do so, the idol we will start worshipping is ourselves.
Christ is God Incarnate. He came among us not for glory but to offer himself up for us. Just like with power, he will receive glory, but only after undergoing the humiliation of crucifixion. The third temptation seeks to derail the mission of Jesus by trying to get him to reach for the glory before its time. We too are often tempted similarly, to seek glory without God, before the fulness of time. But first we must pass through the crucible of the Cross together with Christ. If we do so, we too will receive heavenly glory through Christ.
As the three temptations unfold, we see that Christ counters each of them by quoting from Scripture. The lesson for us is to constantly stay grounded in the Word of God, Christ himself. We also see in the Gospel narrative, that by the third temptation, Satan begins to quote Scripture at Jesus too, trying to lead him astray by misapplying the words of the Bible. We can see, therefore, that Scripture alone is not sufficient. We need guidance as to how to understand the words of the Bible. We need the guiding wisdom of Holy Mother Church.
The temptation of Christ also highlights the reality of spiritual warfare. There are evil spiritual forces that seek to ruin us by separating us from the love of God. In our fallen condition, they attack us especially by playing on our weaknesses and insecurities. They tell us that the solution to our problems is to sin, suggesting that the injunctions against sin are unreasonable and are a violation of our rights. If they get us to sin, they get us to reject the life that Christ offers us, eternal life, our only true fulfillment.
The answer for us is to always stay grounded in Christ. We cannot overcome spiritual warfare on our own. But the evil spirits flee from Christ, so we should always allow Christ to fill us and shine out to the world through us. During Lent, we can expect an increase in spiritual warfare. Whenever we are about to get closer to God, the enemy will attack all the more. We must counter by inviting Christ into our lives even more every single day.
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The readings for the First Sunday of Lent, Cycle C are:
Deuteronomy 26:4-10
Psalm 91:1-2, 10-11, 12-13, 14-15
Romans 10:8-13
Luke 4:1-13
The full text can be found at the USCCB website.
Photo Credit: Mount Quarantania, where, according to tradition, Jesus was tempted Satan by Zoltan Abraham (c) 2013.