Mark 1:12-13--The Temptation of Jesus

Mark 1:12-13
English Standard Version
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The Temptation of Jesus
12 The Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. 13 And he was in the wilderness forty days, being tempted by Satan. And he was with the wild animals, and the angels were ministering to him.

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Immediately after the "mountain top" moment of Jesus' baptism the declaration from heaven that the Father loves the Son and the Holy Spirit came to rest on Him (to empower Jesus for His ministry), we see the Spirit driving Jesus into the wilderness where he didn't eat or drink anything for forty days or forty nights.

There other forty day fast that comes to my mind when I read this is Moses on Mount Sinai.  He was in perfect communion with God for those 40 days and 40 nights so that he needed nothing to eat, and when he came down, his face was glowing as he reflected the glory of the LORD.  I think something similar is going on here.  Jesus is going to be tested just like Israel was tested (and all humanity has been tested) and where Israel and Adam and all other people failed, Jesus would be victorious.  This is not the only time that Jesus would be tempted, but at the end of the period of temptation, Satan left Jesus until a more oprotune time arose.

At the end of His time of fasting (and praying, for those always go together in the Bible) and having victory temptation, Jesus' physical body still needed to be taken care of too.  He was tired and week and among wild animals that might seek to do harm to Him even though He was their Creators, so the Father sent angels to minister to the Son to protect Him, give nourishment to Him, to encourage Him and help strengthen Him for the ministry He was about to enter.  This reminds me a bit of Elijah after His victory on Mount Carmel and Jezebel threatened to kill him.  Elijah ran for his life into the wilderness and after running as far and as fast as he could, he was exhausted and rested under the shade of a broom tree where he imagined he would die from a combination of starvation, dehydration, and exposure to the heat and elements.  Not so!  The LORD sent an angel to make a fire for him and cook for him and after a period of nourishment and rest, Elijah was refreshed for the long journey that was ahead of him.  The LORD even sent ravens to bring food to Elijah and water in a desert place that the LORD had prepared for him during the time that the LORD shut the skies to provide no water for King Ahab and Queen Jezebel.

It is not the focus of Mark to focus on the temptation itself and show us that Jesus used the Word to defeat the lies of the devil--other gospel writers do that.  No, this gospel just simply states the fact that Jesus suffered and was tempted (just like we sufferer and are tempted) so that He can identify with our humanity.  That will be a huge focus of this gospel--to show the humanity of Jesus during a time when there were false teachers that denied either the humanity of Jesus or the divinity of Jesus (they wanted to make Him one or the other, but not both).  Mark will show us clearly that Jesus was fully God and fully man.