In today’s account of the temptations of Jesus we see three different terms being used to describe the one who is tempting — devil, tempter and Satan. Satan is used when Jesus stands firm at the third temptation and orders him to ‘Be off! Satan’ before he quotes the words of Scripture “You must worship the Lord your God, and serve him alone”. In the other two temptations the devil, Satan, tempts by asking him to prove who he is, to give a sign of who he is, but Jesus doesn’t rise to the bait of showing power for the sake of it. We also see an example of where the devil cites scripture for his own purposes.
The bold-faced attempt to get Jesus to worship him is treated firmly. The devil, the tempter, is called out by name and told ‘be off’! Later, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus tells us say Yes when we mean yes and No when we mean no. That advice can be expanded into being definite in the things that are important. His dealing with Satan is an example of this.