Psalms 91:11

Well, the Donatists are not false Christians. They are quite simply not Christians at all, since they listen to what the devil suggested and do not listen to the answer Christ gave him. How, after all, did the Lord, our teacher and savior, answer the devil's suggestion of such things? "Get back, Satan, for it is written: You shall not tempt the Lord your God." The devil, as a matter of fact, had taken his suggestion from Scripture, and the Lord replied from Scripture. The devil had said to the Lord, you see, "Since it is written, He will instruct his angels about you; they will lift you up in their hands, lest you should hurt your foot on a stone." "Hurl yourself down," he said, "and if you are the Son of God, the angels are there to catch you; what are you afraid of?" The Lord could indeed both have cast down his body and not allowed it to die; but what the devil was suggesting to Christ at that time is the sort of thing Christ was not teaching future Christians. This, you see, is exactly what the devil is also suggesting to the Donatists, saying, "Hurl yourselves down, the angels are there to catch you. With such a death you do not go to punishment, but you win through to a crown." They would be Christians if they give an ear to Christ and did not trust the devil, who first separated them from the peace of the church and later on gave them cliff-jumpers.

In various ways has the devil rivalled and resisted the truth. Sometimes his aim has been to destroy the truth by defending it. He maintains that there is one only Lord, the Almighty Creator of the world, in order that out of this doctrine of the unity he may fabricate a heresy. He says that the Father Himself came down into the Virgin, was Himself born of her, Himself suffered, indeed was Himself Jesus Christ. Here the old serpent has fallen out with himself, since, when he tempted Christ after John's baptism, he approached Him as "the Son of God;" surely intimating that God had a Son, even on the testimony of the very Scriptures, out of which he was at the moment forging his temptation: "If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread." Again: "If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence; for it is written, He shall give His angels charge concerning thee"—referring no doubt, to the Father—"and in their hands they shall bear thee up, that thou hurt not thy foot against a stone." Or perhaps, after all, he was only reproaching the Gospels with a lie, saying in fact: "Away with Matthew; away with Luke! Why heed their words? In spite of them, I declare that it was God Himself that I approached; it was the Almighty Himself that I tempted face to face; and it was for no other purpose than to tempt Him that I approached Him. If, on the contrary, it had been only the Son of God, most likely I should never have condescended to deal with Him."

For he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. This passage the devil interpreted concerning the Lord. For at the time when he tempted the Lord, "If," he says, "you are the Son of God, cast yourself down. For it is written concerning you, that he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. In their hands they shall bear you up, lest perhaps you dash your foot against a stone." The devil said nothing more than this: For he has given his angels charge concerning you, that in their hands they may bear you up, lest perhaps you dash your foot against a stone. He left out the middle part. For here it is said, For he has given his angels charge concerning you, to guard you in all your ways. This he did not say, To guard you in all your ways: for he knew it was against himself. For the Lord could have answered him: If the Lord guards me in all my ways, then I am guarded from you too. He was silent, therefore, about what he knew was against himself, and set down what was in his favor.

What then, my brethren, what is said of our Head? "For Thou, Lord, art my hope," etc. Of this we have spoken, "for He has given His angels charge over You, to keep You in all Your ways" [Psalm 91:11]. You heard these words but now, when the Gospel was being read; attend therefore. Our Lord, after He was baptized, fasted. Why was He baptized? That we might not scorn to be baptized. For when John said to our Lord, "Comest Thou to me to be baptized? I ought to be baptized by You;" and our Lord replied, "Suffer it to be so now, for thus it becomes us to fulfil all righteousness;" [Matthew 3:14-15] He wished to fulfil all humility, so that He should be washed, who had no defilement....Our Lord, then, was baptized, and after baptism He was tempted; He fasted forty days, a number which has, as I have often mentioned, a deep meaning. All things cannot be explained at once, lest needful time be too much taken up. After forty days He was an hungred. He could have fasted without ever feeling hunger; but then how could He be tempted? Or had He not overcome the tempter, how couldest thou learn to struggle with him? He was hungry; and then the tempter said, "If Thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread." Was it a great thing for our Lord Jesus Christ to make bread out of stones, when He satisfied so many thousands with five loaves? He made bread out of nothing. For whence came that quantity of food, which could satisfy so many thousands? The sources of that bread are in the Lord's hands. This is nothing wonderful; for He Himself made out of five loaves bread enough for so many thousands, who also every day out of a few seeds raises up on earth immense harvests. These are the miracles of our Lord: but from their constant operation they are disregarded. What then, my brethren, was it impossible for the Lord to create bread out of stones? […]

The charge is to keep thee in all thy ways; here is a limitation of the promise: They shall keep thee in thy ways, that is, "as long as thou keepest in the way of thy duty;" those that go out of that way put themselves out of God's protection. This word the devil left out when he quoted the promise to enforce a temptation, knowing how much it made against him.