After the Lord had fasted forty days and forty nights, He was finally hungry.

Then the tempter came to Him and said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

But He answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.’”

Christ was finally hungry. His hunger has two important theological implications:

This hunger indicates that the Lord was perfect in His humanity and could become hungry just like us.

It also indicates that He did not use His divinity for the comfort of His humanity.

Thus, His humanity remained subject to hunger, thirst, and fatigue, without His divinity protecting it from the weaknesses of the body.

Christ, who possesses authority, did not use His authority for His own sake or comfort.

Rather, He also emptied Himself of this authority… And when He became hungry, Satan came to tempt Him at a time when He was physically weak…

How many remarkable contrasts there are in this temptation between Christ and the first man:

† Satan fought Christ through food, just as he fought the first man through food.

But Christ triumphed in the temptation involving food, thereby responding to the defeat of Adam and Eve.

† Christ was tempted with food while He was hungry, after fasting for forty days, and He triumphed.

Meanwhile, our first parents were defeated by the temptation of eating, even though they were not fasting…

This is a spiritual principle: the person who fasts is much more capable of resisting food than the person who is not fasting.

† Satan triumphed over man and made him eat from the forbidden fruit. But Christ transcended even lawful food, bread, through the spirit.

† The first man was defeated by one fruit, despite having hundreds of other fruits available to him.

But Christ triumphed when He had no alternative before Him.

† The first man was defeated through an actual deed, whereas Christ triumphed even over a thought.

He overcame even the mere thought of eating. Thus, just as the first man was defeated through gluttony,

the Second Man triumphed through a life of asceticism and renunciation.

Satan found before him a different kind of man, one who rose above the level of food and the level of the body,

whose thoughts were occupied with spiritual matters and spiritual food.

Christ responded to the carnality that had caused our first parents to fall through His spirituality…

The tempter said to Him, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.”

Satan loves authority; therefore, he uses it as a weapon in his temptations…

It was not difficult for the stones to become bread, for God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones… It was an easy matter, but the Lord refused…

There are people who love performing miracles and consider them evidence of their sonship to God.

But the Lord does not see true sonship in the performance of miracles. Many will say to Him on the last day,

“Lord, have we not prophesied in Your name, cast out demons in Your name, and done many mighty works?” He will then say to them, “I never knew you”…

Therefore, care not about the gifts of the Spirit, but about the fruits of the Spirit.

The gifts do not save a person, whereas the fruits indicate a person’s communion with the Holy Spirit.

Satan linked sonship to God with turning stones into bread. But Christ, who was confident in His sonship to God,

did not obey this suggestion or accept this condition. He is the Son of God, whether He turns the stones into bread or does not turn them into bread…

Many people believe that their sonship to God requires them to be surrounded by blessings.

Adam was in Paradise, yet he did not express his sonship to God.

But Christ, while in the wilderness, was the only Son of God. Being in Paradise is not evidence of sonship.

Satan wants to make us doubt our sonship to God if God does not open the windows of heaven for us and pour out His blessings upon us until we say, “Enough, enough!”

Stones must become bread in our hands, and the cloud must descend to carry us along the way, and we must have authority as sons!!

This outward display that Satan desires was shattered by Christ on the mountain. He preferred to remain hungry as the Son of God,

and answered Satan, saying, “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.”

The first man saw that the tree was pleasant to the eyes, delightful to behold, and good for food, and he was defeated.

But now Satan was facing a different kind of person, one who desired nothing, but spoke about the spirit and spiritual food.

Sonship to God does not mean bodily satisfaction and an abundance of material blessings. Rather, it means that, as a son, you bear the image of the Heavenly Father.

Sonship to God means that you toil for God’s sake and offer yourself for Him, rather than asking in order to receive… He gives to you without your asking…

Our relationship with God must be a spiritual relationship, not a material one in which we seek a position in the world, authority, worldly blessings, and material possessions…

Our sonship to God means enjoying God, living with Him, abiding in Him, and seeking His Kingdom.

All these other things may be added to us or withheld from us; it makes no difference.

John the Revelator was exiled to the island of Patmos, persecuted for the Word of God. According to the flesh,

he was in distress, but the visions he saw provide definite evidence of his sonship to God, despite his affliction and exile…

What matters is that we enjoy God Himself, not His blessings, gifts, or spiritual talents…

We enjoy God’s love, His fellowship, His dwelling within our hearts, and the work of His Spirit in us,

rather than the fruit and the garden, or gifts and blessings… Satan found a new way of thinking before him on the mountain: “Man shall not live by bread alone”…

Why does man not live by bread alone? Because man is not merely a body… The body is nourished by bread,

while the spirit is nourished by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God. Thus,

Christ elevated the subject to the spiritual level… Therefore, Satan was unable to respond and presented another temptation.

