1Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.
After Jesus’ baptism by John, the Holy Spirit led Jesus into the wilderness to be tempted by Satan. Why was this necessary? The three tests that Satan put before Jesus quickly remind us of three similar tests faced by Israel in the wilderness after they came out of Egypt. Israel failed each of these three tests. In order for Jesus to become a substitute for Israel (and for us) and to die as a sacrifice to bear the judgment for their failure, He had to succeed under the same circumstances. He had to succeed where Israel failed. And He had to do it without His divine power. He had to be shown to be the perfect human being and the perfect Israelite.
Hebrews 4:15 says, For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
Jesus was tested in all the ways that we are, but He never sinned.
James 1:13-15 says, Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man: But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed. Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
But Jesus was not tempted in the way spoken of by James because Jesus could not be “drawn away of his own lust.” Jesus had no inner inclination to sin. He was a human being but not a descendant of Adam, and He was still the Son of God. Jesus’ temptation was external, not internal. Yet this external temptation was surely more intense than that which any other person has ever faced because Satan greatly desired to cause Jesus to sin.
2And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.
Jesus did not eat for forty days and forty nights. Both Moses and Elijah also had experienced 40 days and nights without eating (Exodus 24:18; 34:28; Deuteronomy 9:18; 10:10; 1 Kings 19:8). Surely they were miraculously sustained. Moses’ fast(s) (there may have been three such fasts) occurred when he received the Law on Mount Sinai. Elijah’s fast occurred when he returned to Mount Sinai to cry out to God that Israel had forsaken that covenant of Law (1 Kings 19:10,14). Jesus’ fast of 40 days and nights signals that He will bear Israel’s sin in forsaking God’s Law (relate also Luke 9:28-31).
About six weeks after Israel was delivered from Egypt, the people came into a wilderness area and had no food. They began to complain:
And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness: And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the LORD in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger. (Exodus 16:2-3)
That evening God gave them quail to eat, and starting the next morning, God gave them a daily portion of a new kind of bread called manna (Exodus 16:13-15). God fed His people, but they had failed the test to trust Him.
3And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.
In these verses Satan is referred to as “the devil” (verse 1), “Satan” (verse 10), and “the tempter” (verse 3). Satan is a personal being, a fallen angel who wanted to become equal with God (Isaiah 14:12-15; Ezekiel 28:13-17).
Just before Jesus came into the wilderness to be tested by the devil, God the Father said, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased” (Matthew 3:17). Now Satan says, “If thou be the Son of God,....” Satan taunts Jesus concerning His identity and tells Him to use His divine power to command the stones of the wilderness to become bread for Him to eat.
Why would that be wrong? The Father’s will was that Jesus succeed in trusting Him where Israel had failed so that He could be a perfect subsitute. But Jesus had to succeed as a human being in dependence on His Father and on the Holy Spirit without using His own divine power. If Jesus had done as Satan said, He would have stepped out of the test and would thus have stepped out of His Father’s will.
Satan knew that Jesus had the power to turn stones into bread, but Jesus did not listen to Satan. He did His Father’s will. He knew that His Father loved Him (3:17) and that His Father would not give Him a stone when He needed bread (7:9-11). He knew that His Father would provide for His need.
4But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
Jesus answered Satan by quoting Deuteronomy 8:3. In this verse Moses was looking back on Israel’s experience of being hungry in the wilderness. Moses said,
And he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that he might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the LORD doth man live.
Moses said that God used something which the people did not previously know (manna) to make them know something He wanted them to learn. The lesson God wanted to teach them was that the known thing (bread) was not the source of life. God can just speak and make a new and previously unknown thing (manna) to sustain their lives. It’s not bread that we’ve got to have to live; it’s God’s provision that we’ve got to have to live.
5Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple, 6and saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.
In this second temptation Satan again begins with the words, “If thou be the Son of God,...” and this time uses Scripture in his temptation. Satan chose words from Psalm 91:11-12. These verses say, For he shall give his angels charge over thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They shall bear thee up in their hands, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone.
