"It Is Written": How Jesus Defeated Temptation in the Wilderness — and What It Means for You (Luke 3:22–4:6)
“It Is Written”: How Jesus Defeated Temptation in the Wilderness — and What It Means for You (Luke 3:22–4:6)
Page: 85 | Passage: Luke 3:22–4:6 | Generated: March 2026
DIRECT ANSWER BLOCK
After his baptism, Jesus — “full of the Holy Ghost” — was led by the Spirit into the wilderness and tempted by the devil for forty days. Against three specific temptations, he answered each time with “It is written” — meeting the devil’s proposals with the sword of Scripture. Luke’s genealogy, tracing Jesus back to Adam the “son of God,” frames this confrontation as the second Adam succeeding precisely where the first Adam failed.
KEY VERSE
“And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.”
— Luke 4:4 (KJV)
DEVOTIONAL BODY
The Son of God — Traced Back to Adam
Luke places the temptation immediately after a genealogy, and the genealogy is not placed there by accident. Matthew traces the ancestry of Jesus forward from Abraham, establishing him as Israel’s Messiah. Luke traces it backward — all the way from Jesus through the patriarchs, past Abraham, past Noah, past Enoch, all the way to “Adam, which was the son of God” (Luke 3:38).
This is a deliberate theological frame. Matthew Henry notes the intent precisely: “Luke shows that Jesus was the Seed of the woman that should break the serpent’s head, and traces the line up to Adam… Christ was both the son of Adam and the Son of God, that he might be a proper Mediator between God and the sons of Adam, and might bring the sons of Adam to be, through him, the sons of God.”
The genealogy ends at Adam. The temptation begins immediately after. The connection Luke is drawing is unmistakable: the first Adam faced a temptation in a garden and failed. The second Adam would face a temptation in a wilderness — and he would not fail. Everything Adam lost, Christ would recover. Every boundary Adam crossed, Christ would honor. Every word of God that Adam dismissed, Christ would hold and wield.
Andrew Murray, reflecting on the whole arc of Christ’s humility from incarnation forward, put the incarnation’s purpose this way: “What is the incarnation but His heavenly humility, His emptying Himself and becoming man?” (Humility, Murray). The one who came down into humanity did so precisely to undo what had come undone from within it — and the wilderness is the first arena where that undoing begins.
Full of the Holy Ghost — and Led into Trial
Notice the sequence Luke records: Jesus is “full of the Holy Ghost” when he is led into the wilderness (Luke 4:1). The temptation does not come on him when the Spirit departs; it comes on him when the Spirit is fully present. The Spirit does not lead him around the wilderness but into it. This is important because it tells us something about the nature of spiritual fullness that is often misunderstood: being filled with the Spirit does not exempt us from trial. It often leads us directly toward it.
Matthew Henry’s observation is sobering and clarifying: “He who knew his own strength might give Satan advantage; but we may not, who know our own weakness.” Jesus entered the wilderness knowing who he was and what he carried. He did not avoid the confrontation with the enemy; he walked into it, in the power of the Spirit, and met it head-on.
The forty days of temptation echo Moses’s forty years in the wilderness, Israel’s forty years of wandering, Elijah’s forty-day journey to Horeb. Forty is the number of testing and formation in Scripture. Jesus entered this number fully, and he came out of it intact — not because the trial was easy, but because he had resources that could not be exhausted.
“It Is Written”: The Weapon That Never Fails
The three temptations the devil presents are a progressive assault on the identity and mission of Jesus: first, an appeal to physical need and the use of supernatural power for personal comfort; second, an offer of all the world’s kingdoms in exchange for worship; third, a dare to test God’s protection by throwing himself from the temple pinnacle.
Each temptation is aimed at something real. The hunger was genuine — he had eaten nothing for forty days. The kingdoms were real — the offer of power and influence is one of the oldest and most powerful temptations there is. The challenge at the temple was subtle: the devil even quoted Scripture in making it, trying to turn the weapon against its owner.
And in each case, Jesus’s answer is the same: It is written.
First temptation: “It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God” (Luke 4:4). Second: “It is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve” (Luke 4:8). Third: “It is said, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God” (Luke 4:12).
Spurgeon’s Faith’s Checkbook entry on “Man shall not live by bread alone” makes the essential point: “If God so willed it we could live without bread, even as Jesus did for forty days; but we could not live without His Word. By that Word we were created, and by it alone can we be kept in being… With this alone we can withstand the devil. Take this from us, and our enemy will have us in his power, for we shall soon faint.” (Faith’s Checkbook, July 4, “The Word, Necessary Food.”)
