Daily Bible Reading 30th April 2026 // Luke 4:1-13
1 And Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness 2 for forty days, being tempted by the devil. And he ate nothing during those days. And when they were over, he was hungry. 3 The devil said to him, “If you are the Son of God, command this stone to become bread.” 4 And Jesus answered him, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread alone.’” 5 And the devil took him up and showed him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, 6 and said to him, “To you I will give all this authority and their glory, for it has been delivered to me, and I give it to whom I will. 7 If you, then, will worship me, it will all be yours.” 8 And Jesus answered him, “It is written,
“‘You shall worship the Lord your God,
and him only shall you serve.’”
9 And he took him to Jerusalem and set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down from here, 10 for it is written,
“‘He will command his angels concerning you,
to guard you’,
11 and
“‘On their hands they will bear you up,
lest you strike your foot against a stone.’”
12 And Jesus answered him, “It is said, ‘You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.’” 13 And when the devil had ended every temptation, he departed from him until an opportune time.
But it is a temptation that has not always been resisted today, to our cost. For let us be quite clear, Christ's attitude comes down on the side of discipline, denial, cross bearing, 'narrowness', and the principle of division with the world, cutting across its cherished notions, habits, attitudes and desires, and this 'goes against the grain' with the 'natural man' in us. It is so much easier to compromise. It is hardly surprising, in the light of this, that Paul should warn us of the danger of 'corrupting the word of God' (2 Corinthians 2:17) and of 'handling the word of God deceitfully' (2 Corinthians 4:2), and of the need to speak in sincerity as men commissioned by God, when the temptation to accommodate our message for the sake of peace, and minimize the offence of the cross, is so real. Is the thought of offering a 'cut-price' Christianity, with a view to winning more people, so far off the mark as a way of describing some approaches to Christian work? Jesus would not lower the price of discipleship when dealing with the rich young ruler and was prepared to let him go rather than compromise the challenge of the gospel; but one suspects that some modern attitudes would have been prepared - because of his 'potential' as a future leader or his social position - to make some diplomatic and judicious adjustment so as to accommodate his undoubted interest in spiritual things, in the hope that at a later stage he might become more committed. However such an attitude may be regarded, whatever it may be called, such an accommodation is still a betrayal of the highest; and Christ simply refused to win men on such terms. For Him and in his estimation, discipleship without a cross was of the devil.