Wednesday, November 9, 2011

Matthew, Chapter 4: Jesus goes to Burning Man

Jesus and the holy spirit go off into the desert to be tempted of the devil (v. 1). Hoyay!

After 40 days, Jesus is pretty hungry, because the thoughtless holy ghost forgot to even pack some beef jerky. Unsurprisingly, he hallucinates that satan appears, if only so he can quit the desert and go find a 24-hour waffle house. Satan taunts that if he's really the son of god, he should turn some rocks into bread. Jesus priggishly replies that Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God (v. 4). But he does at least get a free ride back to Jerusalem, where satan puts him on a tower and challenges him to jump off and get the angels to save him. Jesus is no dummy, though, and refuses, reminding us that we shouldn't test god. Except for those times in Judges and 1 and 2 Kings, that is. Because he'll fail. Is something that isn't in there, but should be. Satan, note, does not push him.

Anyway, satan's next bizarro test is to take Jesus up to the top of a mountain and tell him he can rule over everything he sees if he'll just turn over to the dark side. Jesus again refuses, saying we should only worship and serve god. Satan gives up at this point, and some angels come down to minister to Jesus. And hopefully give him some food.

In verse 14, we get yet another of the bible's awkward transitions to a completely unrelated story where suddenly John is in prison, so Jesus leaves Nazareth for Galilee, home of the Gentiles. Where he doesn't free his friend, but rather, starts preaching. One day, he heads down to the beach and finds two men fishing, Simon Peter and Andrew. He convinces them to become his followers. Then he meets two more fishermen, James and John, still not the John in prison, and convinces them to come along as well.

This bunch of merry pranksters heads all over Galilee, preaching and healing people and casting out devils, and soon he's known all over Syria.

No comments:

Post a Comment