Matthew Henry adds the larger lesson: “The word of God is our sword, and faith in that word is our shield… Let not any abuse of Scripture by Satan or by men abate our esteem, or cause us to abandon its use; but let us study it still, seek to know it, and seek our defence from it in all kinds of assaults. Let this word dwell richly in us, for it is our life.”
It is worth pausing on that final phrase: Let this word dwell richly in us, for it is our life. The reason Jesus could answer each temptation with “It is written” is that the Word dwelt richly in him. He did not scramble for a verse under pressure; he spoke from a deep reservoir. The discipline of Scripture memory and meditation is not a religious exercise for extra-credit Christians. It is battlefield preparation.
The Shape of the Defeat
When the devil had exhausted all three temptations, he “departed from him for a season” (Luke 4:13). The defeat was real and complete — but it was also temporary. The enemy would return. He would not come again as a subtle tempter seeking to draw Jesus into sin, as Matthew Henry notes; he would come as a persecutor, seeking to bring Jesus into suffering. But that too was on the Father’s calendar.
For now, the wilderness is over. Jesus emerges in the power of the Spirit. The same Spirit who led him in leads him out. He returns to Galilee with a fame that goes out through all the region. The temptation is behind him; the ministry is ahead.
For every believer facing their own wilderness — their own forty days of testing, their own encounter with a voice that asks “If you are the son of God, prove it” — the pattern is given here. The Spirit who fills you is the same Spirit who led Jesus into and out of the wilderness. The Word that armed Jesus is the same Word you have been given. The enemy who spoke to him is the same enemy who speaks to you. And the outcome, for those who are in Christ, is the same: he departed — if not forever, then at least for now.
CALLOUT
“It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God.” — Luke 4:4
Jesus did not win the wilderness by supernatural force. He won it by Scripture — by knowing the Word so well that it was the first thing he reached for under extreme pressure. This is the weapon you have been given. The question is whether it dwells in you richly enough to be available when the moment comes.
APPLICATION
Three things Luke 3:22–4:6 invites you to do:
- Know your identity before the trial comes. Jesus entered the wilderness knowing who he was — the beloved Son, well-pleasing to the Father. His security did not rest on his circumstances but on the Father’s declaration. Ground your identity in what God says about you in Christ before the testing begins.
- Memorize Scripture as a weapon, not just a comfort. “It is written” is a declaration made from memory, under pressure. Start with one verse this week. Build the reservoir so that when you need it, it is there.
- Trust the Spirit through the wilderness, not just to the edge of it. The Spirit who filled Jesus led him into the wilderness. If you are in a season of testing, the Spirit has not abandoned you in it. He is present with you in it, and he will lead you out.
FAQ BLOCK
Q: Why does Luke trace Jesus’s genealogy back to Adam in Luke 3:38?
Luke’s genealogy establishes Jesus as the second Adam — the one who came to succeed where the first Adam failed. Matthew traces Christ’s lineage to Abraham to show him as Israel’s Messiah; Luke goes further back to Adam to show him as the redeemer of all humanity. The placement of the genealogy immediately before the temptation narrative makes the parallel explicit.
Q: What is the significance of Jesus being “full of the Holy Ghost” before the temptation?
Being filled with the Spirit did not exempt Jesus from temptation — it led him directly into it. This tells us that spiritual fullness and spiritual trial are not opposites. The Spirit who fills us also guides us into the tests that form and prove our faith. Jesus’s example shows that the answer to temptation is not to avoid the wilderness but to enter it in the power of the Spirit and armed with the Word.
Q: Why did Jesus answer the devil by saying “It is written”?
Jesus used Scripture as his primary weapon against every temptation the devil brought. This was not a default to the only resource available; it was a deliberate choice to wield the Word as a sword (cf. Ephesians 6:17). Spurgeon’s observation stands: “With this alone we can withstand the devil.” The devil even tried to use Scripture against Jesus (Luke 4:10–11), which shows that knowing the Word superficially is not enough — Jesus answered by knowing the whole counsel of God and refusing to take verses out of their proper context.
Q: What does it mean that the devil “departed from him for a season”?
The word “season” indicates that the devil’s departure was tactical, not final. He had failed in this encounter and withdrew, but he would return — not as tempter to sin but as persecutor seeking suffering, as Matthew Henry observes. For believers, the same pattern holds: victory in one trial does not mean immunity from future ones. But it does mean the pattern of victory is established: the same Word, the same Spirit, the same outcome.
CALL TO ACTION
Jesus faced the wilderness fully human, fully armed with the Word, and fully victorious. He did it not only for himself but for all who would follow him. The same resources he used are available to you: the Spirit who fills, the Word that stands, the Father who declares you beloved.
We’ll send you a free pocket New Testament to hold it all in. Just cover shipping.
Get Your Free Pocket New Testament →