“Command that these stones become bread.” Some interpret this in another way:

Command that these stones become bread. Fill the world with bread, and people will follow You. Thus,

You will accomplish Your mission through bread, and everyone will run after You…

But Christ refused to abandon His spiritual work and refused to have people follow Him for the sake of bread…

This is what some denominations do, as many people join them because of bread, clothing, and other forms of assistance… In reality,

they join them, not God and His Kingdom at all.

Likewise, if we make our relationship with the poor merely a matter of material giving:

They may lie to obtain money, resort to various schemes, and invent stories and reasons to receive assistance.

In all of this, they lose the Kingdom, while we abandon spiritual work and settle for social work.

“Man shall not live by bread alone”… But this does not mean that we should not give; rather, “These you ought to have done, without leaving the others undone”…

Spiritual care must precede material assistance and must form its foundation.

Christ refused to establish the Kingdom upon bread, not only with regard to Himself, but also with regard to His disciples.

He said to them, “Take neither gold nor silver, nor a bag (for carrying provisions).”

The servant whom the Lord calls to serve, but who thinks about his livelihood and how he will eat, has fallen into the temptation of bread…

The Prophet David said, “I have been young, and now am old; yet I have not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his descendants begging bread.”

We do not ask for it, but God grants it to us without our asking.

Christ did not perform the miracle of bread. Instead, He offered persuasion and teaching.

This is a more difficult path, but it is deeper. His disciples said, “As having nothing, and yet possessing all things; as poor, yet making many rich.”

Indeed, He deprived some of bread in order to test their hearts, as in the case of the widow of Zarephath of Sidon.

She had only a little flour and oil to make a small cake for herself and her son to eat before they died, and it was a time of famine.

He commanded her to give the single meal she had to the Prophet Elijah. And she gave it…

The flour and the oil in her house did not run out throughout the entire period of famine…

The spiritual person cares about the food of the spirit, not the food of the body.

The person who is spiritually satisfied does not feel the hunger of the body.

But if he is spiritually hungry, bodily hunger becomes exhausting for him.

That is why hunger does not exhaust us during Holy Week, because we receive spiritual nourishment from the readings,

hymns, sacred memories, and rituals. A soul that is satisfied tramples upon honeycomb.

Spiritual work satisfies a person… The Psalm says:

“Because Your lovingkindness is better than life, my lips shall praise You. Thus I will bless You while I live;

I will lift up my hands in Your name. My soul shall be satisfied as with marrow and fatness.”

Anba Shenouda, the Archimandrite and leader of the solitary monks, when he was nine years old,

used to give his daily food to the shepherd of his sheep and remain fasting, satisfied by his prayers…

And how did our holy fathers in the wilderness and mountains endure hunger and thirst?

It was because of their spiritual satisfaction through prayers, meditations, and readings.

We see the whole world, through the temptation of bread, running after its daily livelihood.

People feel hungry because they have not received spiritual food. They have not satisfied their hearts with the Word of God, as the Psalmist said:

“I found Your words, and I ate them…”

Such a person does not feel hunger. Rather, Scripture says, “A good report makes the bones healthy,”

and there is no better news than the Word of God, the Good News of salvation. We see this clearly in the story of the Samaritan woman.

When the Lord was satisfied with the conversion and repentance of the Samaritan woman,

His disciples invited Him to eat, but He excused Himself by saying, “I have food to eat of which you do not know.”

“My food is to do the will of Him who sent Me…”

He spoke to the woman about the living water, of which whoever drinks will never thirst again.

In Heaven, we will neither eat nor drink, but we will be nourished by spiritual food.

We will be nourished by God’s love, His fellowship, and the experience of tasting Him, because the Psalm says, “Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good.”

Someone may say, “I read the Gospel, but I do not feel this spiritual satisfaction!”…

We would say to him: This is because you are reading in the wrong way.

Read with delight, with understanding, and in a spirit of prayer… Read with love,

with emotion, and with a desire to benefit. Then the Lord will prepare a spiritual table for you.

The same applies to the lives of the saints. They are delicious spiritual nourishment…

Mar Isaac says, “The accounts of the saints are delightful, like water to newly planted seedlings.” That is, like water for newly planted crops…

Yes, man shall not live by bread alone…

An article by His Holiness Pope Shenouda III – El-Keraza Magazine – Year Nine (Issue Six), 10-2-1978.

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