Not by Bread Alone

And the tempter came and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command these stones to become loaves of bread.”  But he answered, “It is written, “‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”     Matthew 4:3-4 ESV

At the end of forty days in the wilderness, when he knew Jesus was hungry, the devil came to Jesus with the temptation of provision.  The insinuation here is that the Father was not taking care of Him, so Jesus should just take matters into His own hands, and therefore, the suggestion to turn stones into bread.

So often, this is how the enemy will approach us.  We tend to have a pretty good idea of what we want our lives to look like.  Even in our prayers, we generally know what we want God’s answers to look like before we even ask Him for anything.  So when life does not look exactly the way we think it should, the devil comes and magnifies this for us:

“Didn’t you ask God for such and such?  I don’t see that here, do you?  Maybe you should quit your silly ‘waiting on God’ and just get busy.  You know what to do!”

Sadly, we often listen to the deceiver, and we question God.  

We begin to believe that maybe He didn’t hear us, and we may cry out to Him with the implication that He’s not listening.  And all the while we berate ourselves for our lack of faith.

Or we think that God really doesn’t love us, or we wouldn’t be in this situation.  We think that there is something wrong with ourselves and we may sink into depression.  And so we just stop looking for the answer.

Or we get angry with God, and we believe that we know better.  After all, we told Him what we wanted and we likely even suggested to Him what we thought His answer should look like.  And since He hasn’t come through, we take matters into our own hands and try to turn the stones to bread.

Not surprisingly, Jesus’ approach was different.  Jesus went to Scripture.

When faced with the question of whether His Father would provide, Jesus went back to another wilderness story.  He quoted the words that Moses spoke to the children of Israel before they entered the Promised Land.

And he humbled you and let you hunger and fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know, that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but man lives by every word that comes from the mouth of the Lord.  Deuteronomy 8:3 ESV

Jesus understood that His greatest need - even after forty days without eating - was not food.  His greatest need was God!  Knowing God’s Word and trusting God’s Word was as vital to survival as food.  And while the devil wanted Jesus to think that God was not providing, Jesus took the opportunity to remind him why God allows hunger.

God’s track record on caring for the hungry was pretty good.  In fact, over and over in Scripture we see that God provides.  But He wants us to trust Him and not try to take matters into our own hands.  

God provided abundantly for Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden.  When they stopped trusting His provision and tried to take matters into their own hands, food became a struggle instead of a gift.

In the wilderness, the children of Israel continually struggled to trust in the Lord’s provision.  And yet, the Lord continually provided for them water and bread as He sought to help them understand His goodness.

When the disciples saw a hungry crowd and thought they needed to come up with a solution, their best idea was to send the people away, or to possibly pool their resources to buy a little food so that maybe everyone could get one bite. God had a better plan.  His plan is always better than ours.  

The temptation will likely always be to try to figure a way out on our own.  But maybe it is time to learn this lesson that God has been trying to teach His people for generations - this lesson that Jesus understood clearly and thus responded to the tempter.  The lesson is simple but profound.  Man does not live by bread alone.

Reflect: What is it that you think you need right now?  Is it possible that the need actually is deeper?  Can you trust that God will provide?

Remember: Man does not live by bread alone.