Words from God

Read Matthew 4:3-4

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After forty days without food Jesus was hungry and weak, vulnerable to the particular temptation to turn stones into bread. In his baptism, God had declared Jesus to be his Son, and the devil took advantage of that by urging Jesus to “prove his Sonship by catering for himself” (Spurgeon). He certainly could have done so, as later miracles show (Mt.14:13-21; 15:32-39). But he chose not to.

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Jesus recognised that he was being tested like Israel in the wilderness (Deut.8:2-5,16). So his answer came from that passage (v3): “God humbled you, causing you to hunger and then feeding you with manna, to teach you that man does not live on bread alone but on every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord”. He knew that he was being taught to put God’s purpose first, as the obedient Son.

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Like Jesus, we need to trust God rather than act out of self-reliance. In order to do that we need to value God’s Word as our essential nutrition, as necessary for our spirits as food is for our bodies We are born again – sons of God – “through the living and enduring word of God” (1 Pet.1:23; Jn.1:12-13), and that same word is the pure spiritual milk we should crave for our growth (1 Pet.2:2; Jer.15:16).