Study Format:
1. Read passage aloud. What did you notice in the reading? What words or phrase caught your attention?
2. Read passage aloud a second time. What questions would you ask the text?
3. Read passage aloud a third time. What do you hear God calling you to do or be in response to this text?
Interesting Ideas to Consider:
• The lectionary always has the temptation of Jesus as the Gospel reading for the first Sunday in Lent. Which means we’ve read all the stories around this one already this year. Take a few minutes to remember what happened before this (the miraculous announcement and birth of John, the miraculous announcement and birth of Jesus, Jesus and John meeting at the Jordan, Jesus’ baptism), and what happened after (the beginning of Jesus Galilean ministry and his rejection at Nazareth). How do the events before and after affect how you understand the text? How does this text affect how you understand the events before and after? How does reading this story on Lent 1 change how you hear this story? How you experience Lent?
• Culpepper notes several important functions the temptation scene holds in Luke
1) Clarifies the nature of Jesus’ work as the Son of God – work is to combat Satan and demonstrate faithfulness
2) Identifies Jesus with the heritage of Israel – Jesus is in the wilderness forty days, Israel was in the wilderness forty years, bread reminds of manna, quotes from Deuteronomy link to the three temptations of Israel (Exod. 16:15; 17:1-7; 32)
3) Mirror the conflict of God’s reign with the reign of Satan – many times in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus ministry is depicted as “an attack on the enslaving and destructive effects of Satan’s work” (Culpepper 98)
4) Emphasizes Jesus ministry as the fulfillment of the Scriptures – Jesus quotes scripture to respond to the devil. Other times in Luke Jesus is referred to as the fulfillment of Scripture (3:4-6; 4:18-19; 7:18-23; 24:44)
5) Offers a model for resisting temptation – In Luke, Jesus frequently exemplifies Christian virtues; he is empowered by the Spirit, prays regularly, associates with outcasts
• The story moves at the leading of the Spirit. The Spirit descends in 3:22, leads him into the wilderness in 4:1, and moves him into ministry in 4:14. Being led “in the Spirit” is also a phrase commonly used to describe Christian leaders in Acts (the seven, 6:3; Stephen, 6:5; 7:55; Barnabas, 11:24).
• In the Old Testament, forty is often a number associated with trial or testing. During the flood, it rained for forty days (Gen 7:17). The Israelites wandered in the wilderness forty years. Moses spent forty days on Mt. Sinai receiving the law (Exodus 24:18, 34:1 – 28). Jonah warned the Ninevites of God’s destruction in forty days (Jonah 3:4).
• The first temptation is a challenge to Jesus sonship. The forty days and the reference to bread parallel the manna in the wilderness (Deut 8:3).
• The second temptation is a gain of power by compromise. Authority becomes an ongoing theme in Luke, Jesus taught with authority (4:32), commanded unclean spirits with authority (4:36), had the authority to forgive sins (5:24), gave the twelve authority (10:19).
• The third temptation is to call on God to deliver Jesus from death. This temptation takes place in Jerusalem, the very place where Jesus would die. So by refusing to give in to the devil’s temptation and test God to save him in Jerusalem, Jesus prefigures the time when he will indeed face death in Jerusalem and not call upon God to save him.
• The devil departs “until an opportune time” foreshadowing the devil’s return in the events leading up to his death (22:3, 31, 53).
Works Sourced:
Culpepper, R. Alan. “The Gospel of Luke.” The New Interpreter’s Bible Volume IX. Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press, 1995.
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