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Introduction

Here is a way to distinguish the four Gospels. (I’ve slightly altered their normal order to make their logical distinctions easier to recognize and remember.)

• Mark – the shortest Gospel
• Matthew – the Jewish Gospel
• Luke – the Gentile Gospel
• John – the deepest Gospel

Matthew (also known as Levi) was one of the original twelve apostles of Jesus. Before being called into Jesus’ ministry, Matthew had been a tax collector. Tax collectors are always viewed negatively, but this was particular so among Jews in 1st-century Israel because their tax collectors were considered collaborators with the oppressive and hated Roman regime to which Israel was subject. Therefore, Matthew’s response to Jesus’ call for repentance and his participation in Jesus’ ministry as an apostle indicated that Jesus would be able to turn any sinner into a saint by His patient teaching.

Matthew’s Gospel follows the same general pattern as Mark’s. However, Matthew’s is more expansive overall. Even though there are certain incidents and teaching that Matthew spends less time reporting and explaining than Mark did, Matthew’s Gospel is about 60% longer in total. Another difference between the two Gospels is that Matthew writes more for a Jewish audience. While Mark’s Gospel seems directed at both Jews and Gentiles, Matthew shows more deference to Jewish sensibilities. For example, Matthew, unlike any of the other Gospel writers, often uses the expression “kingdom of heaven” rather than “kingdom of God; the two terms are synonymous, but the former follows the Jewish practice of minimizing usage of God’s name out of respect. Another example, is that Matthew begins his Gospel by tracing Jesus’ ancestry back to Abraham – the first Jew. Gentiles wouldn’t necessarily want to begin the story of Jesus’ life with a Jewish genealogy.

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Matthew 1

Matthew begins his account of what Jesus said and did by identifying Him as the Messiah promised by Israel’s prophets. To emphasize this point, Matthew gives a genealogy of Jesus that begins with Abraham and includes over forty names – some familiar, others obscure. Matthew’s point is that the Old Testament points to Jesus as the Messiah, and that this begins with His descent from both Abraham and David – two Jews to whom God had made important messianic promises (FJOT).

Following the genealogy, Matthew gives an account of how Jesus was conceived. It’s unlikely that Matthew was a personal witness to events early in Jesus’ life. The likely sources for this information, therefore, were Jesus’ mother Mary and her other children. Though uncertain of Him at times during His earthly ministry, His earthly family rallied to Him at the end.

Mt 1:1 – The first sentence of Matthew’s Gospel is identical in intent to the first sentence of Mark’s Gospel. The two men used different but synonymous terms to make the exact same point: that Jesus is the long-promised and long-awaited Messiah of Israel. This is, of course, the central theme of the New Testament and the key to everything God has planned for humanity.

Mt 1:11-12 – The “deportation to Babylon” is associated with King Nebuchadnezzar’s conquering of Jerusalem in 586 BC .

Mt 1:16 – Notice that Matthew’s format throughout this genealogy up until this point has been “so-and-so the father of so-and-so…” but with Joseph he changes the format to “the husband of Mary, by whom Jesus was born.” Matthew is, of course, alluding to the virgin birth. Matthew will be more explicit about this as the chapter goes on.

Mt 1:18 – Here is Matthew being explicit about how Jesus was conceived in Mary’s womb.

Mt 1:19 – What a role model for men! Joseph was going to do what needed to be done, but he wasn’t going to take it upon himself to embarrass Mary in the process.

Mt 1:20 – The angel confirms what was stated about the conception of Jesus in Mt 1:18.

Mt 1:21 – The Greek name for “Jesus” is “Joshua” in Hebrew, which means “The Lord is salvation” or “The Lord saves.” This is why the angel says, “…for He will save His people from their sins. Thus the very name “Jesus” says who He is and what He does. ***** For comparison, see the note on John the Baptist’s first name at Lk 1:13 (in BSN: Luke).

Mt 1:22-23 – Matthew is quoting from Isaiah 7:14; 8:8, 10. The Hebrew word “Immanuel,” used in Is 7:14 means “God is with us.” “Immanuel” is used again in Is 8:8, and then its meaning is spelled out in Is 8:10. #Hints

Mt 1:24-25 – Once again, Matthew makes clear that Jesus was the son not of Joseph but of God.

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Matthew 2

In this portion of Matthew’s Gospel, he continues emphasizing that Jesus was the Messiah promised by the Old Testament. Matthew started out with Jesus’ messianic genealogy and then proceeded to Isaiah’s prophecy. There were so many prophecies of Messiah in the Old Testament. What’s fascinating, however, is that no one could figure out ahead of time how all these prophecies were going to be fulfilled because so many of them seemed to contradict each other – for example, and most notably, portraying Messiah as suffering but also as having great glory (which was resolved by the suffering coming first and leading to the glorification – see Lk 24:26 and 1 Pet 1:10-11).

Matthew 2 demonstrates another ostensible contradiction in the messianic prophecies (FJOT) – this one having to do with geography. That is, from where would Messiah come? The Old Testament seemed to indicate many places. Matthew shows us in this chapter how some of the potentially conflicting prophecies were actually fulfilled in the life of Jesus. To be specific, Matthew shows how Messiah was associated with different locations: Jerusalem, Bethlehem, Judea, Egypt, Galilee, and Nazareth. Before Jesus, it was hard for people to understand just where they were to look for this Messiah, but it’s clear in retrospect why and how they were all included in Jesus’ life. He was on the move throughout His time on earth. As He Himself said, “the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head” (Mt 8:20). This is perfectly fitting for one whose resting place would not be on earth at all but rather it would be the throne of heaven.

