Here's the question I want to open with: why did Satan suggest turning stones into bread? It's a strange request, but we've heard this reading so many times it's lost shock value. However, that's a problem with us, not the story.

The First Temptation ought to pique our curiosity. Why start with bread from stones?

Saints Augustine & Chrysostom notice that Satan is repeating the tactic he used against Adam & Eve. Satan tempted the first humans through food, and it was effective in causing the Fall, so Satan leads with food again.

The rationale makes sense: food was a successful trap before, so why not start with a food trap again?

Food seems to be Satan's standard opening tactic. We have a rationale, but we shouldn't stop there. We still need to connect the First Temptation to the Second & Third Temptation.

Many read the First Temptation as purely a matter of physical hunger. Christ is hungry, so Christ wants to eat, & Satan tells Him to eat. That's a simple explanation, but it makes the story disjointed.

It's easy for most readers to see the Second & Third Temptations are temptations of pride.

So if the First Temptation is just about being hungry, it doesn't align with the other temptations. Satan's strategy would've been:

Pride is using one's own power to fulfill your own goals in disregard of others.

Pride comes in many forms. We're familiar with the petty forms of pride: bragging, vanity, idolizing yourself, making others feel inferior.

Usually, humans become prideful over petty things like money, prestige, or sex. No one ever truly owns these things; they are debts we owe to Fortune.

Although petty pride is common, people are aware it is a vice. Humans are prideful over petty things all the time. Still, people usually limit their pride to petty matters or disregard only people they hate.

Most people are only willing to disregard a few others, perhaps an envied rival or an enemy group. The moral conscience tends to kick in once someone realizes their actions will require sacrificing innocent bystanders. Few people would be willing to sacrifice the world to make prideful gains.

Theologians might call this petty kind of pride: carnal or venial pride. Call it whatever is helpful to you. Satan isn't tempting Christ with this kind of pride in the First Temptation.

Satan is tempting Christ with a grave form of pride. A pride that disregards God & Creation. Satan is suggesting Christ break the universe to serve human desires.

"Break reality for some bread," says Satan, "just because you're hungry. It'd be easy for you."

But what could motivate someone to break reality for a loaf of bread?

One motive is hatred towards God. This is Satan's motive. He simply hates Creation & he's determined to use his power to destroy whatever he can to spite the Creator.

Even though Satan was created to care for Creation, he became determined to consume reality rather than preserve it. In a way, Satan was presented with the same choice as he now presents to Christ - either preserve Creation or ruin it just because you can.

Satan long ago chose to be the father of grave pride.

Another motive is distrust of God. Distrust is what Satan attempts to plant in Christ because distrust leads to pride.

Human society is full of prideful acts rooted in distrust. People convince themselves that nobody else can be trusted.

"Everyone is only looking out for themselves," or "It's a dog-eat-dog world." But if we don't trust anyone to take care of us, we must prioritize ourselves first. Pride becomes necessary for survival. We must use our power for ourselves because no one else can be trusted.

That attitude probably sounds familiar. But now make such assumptions about God instead of people & you'll understand how distrust towards God causes grave pride.

Imagine believing that God doesn't care about you and won't provide anything to sustain you. Pride is necessary for survival if neither the world nor the creator cares about you. These beliefs are motives to use power pridefully. So if you have the power to break reality to get some bread, then you should.

Distrust toward God warps our imagination, which warps our moral code, which drives us towards pride. This is the ingenuity in Satan's First Temptation.

Satan wants Christ to doubt God's good character. If Satan can do that, then Christ will then panic & use his power to save himself in disregard of Creation or creator.

"God won't help you," Satan whispers "you'll have to break His Creation to take care of yourself."

The action is built on slandering God. Satan wants Christ to believe that God is negligent and then act on that belief.

Distrust is always an implied judgment against someone. Those who truly believe "everyone is only looking out for themselves" are accusing all people of being selfish and evil.

Likewise, suppose we truly believe God can't be bothered to provide us our daily necessities. In that case, we are accusing God of being an abusive parent. We accuse God of negligence.

The motive behind our prideful action is slander against our Creator.

Satan is suggesting grave pride by means of building a foundation of distrust. It's the same distrust he planted in Adam & Eve which led to their Fall.

"God is neglecting you," Satan whispered to Eve, "disregard his lies & you can become a god yourself. Then you can take care of yourself without him."

Satan says the same thing to Christ in this Gospel story.

"God is neglecting you. Disregard his Creation & you can become a god yourself. Then you can take care of yourself."

Satan accuses God of being an abusive parent and asks Christ to denounce God too. Christ knows this is slander and does not even entertain the possibility.

Instead, He invokes every word of God, as they all prove God's unending commitment.

Christ invokes His eternity of personal testimony as The Word. Along with The Father & The Holy Spirit, The Word is perpetually sustaining everything in Creation.

Satan is asking Christ to accuse Himself of neglect while Christ is sustaining everything at that very moment. Satan can sow distrust about God amongst humans, but Christ is fully God & fully man.

The tactic cannot work on Him. He cannot testify against Himself.

Christ invokes the Old Testament, words of Scripture that document God's long grace towards an evil world & evil people.

Christ invokes the living words in Creation. God must give existence to everything at every moment. Therefore, the presence of any one thing is proof of God's grace, right here & now.

If God was a negligent parent who didn't care about us, we would instantly cease existing. Christ exists, the stones exist, and even Satan exists solely because God continues singing them into being. If God stops, we would not even have power of our own to use selfishly.

Even the power Satan uses pridefully is on a moment-to-moment loan from God.

As long as we exist, we depend on God, whether we want that or not, whether we realize it or not. The bread only exists because God sustains it. God is sustaining and will continue to sustain, now & ever & forever.

Christ knew God was going to sustain Him one way or another, whether it was natural bread or miracle bread, like the manna for the Israelites in the desert. God sustains the bread, and the miracle-bread, and the bread we try to hoard.

The entire universe testifies that He is sustaining each thing, here & now. The universe testifies against Satan's slander. As long as the universe keeps existing, it testifies against distrust towards God, against grave pride, against futile attempts to survive independently of God.

Grave pride does not really free us from dependence on God. Pride is truly just self-harm, although its fallout will also bring harm to the rest of Creation.

Pride may create unstable counterfeits of the hated original creations. But, pride evolves in a downward spiral, ultimately destroying whatever is under its dominion.

Christ does not denounce God, unlike Adam & Eve. Christ cannot lie to Himself. Instead, Christ invokes all the words of God to prove Satan is a liar.

Against the torrent of testimonies surrounding Christ, Satan's opening tactic is defeated.

Satan is cunning: he hid grave pride & slander against God in what sounded like an innocuous suggestion about bread.

It's crucial to study enemy tactics to prepare a counter. And the biblical account of Christ in the desert reveals Satan's favorite opening tactic. Now all generations may learn how to silence the Lord of Pride.