3. OF JESUS Mark 1:12-13 (Matthew 4:1-11; Luke 4:1-13) 12 And straightway the Spirit driveth him forth into the wilderness.--Mark uses a stronger term than any of the other writers. Matthew says he was "led up of the Spirit." (Matthew 4:1.) Mark shows more clearly that it was not at the volition of Jesus that he entered into the temptation. That he was led by the Spirit to be tempted shows that he was subjected to temptation in accordance with a deliberate purpose, but a purpose not his own. It was not of voluntary entrance into temptation, but of being divinely led into it for a special divine purpose. God desires the faith and loyalty of all his children and servants to be tried and approved before he can commit high trust to them. Jesus was entering on the highest work that pertained to earth--that of rescuing the world from the rule of the devil and of bringing it back to its loyalty to God, and to its proper and harmonious relations to the universe, and of adjusting all the forces and operations of the world to the workings of the divine order. They had all been disturbed and broken by the rule of the devil on earth. Christ had come to rescue the world from the devil. The devil naturally sought to induce him to turn from his purpose and to enter his service. 13 And he was in the wilderness forty days tempted of Satan;-- [Whether this fast was entered upon voluntarily to bring him into a state of close and holy communion with God, and to give him spiritual strength for the temptation, or whether it was the devil's work to weaken him bodily to make him an easy prey to the tempter, we have no means of determining. He fasted forty days, so had Moses done twice (Exodus 34:28; Deuteronomy 9:9), and once Elijah (1 Kings 19:8). Possibly this was the limit of human endurance, that it was selected by or for each of them. Some have thought they were miraculously sustained. If so, the effect of the fast would have been counteracted. But at the close of the forty days he hungered--the pangs of hunger were intense, the bodily powers were exhausted, and all fleshly strength of will, he was at the mercy of the tempter. But his spirit by the fast had been probably drawn into closer union with God, and had grown the stronger. Spiritual power was and is gained by fasting and prayer. "This kind goeth not out save by prayer and fasting," explained Jesus when his disciples could not cast out a demon. (Matthew 17:19.)] and he was with the wild beasts;--He had no comfort from and no association with man. His only earthly companions were wild beasts, which were more likely to annoy and hurt him than in any way to help and comfort him. and the angels ministered unto him.--The angelic world is represented. No human being was with him, yet he was not alone. Angels were present. Angels communed with Christ in his glory of transfiguration, sustained him in the anguish of the garden, watched over him at the tomb; they thronged the earth at his coming, and hovered in the air at the hour of his ascension. We could not imagine our Lord in the wilderness without angelic love. Twice has the destiny of the world been suspended on the action of a single person, and each of these was made an object of especial temptation by our cunning adversary. The first Adam fell and the race fell with him. The second Adam defeated the tempter and redeemed the race from the fall. He won his victory by familiarity with the word of God, coupled with his loyalty to the will of the Father. [It is a part of the order of God that every servant of God shall be tried and tested. This means that only what is worthy and well-approved shall enter into the eternal home of God. The testing, the proving of persons, is temptation in the better sense of that word. All suffering, all self-denial for right is temptation. "My son, regard not lightly the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art reproved of him; for whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. It is for chastening that ye endure; God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is there whom his father chasteneth not?" (Hebrews 12:5-7.) Jesus was tried and tempted that he might prove himself worthy to be the Son of God, and that he might fully sympathize with man whom he came to rescue and redeem. "For we have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that bath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin." (Hebrews 4:15)] It seems to our wisdom needful that man should be tempted and his weakness shaken to call out the character of God. If we had no trials, temptations, and weaknesses we would never know good from evil. If our fellow men never sinned against us, were never weak, helpless, and in distress, our own better natures would never be brought out and strengthened. If man had not sinned there would have been no occasion to call out the mercy, love, wisdom, and to prove the excellencies and glory of God; and we would be in ignorance of the qualities of the divine character that are most helpful to us and that draw us to God and call out the best elements of man. The mistakes, errors, misfortunes, weaknesses, and wants of the child call out the love and tenderness of the parent. So man, a weak, erring sinner, calls out the love of God, shows who and what he is, and excites man's love to him. "We love, because he first loved us."