Temptation of Bread

 Luke 4:1-13

February 22, 2026, Lent 1

Temptation of Christ
J. Kirk Richards

 

Jesus is tested in the desert by Satan.

He is presented with three temptations:

food, security, and wealth and power.

I have to tell you, I think I could pass on security and power.

But it doesn’t matter, because I think I would fail the first test.

 

After 40 days in the desert, without food,

I think I would cave right away.

I could see not eating few days,

technically a healthy person

could survive 60 days without food

but forty days of not eating is a long time.

What harm would it be just to accept a little bit of bread?

I mean forty days without it, Jesus could have died,

then what good would he be?

 

How annoying is it that we have this constant need of food?

Every day, our bodies call for it.

Most of us have it pretty easy,

we can just go down to the store and buy it,

but what if you don’t have the money for it?

what if you don’t have the access or the resources?

What if you’re in a desert of any kind?

 

Just the prospect of being without food is terrifying

to a lot of people, the fear of not being able to eat

or of not being able to feed your children drives

a lot of people to do a lot of things they normally wouldn’t.

The compromises that people make to survive are soul-snatching.

 

We make compromises in our own lives for the sake of food.

For that piece of bread.

We’ve all done things we haven’t wanted to do just to keep a job.

And good, honest people can be driven to do the unimaginable.

Listen to this story:

 

In 1922, a town called Herrin in southern Illinois

was a mining town and there was a nationwide mine workers strike.

The owner of the mine near Herrin went along with the strike,

but he was deep in debt, and as the strike went on, he saw

the price of coal rise and rise and he couldn’t resist the temptation.

 

So he decided to just move out what had already been dug up

and was waiting on rail cars to ship.

This was in violation of what had

previously been agreed on with the union.

To do it, he decided to bring in non-union workers.

And he hired armed guards to monitor the mines.

He brought in poor people needing work from Chicago

who probably had no idea that they were breaking a strike,

or what exactly they were walking into.

 

After the first train car of coal left the mine,

Two striking union workers tried to get into to the mine

and they were shot and killed by the guards.

The next day, the union workers came on masse.

They started shooting into the mine trapping the workers

the sheriff was called, but he did nothing to curb the violence.

A truce was attempted. The strike breakers sent out

a mine guard with a broomstick and a white apron on it.

 

They began marching the workers, the guards, and the

superintendents into Herrin which was 5 miles away.

The plan was for the strike breakers and the guards

and the superintendent to get to Herrin and to leave the state.

Along the way, a mob of people gathered around them.

The mob became angry, as mobs do,

yelling and taunting the strike breakers.

Someone yelled that the best way to stop a

strike breaking was to kill all the strike breakers.

And then it started.

  

There are a lot of terrible, terrible details.

But in the end, 23 people were killed:

18 workers, 4 guards, and the mine superintendent

while a mob of over 1000 people, men women and children

watched, encouraged, and even joined in.

 

The Herrin Massacre.

There’s a painting depicting it in the Columbus Art Museum.

I’m not showing it, because it’s too disturbing.

One reporter that had come to witness tried to give

an dying man some water, and he was told that if he did

he wouldn’t live to see the next day.

 

Six people out of the mob were arrested,

the first two trials, which were held outside Herrin,

but in another town in Southern Illinois,

ended in acquittals. The prosecution gave up after that

and no one was ever prosecuted.

 

In 1978, journalism students from

Southern Illinois University went to

Herrin to interview people who remembered it.

Most Herrin people who were there

said they were not ashamed of the incident.

Most said you couldn’t blame them for doing what they did.

One man said, “they were taking the bread out of our mouths.”

 

Do you see yourself in that story?

I would guess most of us would not.

I didn’t when I first heard the story. I was aghast.

 

But the juries that acquitted the people could

apparently saw themselves in this story.

And the people years on said

they would have made the same choice.

“They were taking the bread out of our mouths.”

 

That whole town of people were not sociopaths.

I’m sure their parents taught them right from wrong.

The murder rate in Herrin after that was

not higher than anywhere else.

We all know that standing up for ourselves in

the face of injustice is the right thing to do.

I think unions have been a great asset to working people.

 

But somewhere along the line, they compromised.

They compromised their integrity, their compassion,

and their humanity.

They gave into the temptation for bread,

then they wanted to secure their jobs,

then they went for power with violence.

 

We might look down on the compromise they made.

But the truth is, we make compromises with the devil every day.

