Third temptation

Once more forces collect for the assault—the mountain-peak view of the vast glory of the world, offering itself to him who is truly competent to rule! How the sensation of spiritual strength must swell the breast at Satan’s words! The will to power increased with the sense of exalted dignity and importance! Never was the costliness of earth more deeply felt than by Jesus’ greatest and most sensitive of hearts; sweet and potent, it must have hummed in his blood, calling up all his powers of creativeness and ownership. The greatness you feel in you, mighty one that you are, what are you going to do with it? Squander it on the paltriness of the poor or the stuffiness of the pious? On the mission of a wandering preacher? You were born to rule; the power and responsibility of a true sovereign await you! Tremendous temptation! The price, of course, is the falling away from God: “All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.” It is the showdown. Now comes the answer that puts an end to the combat: “Begone, Satan! for it is written, ‘The Lord thy God shalt thou worship and him only shalt thou serve.’ ” At that the devil left him, Luke adds, “for a while” (4:13).  – – Romano Guarding ‘The Lord’

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