Luke 4:1–21

The Temptation of Jesus

Then Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan River. He was led by the Spirit in the wilderness, ²where he was tempted by the devil for forty days. Jesus ate nothing all that time and became very hungry.

³Then the devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, tell this stone to become a loaf of bread.”

⁴But Jesus told him, “No! The Scriptures say, ‘People do not live by bread alone.’”

⁵Then the devil took him up and revealed to him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. ⁶“I will give you the glory of these kingdoms and authority over them,” the devil said, “because they are mine to give to anyone I please. ⁷I will give it all to you if you will worship me.”

⁸Jesus replied, “The Scriptures say,

‘You must worship the Lord your God

and serve only him.’”

⁹Then the devil took him to Jerusalem, to the highest point of the Temple, and said, “If you are the Son of God, jump off! ¹⁰For the Scriptures say,

‘He will order his angels to protect and guard you.

¹¹And they will hold you up with their hands

so you won’t even hurt your foot on a stone.’ ”

¹²Jesus responded, “The Scriptures also say, ‘You must not test the Lord your God.’”

¹³When the devil had finished tempting Jesus, he left him until the next opportunity came.

Jesus Rejected at Nazareth

¹⁴Then Jesus returned to Galilee, filled with the Holy Spirit’s power. Reports about him spread quickly through the whole region. ¹⁵He taught regularly in their synagogues and was praised by everyone.

¹⁶When he came to the village of Nazareth, his boyhood home, he went as usual to the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read the Scriptures. ¹⁷The scroll of Isaiah the prophet was handed to him. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written:

¹⁸“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me,

for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released,

that the blind will see,

that the oppressed will be set free,

¹⁹and that the time of the Lord’s favor has come.”

²⁰He rolled up the scroll, handed it back to the attendant, and sat down. All eyes in the synagogue looked at him intently. ²¹Then he began to speak to them. “The Scripture you’ve just heard has been fulfilled this very day!”