Gospel of Mark Chapter1 Vs. 12

 The Temptation of Jesus

Mark 1:12 “And immediately the Spirit driveth him into the wilderness.”

immediately the Spirit... Jesus’ temptation came right after His baptism.

driveth him into... By spiritual impulse, showing the manner of the leading of Mat. 4:1; Luke 4:1. Compelled by the Spirit, Jesus confronted Satan and took the first step toward over-throwing his evil kingdom (1Jhn. 3:8). Though God tempts no one (Jas. 1:13), He sometimes sovereignly permits Satan to tempt His people (e.g., Job; Luke 22:31-32).

Driveth him (ἐκβάλλει)

Stronger than Matthew's ἀνήχθη, was led up, and Luke's ἤγετο, was led. See on Mat. 9:38. It is the word used of our Lord's expulsion of demons, Mark 1:34, 1:39.

The verb driveth calls attention to the forcefulness of the Spirit’s urging. The wilderness is the desert waste of Palestine.

the wilderness... The exact location of Jesus’ encounter with Satan is unknown. It most likely would have been the same wilderness where John lived and ministered, the desolate region farther South, or the arid Arabian desert across the Jordan.

The Wilderness

The place is unknown. Tradition fixes it near Jericho, in the neighborhood of the Quarantania, the precipitous face of which is pierced with ancient cells and chapels, and a ruined church is on its topmost peak. Dr. Tristram says that every spring a few devout Abyssinian Christians are in the habit of coming and remaining here for forty days, to keep their Lent on the spot where they suppose that our Lord fasted and was tempted.

THE TEMPTATION

And straightway the Spirit driveth Him forth into the wilderness. And He was in the wilderness forty days tempted of Satan; and He was with the wild beasts; and the angels ministered unto Him. Mark 1:12-13 (R.V.)

ST. Mark has not recorded the details of our Lord’s temptations and lays more stress upon the duration of the struggle, than the nature of the last and crowning assaults. But he is careful, like the others, to connect it closely with the baptism of Jesus, and the miraculous testimony then borne to Him.

It is indeed instructive that He should have suffered this affront, immediately upon being recognized as the Messiah. But the explanation will not be found in the notion, which Milton has popularized, that only now Satan was assured of the urgent necessity for attacking Him:

"That heard the adversary . . . and with the voice Divine

Nigh thunderstruck, the exalted Man, to whom

Such high attest was given, awhile surveyed

With wonder."

As if Satan forgot the marvels of the sacred infancy. As if the spirits who attack all could have failed to identify, after thirty years of defeat, the Greater One whom the Baptist had everywhere proclaimed. No. But Satan admirably chose the time for a supreme effort. High places are dizzy, and especially when one has just attained them; and therefore, it was when the voice of the herald and the Voice from the heavens were blended in acclaim, that the Evil One tried all his arts. He had formerly plunged Elijah into despair and a desire to die, immediately after fire from heaven responded to the prophet’s prayer. Soon after this, he would degrade Peter to be his mouthpiece, just when his noblest testimony was borne, and the highest approval of his Lord was won. In the flush of their triumphs, he found his best opportunity; but Jesus remained unflushed, and met the first recorded temptation, in the full consciousness of Messiahship, by quoting the words which spoke to every man alike, and as man.

Jesus’ temptation by Satan

After His baptism Jesus went forward in the power of the Spirit and at once (euthys, immediately) the Spirit sent Him farther out into the desert region. The word sent is from a strong verb (ekballō) meaning drive out, expel, send away. Mark used it to denote the expulsion of demons (Mark 1:34, 1:39; 3:15, 3:22-23; 6:13; 7:26; 9:18, 9:28, 9:38). Here it reflects Mark’s forceful style (cf. led, Mat. 4:1; Luke 4:1). The thought is that of strong moral compulsion by which the Spirit led Jesus to take the offensive against temptation and evil instead of avoiding them. The desert (erēmos cf. Mark 1:4) region, dry uninhabited places, was viewed traditionally as the haunt of evil powers (cf. Mat. 12:43; Luke 8:29; 9:24). The traditional temptation site is northwest of the Dead Sea immediately west of Jericho.