Satan misquoted these verses. He took the first part of the first sentence, inserted the word “and,” and then joined that part to the second sentence. Satan took out the phrase, “to keep thee in all thy ways.” The verse really means that God will protect His own – especially the Messiah, because He trusts God perfectly – when evil is judged. Jesus said, And he that sent me is with me: the Father hath not left me alone; for I do always those things that please him (John 8:29). The Father will keep Jesus in all His ways. The verse does not mean that God will keep someone who deliberately steps out of His will. Satan wanted Jesus to jump off the temple to try to force God to prove that He would really catch Him.
7Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.
Jesus’ reply to Satan was brief but deeply profound. Jesus quoted from Deuteronomy 6:16: Ye shall not tempt the LORD your God, as ye tempted him in Massah. In this verse Moses again looked back to an experience of Israel in the wilderness (Exodus 17:1-7). The people came to a place where there was no water to drink, and they complained against Moses because of their thirst. The people said, “Wherefore is this that thou hast brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?” God did give the people water, but Israel had failed the test.
Exodus 17:7 says, And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not? Israel tested God; they demanded that He meet their conditions or they wouldn’t trust Him. Even after the LORD had miraculously delivered them from Egypt and had given them manna to eat in the wilderness, when a new need arose they said, “Is the LORD among us, or not?”
Satan tried to get Jesus to test God. He took Him to God’s temple in Jerusalem – the house of Jesus’ Father. Satan’s words implied, “Jesus, now find out whether God’s really with you or not!” It would have been sin for Jesus to put Himself in danger outside the will of His Father, and it would have been sin for Jesus to wrongly use His Father’s word to try to force His Father to rescue Him. But Jesus did not sin.
8Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; 9and saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
In the third temptation, Satan offered to give Jesus the kingdoms of the world if Jesus would fall down and worship him. Luke records, And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it (Luke 4:6). Was the authority and glory of the kingdoms of the world really handed over to Satan? Could Satan really give this authority and glory to whomsoever he wished? Was Satan’s claim true? King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon had a dream, which Daniel interpreted, in which Nebuchadnezzar was humbled by God. In his dream, Nebuchadnezzar heard a being who came down from heaven say that the purpose of Nebuchadnezzar’s being humbled was, that the living may know that the most High ruleth in the kingdom of men, and giveth it to whomsoever he will, and setteth up over it the basest of men (Daniel 4:17). It has always been God who rules in the kingdoms of earth, and it is God who gives authority on earth to whomsoever He wills. Satan words were a lie.
But Jesus did call Satan “the prince of this world” (John 12:31; 14:30). Satan is a usurper. When Adam sinned, Adam died spiritually. Satan then seized from Adam the dominion over the earth that God had entrusted to him. Romans 5:21 is properly translated, “...sin reigned in death....” Wherever there is spiritual death, sin reigns. And the personal agent in the reign of sin is Satan. The authority and glory of the kingdoms of earth was not given to Satan; He attempted and continues to attempt to grab and exert that authority, but the authority has always belonged to God.
10Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
Jesus answered Satan by quoting Deuteronomy 6:13 (see Septuagint, Codex Alexandrinus). In Deuteronomy 6:12, Moses said, Then beware lest thou forget the LORD, which brought thee forth out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage. After Israel was delivered by the LORD out of Egypt, Moses went up on Mount Sinai to be given the Law. While Moses was on the mountain, the people made a golden calf to worship. The LORD said to Moses, They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them: they have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it, and have sacrificed thereunto, and said, These be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt (Exodus 32:8). In the wilderness Israel quickly forgot the LORD who brought them forth out of the land of Egypt and worshipped a false god. Israel failed this test. Jesus used Moses’ later words to Israel and said to Satan, “it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.” Jesus succeeded in the test in which Israel had failed.
Jesus also answered, “Get thee hence, Satan.” (Many manuscripts say, “Get thee behind me, Satan.”) He answered Peter in the same way when Peter said that Jesus would not suffer and be killed and be raised on the third day (Matthew 16:21-23). It may have been at that time that Jesus told His disciples about His earlier temptation by Satan. Satan offered Jesus the opportunity to reign without going to the cross. That would have been a false reign, a submission to Satan, and a defiance of God. Jesus commanded Satan to go. Clearly, Jesus was Lord over Satan.
11Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.
This time of testing for Jesus was over. Israel in the wilderness failed each of these three tests: they failed to trust God for His provision, they put conditions on whether or not they would believe that God was with them, and they turned to another god to get what they wanted. Jesus DID trust His Father to provide for Him, He did NOT demand that His Father prove that He was with Him, and He WAITED in obedience and confidence that His Father would give Him the kingdom that He’d promised at the right time. His example is a life lesson for us. In each test, Jesus answered Satan with Scripture – all from Deuteronomy. Jesus knew that the Old Testament Law was the Word of God.
12Now when Jesus had heard that John was cast into prison, he departed into Galilee; 13and leaving Nazareth, he came and dwelt in Capernaum, which is upon the sea coast, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim: 14that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, 15The land of Zabulon, and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles; 16the people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up. 17From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Herod, who was then the Roman governor of Galilee, arrested John the Baptist and put him into prison (Luke 3:1,18-20). At that point Jesus went to the Galilee region. There He began to proclaim the same message that John had proclaimed: “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” But then, it was He who is the Messianic King of Psalm 2 who proclaimed the message (Matthew 3:17; Psalm 2:6-9). The One who will be the king was offering the kingdom to Israel. The requirement for the establishment of the kingdom was righteousness in Israel and faith in the revelation that God was giving in His Son.
Jesus’ going to Galilee to reside was also a fulfillment of prophecy. Isaiah 8:22 spoke of a time when Israel was in darkness: And they shall look unto the earth; and behold trouble and darkness, dimness of anguish; and they shall be driven to darkness. The next verse in Isaiah says, Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the nations (9:1). The verb translated “more grievously afflict” means “make heavy” and can be used in the sense “glorify.” The same verb is translated “glorify” in Jeremiah 30:19, and that is probably the sense here, too. There is a contrast being made: at the first, God lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and Naphtali by the coming of the Assyrians, but afterward He brought glory to the Galilee region. Isaiah goes on to say, The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined (Isaiah 9:2). That means that light for the darkness in Israel would shine in the Galilee region. Isaiah 9:6-7 make clear that this light and deliverance for Israel would come through the government of the Messiah. Matthew says that Jesus’ going to reside in Galilee is the fulfillment of Isaiah’s prophecy of light shining there.
There is a parallel between Matthew 4:17 and Matthew 16:21. Both verses start the same way: “From that time Jesus began to....” From the time that Jesus went to reside in Galilee after the arrest of John the Baptist, He began to proclaim, “Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand” (4:17). Jesus began to offer the kingdom to Israel. In 16:21, from the time that Peter recognized that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God, Jesus began to explain to His disciples that it was necessary for Him to be killed and to be raised from the dead on the third day. In chapter 16 the offer of the kingdom of heaven had been rejected by Israel, and the King was about to pay the price to satisfy God’s justice for the world’s sin.
18And Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers.
In verses 18-22, Matthew focuses on a snapshot moment in the call of four of Jesus’ disciples. Jesus was walking beside the sea of Galilee. He first saw two brothers – Simon and Andrew – as they were casting a fishing net into the sea. Mark’s account is very similar to Matthew’s, Luke gives us a different snapshot, and John gives us some background information. In John 1:35-42 we learn that Andrew had been a disciple of John the Baptist. Andrew met Jesus soon after Jesus was baptized by John. Andrew then called his brother Simon to meet Jesus. At that first encounter Jesus told Simon that his name would be “Cephas” (the Aramaic form of the name “Peter”).
Luke’s snapshot of Jesus’ calling Simon and Andrew is found in Luke 5:1-11. Luke explains that Jesus told Simon, who had fished all night and caught nothing, to take the boat out and cast his nets again. This time he and his brother Andrew caught so many fish that their nets were breaking. They called their partners, James and John, to bring their ship and help them. Both ships were so full of fish that they could hardly stay afloat. Both sets of brothers were totally amazed. Peter said, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.
