Genesis 3:1b He said to the woman, Did God really say, You must not eat from any tree in the garden?
This is the first temptation of a human being, and it is brilliant. If Satan can make us doubt God’s word, he can make us doubt God’s love, and also his laws. That is why more books have been written against the Bible than against any other book by far. The Bible is the most banned, burned and blasphemed book in the history of the world. Satan is serious about turning people away from God, and he starts by attacking God’s word.
Satan hates the Bible and wants us to doubt it, but Jesus loves the Bible and wants us to trust it. It is easier for heaven and earth to disappear than for the least stroke of a pen to drop out of the Law (Luke 16:17), he said. By referring to the least stroke of a pen, Jesus showed that he believed the Bible right down to the spelling.
He also said your word is truth (John 17:17). He did not say your word is truthful, or your word contains truth, but your word is truth. In fact, All Scripture is God-breathed (2 Timothy 3:16), wrote Paul. It’s as though God himself breathed out every single syllable into the Bible.
So when Jesus was tempted by the devil, he did not doubt the Bible—he quoted it. It is written . . . . It is also written . . . . it is written (Matthew 4:4, 4:7, 4:10), he said. The most trustworthy person in the world, believed the most trustworthy book in the world, and they bear witness to each other.
Our first parents were deceived by the devil because they doubted God’s word. Jesus triumphed over the devil because he trusted God’s word. Now the choice is ours: we can follow Jesus, or we can follow Satan.