If you’ve ever been in a situation where

you might lose everything you’ve had,

you know what desperation can lead us to,

the things we would trade to have it all back

the way it was before.

 

Many of us have stayed in bad home

situations for economic reasons.

I think each one of us has, at one time or another,

worked against our best judgment,

or allowed one of our boundaries to be broken

or kept our mouth shut in order to keep a job and keep

that food flowing into our homes. We compromise.

 

And  just being a part of the world

make us part of the great compromise.

We turn our heads and look away as bodies pile

up and wars are fought in our name.

We live with the fact that in the supposed richest country

in the world, people can’t afford health care and

people go hungry and can’t afford homes.

As part of society, we make compromises with evil.

We turn away because it makes life easier than paying attention.

 

It all starts with that one little compromise.

Giving into that one fear.

And before we know it,

we’ve given our soul away to the devil.

We start with the temptation of food,

and once we take that, it leads to security,

and inevitably it leads to domination and power.

And then we belong to the devil.

Even if we still worship God.

 

We are right now in a rash of certain

Christians who want to claim political power.

We’re not the first nation to do this and

this is not the first time in history for sure,

but it seems like this Christian claim of absolute

political power is getting as close as it’s ever been.

 

A self-proclaimed Christian Nationalist pastor,

Doug Wilson, was invited to speak at the pentagon this week,

speaking to the military at the newly-instituted

monthly prayer services there.

(all the prayer services have been Christian,

and all were Christian Nationalist by the way)

 

Wilson has defended slavery, saying it wasn’t so bad,

believes that women shouldn’t have

the right to vote apart from their husbands,

wants homosexuality to be illegal,

and he advocates for a full-on Christian theocracy,

which punishes people for not following.

 

Disturbing to say the least.

But the most disturbing thing is, he’s not alone in these thoughts today.

 

Now I don’t think that any of these people

started out saying they want to be megalomaniacs.

They don’t begin their public lives wanting

power and control like an evil villain in a

super-hero movie.

 

They start out with that little temptation.

With those little “what ifs” that the devil feeds us:

“If you don’t do this, you could starve.

what if they take what’s yours, protect your family,

it’s about your survival, it’s just some bread,

it’s rightfully yours, take it. It’s about your security,

it’s about your future, they’re trying to take away your heritage,

your faith, your way of life,

you’re doing this for God.

You’re doing this to defend Jesus.” 

 

And eventually, you’re calling for the arrest

of people who think or worship differently than you.

You’re hating your enemies, you’re looking at the sliver

everyone else’s eye and ignoring your own,

you’re making captives instead of setting them free,

you’re scolding the 5000 for not fending for themselves,

instead of feeding them. Basically you’re defying everything

that Jesus ever stood for.

 

Jesus had been in the desert without food for forty days

without shelter and without anything to rely on.

Jesus is at his worst and most vulnerable

He’s in the middle of nowhere and doesn’t know

when the next time he will be able to eat is.

He could have taken that bread.

But he didn’t.

 

Surely Jesus could have been trusted

to take control of all the kingdoms of the world

and run them justly and fairly.

But he didn’t.

 

If God had wanted us to take over political

empires and have Christian theocracies,

then this story would have ended very differently.

But Jesus didn’t take over the Roman Empire

and impose his will on everyone through political control.

God didn’t want that.

God didn’t want that for Jesus,

and Jesus rejected it because he knew it was what the devil wants.

And the devil wants it because he knows

it will lead to our destruction.

 

It’s not about the wrong party having control

It wouldn’t be better if they had some

reasonable, more sympathetic policies.

Exercising earthly dominion in the name of Jesus

runs contrary to everything that Jesus stood for.

It never works out, because it’s not of God.

 

Preacher and author, Barbara Brown Taylor wrote:

Jesus was not killed by atheism and anarchy.

He was brought down by law and order

allied with religion—which is always a deadly mix.

Beware those who claim to know the mind of God

and are prepared to use force, if necessary, to make others conform.

Beware those who cannot tell God’s will from their own. 

 

We have a savior who has stood up to the powers of this world.

Who did not use his power for his own sake.

We have a savior who would not compromise with Satan.

He gave up his comfort, his power, and his position

he gave up his short cut and his sure thing,

and he traded it for us and for our salvation.

 

Jesus knew that this world is hopelessly tied up with the devil

Jesus knows that we are slaves to sin and cannot free ourselves

And Jesus knew that God loves us all the same,

so Christ gave us a path.

A path of service to others, a path of forgiveness,

A path to life instead of death.