It seems likely that the event which Luke recorded occurred before the calling which Matthew recorded. Matthew’s snapshot may have been taken the next day.
19And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. 20And they straightway left their nets, and followed him.
Jesus told Simon Peter and Andrew his brother to follow Him. He said that He would make them fishers of men. Jesus probably said it that way because it forced these two men to make a choice – to use their lives to fish for fish or to use their lives to fish for men. Also, the “fishing” metaphor is found in the Old Testament. But in the Old Testament this metaphor is used negatively to mean that enemies of Israel will fish for them in order to hurt them. For example, Jeremiah 16:16-17 says, Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the LORD, and they shall fish them; and after will I send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks. For mine eyes are upon all their ways: they are not hid from my face, neither is their iniquity hid from mine eyes. Habakkuk 1:13-15 also speaks of Israel’s enemies catching people in their net. But Jesus used the fishing metaphor in a postive way, indicating a new day of blessing for those who believe in Him.
Peter and Andrew immediately left their nets and followed Jesus.
21And going on from thence, he saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets; and he called them. 22And they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him.
Matthew’s snapshot of this event records that as Jesus walked a bit farther along the Sea of Galilee He saw two more brothers, James and John. They were in their boat with their father Zebedee and were working to mend their nets. Maybe this was a routine mending or maybe it was the result of the huge catch of fish that Luke described. When Jesus called these brothers, they also immediately followed Jesus. If their father also saw the miraculous huge catch of fish that Luke described, maybe Zebedee gave his sons a nod to go with Jesus. But in any case it was a big decision for James and John. They were leaving their visible means of livelihood – the boat and their father.
Jesus’ calling of these two sets of brothers – Simon Peter and his brother Andrew, and James and his brother John – stands in striking contrast to God’s dealings with brothers in the Old Testament. In Genesis 4, Abel’s offering was found acceptable to God but his brother Cain’s offering was not. In Genesis 21 God chose the line of Abraham’s son Isaac, not the line of Isaac’s brother Ishmael. In Genesis 25 God announced blessing for Jacob rather than for Jacob’s twin brother Esau. So, it seems significant that Matthew specifically records Jesus’ calling of two sets of brothers to be His disciples. The grace that Christ brings desires that all people believe in and follow Him.
23And Jesus went about all Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people. 24And his fame went throughout all Syria: and they brought unto him all sick people that were taken with divers diseases and torments, and those which were possessed with devils, and those which were lunatick, and those that had the palsy; and he healed them. 25And there followed him great multitudes of people from Galilee, and from Decapolis, and from Jerusalem, and from Judaea, and from beyond Jordan.
Jesus went about in the northern part of Israel in the region of Galilee. He taught in the synagogues of the Jews, proclaimed the Gospel of the Kingdom, and healed every kind of disease and ailment in the people. The Gospel of the Kingdom is that the kingdom of heaven had come near (verse 17). Jesus was offering the kingdom of heaven to Israel. He explained it to the Jews in the synagogues, He told people throughout the region about it, and He did miracles that proved that He had authority from God.
“All sick people” were brought to Jesus (verse 24). It seems likely that in the Galilee region of Israel some of these people came from mixed marriages of Jews and Gentiles and that some of these people were not Jews at all. Yet no one was turned away. The coming of Jesus’ kingdom would bring blessing to all nations.
All of these people showed some measure of faith by coming to be healed, but probably not all of them became believers in Jesus as the Messiah and the Son of God. Surely there is an important lesson in this for us. Sickness and death on earth are the result of Adam’s sin. Romans 6:23 says, the wages of sin is death. All of Adam’s descendants sometimes get sick and eventually die. The only way that the consequences of Adam’s sin (and our sins) can be removed is through the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ which He shed for us. Thus, the healings that Jesus performed anticipated His death for the sins of the people He was healing. But Jesus healed the whole multitude that came to Him. Therefore, His death at the cross must have been for all people.
Note: All Scriptures are quoted from the King James Version of the Bible.