Copyright Charleston Post and Courier
When artificial intelligence tools first appeared, they were hailed as revolutionary. Yet their earliest adopters weren’t governments or corporations — they were college students. Within months, surveys showed that most students were using AI to cheat in their studies. The temptation was simple: these tools were a shortcut to success. Yet this problem is nothing new. In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus faces a similar set of temptations. However, it was not with technology, but rather unfettered power. After his baptism, he retreats into the wilderness for 40 days, where he’s met by “the Accuser,” or Satan. Hungry, exhausted and alone, he’s offered three shortcuts that each promise relief or glory without the suffering of obedience. The first temptation is physical: “Command this stone to become bread.” After weeks of fasting, no one could blame him for wanting a meal. But Jesus refuses, quoting Scripture: “Man shall not live by bread alone.” The real test isn’t about food, as Jesus will later miraculously feed 5,000 hungry people. Instead, it’s about whether divine power should serve individual self-interest. The second temptation is the one that echoes loudest in our own cultural moment. Satan shows Jesus all the kingdoms of the world and says, “I will give you all their authority and glory… if you worship me.” It’s an offer of total political control and a promise that, with enough power, Jesus could set things right. From ancient emperors to modern strongmen, history is littered with those who believed a little moral compromise was worth it if the ends were good enough. Within Christianity today, leaders are routinely trading faithfulness for influence, convincing themselves that God’s work could be done more efficiently with a seat at Caesar’s table. But every time the church has cozied up to the state, whether under Constantine, during the Crusades or through nationalist movements, it has come away both more corrupted from within and less compelling to those outside of it. Political power always promises salvation. It rarely delivers. As Jesus saw, it requires worship of ideology, of tribe, of nation or of self. And that worship demands moral concessions. The deal is never free. The third temptation is not only the most ingenious, but also the most hazardous to religious people. Satan takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the Temple and challenges him to throw himself down, this time quoting Scripture to claim that angels will save him. It’s a religious manipulation — an appeal to spectacle and coercing a belief based on power instead of persuading by love. Jesus answers, “You shall not put the Lord your God to the test.” By refuting Satan’s weaponization of Scripture, Jesus exposes a danger that still infects public life: the use of holy language to justify unholy means. Anyone can quote sacred texts or patriotic slogans coated in religious piety to defend their own ambitions. That doesn’t make them righteous. Each temptation offered Jesus a way to get what his Father would one day award him with, but avoids the suffering he knew he needed to undergo to get there. Each temptation, in its own way, was about moral expediency. They were shortcuts to success. It’s the same logic that underpins the rationalizations of every demagogue, every cover-up, every cruelty. Yet Jesus rejects that logic entirely. He refuses the crown without the cross. That’s not just a religious metaphor, it’s a moral one. Our age is obsessed with efficiency and winning every election cycle. We want the benefits of justice without the sacrifice — the public glory without the personal integrity. But a shortcut to virtue is no virtue at all. Political power especially tempts us to believe that if only our side controlled everything, we could fix the world. Yet power cannot redeem what it inevitably corrupts. And yet, this is not a hopeless story. Because where power corrupts, grace restores. Where shortcuts fall short, sacrificial love redeems. This hope emerges from the paradox at the heart of Christianity: the cross, once a symbol of defeat, becomes a symbol of victory. In refusing the shortcut, Jesus opened the long road to redemption. He showed that true power is not in taking control, but in trusting that God’s ways are higher than our own.