Thus God’s prophecies work like a riddle or a mystery. That is, it seems there is no way that everything He says on a given subject can be true, but then the reality manifests, which then becomes history, and gives the answer. And, at that point, all we can do is express awe and thanksgiving at His wisdom and power. Truly, nothing is too difficult for Him. (Mysteries and Revelations)

There are two words that Matthew uses in this chapter – “magi” in Mt 2:1, 7, 12, 16 and “Nazarene” in Mt 2:23 – where the curse of Babel interferes with our understanding. See notes on both below (at Mt 2:1-6 and Mt 2:22-23). It is surprising that we don’t find more problematic words in the Bible than we do.

Mt 2:1-16 – I have yet to find a satisfying explanation of “the magi.” As for the star, it seems to have been prophesied by Balaam in Num 24:17 (“a star shall come forth from Jacob”), and Jesus identifies Himself as “the bright morning star” in Rev 22:16.

Mt 2:1-6 – Matthew tells us that Jesus was born in Bethlehem, and that this had been prophesied – but no more than this. Luke explains what led Mary and Joseph to be in Bethlehem for the birth (Lk 2:1-7); Matthew just says this is where it happened.

Mt 2:2 – “King of the Jews” is another name Jews gave their Messiah. This was perfectly appropriate since God had promised King David a descendant who would one day inherit his throne. ***** Matthew records the worship of Jesus at the beginning of his Gospel (here as well as verses 8 and 11), the middle (Mt 14:33), and then end (Mt 28:9, 17). What might this imply about Jesus? See especially the BSN note on Mt 28:9 below. #Hints

Mt 2:4-6 – Matthew is quoting the prophet Micah (Mic 5:2). Micah was a contemporary of Isaiah (who prophesied of Immanuel – God is with us – quoted in Mt 1).

Mt 2:7-12 – King Herod would have felt threatened by news that Israel’s Messiah had been born. Messiah was prophesied to become Israel’s king. There wasn’t room for two kings of Israel. ***** Note the word worship being used with reference to Jesus in verses 8 and 11. See also BSN note on this accompanying Mt 2:2 above. #Hints

Mt 2:13-21 – Matthew here explains the next geographic twist in Jesus the Messiah’s story (FJOT) – why He went to Egypt and why He came back. Matthew is quoting the prophet Hosea (Hos 11:1). For more about this quotation, see Israel as God’s Son.

Mt 2:16-18 – Matthew is quoting Jer 31:15.

Mt 2:22-23 – It is difficult to know which Old Testament prophet Matthew is quoting here since there is no obvious explicit reference to the city or town of “Nazareth” in the Old Testament. Some Bible scholars have suggested it’s a reference to Isaiah 11:1 (in which the Hebrew word for “branch” or “shoot” is considered to be the etymological root of “Nazareth”), others suggest that the Nazirite vow described in Numbers 6:1-21, while still others think it’s a generalized expression of contempt like “dirtwater town”, “the sticks,” or “flyover country.”

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Matthew 3

In today’s reading, Matthew tells us of John the Baptist. Not only had the Messiah been prophesied in the Old Testament, but a forerunner to Messiah had been prophesied as well. Therefore, just as Jesus fulfilled messianic prophecies, so John the Baptist fulfilled the “forerunner to Messiah” prophecies.

John the Baptist preached a baptism (washing) of repentance for the forgiveness of sins to his fellow Jews. This is to say that he proclaimed to Israel’s citizenry their sinfulness in the sight of God – and, by and large, they accepted this indictment. To the degree that they did, they would go on to recognize that Jesus was a man sent by God. Israel’s leaders, however, would not accept John’s assessment of their spiritual state and so considered Jesus to be of the devil. That’s why these leaders would ultimately urge the Romans to crucify Jesus.

In today’s reading, Matthew not only introduces John, he shows how he introduces Jesus. As the moon gives way to the sun in the morning, so John gave way to Jesus.

Mt 3:1-6 – John the Baptist was the son of a priest who served the temple in Jerusalem. Thus John’s ascetic life in the wilderness was of his choosing, not of necessity. His father could have gotten him a cushier gig. That crowds from Jerusalem went out to the wilderness to hear him was a testimony to the power of his preaching, the timeliness of his message, and the humility of those who were responsive to such a messenger and message. Though he did no miracles (Jn 10:41), God’s hand was clearly upon him to herald Israel’s Messiah.

Mt 3:2 – To REPENT is required for entrance into THE KINGDOM OF GOD.

Mt 3:3 – Matthew is quoting the prophet Isaiah (Is 40:3).

Mt 3:7-8 – John the Baptist is not fooled by the hypocrisy of THE PHARISEES AND SADDUCEES; he tells them they’re going to need evidence of their repentance.

Mt 3:10-12 – John the Baptist promises that Israel’s Messiah will show the same spectrum of kindness and severity (Rom 11:22) that God has shown Israel from the time of Moses. That is, God’s judgments are hard, but His mercies are great.

Mt 3:13-15 – Those three little words “at this time” were critically important, because there would come a time when their roles would be reversed…and reversed forever. As the preacher of Ecclesiastes taught, timing is an important element of righteousness (Eccl 3:1-8). See related BSN note on Jn 2:4.

Mt 3:16-17 – This dove had been looking for resting place for a long, long time – a lot longer than Noah’s dove (Gen 8:8). The Father had gotten Israel to this point, the Son would get them all the way home.

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Matthew 4

In yesterday’s reading, we learned about what happened when John the Baptist baptized Jesus. Among other things, a voice from heaven declared divine approval of Jesus and that He was the Son of God. In today’s reading, we see what happened as an immediate consequence of that event – which was that Jesus’ belief that He was the Son of God was tested by the devil…and in extreme circumstances.

After the period of temptation, Matthew gives readers another Old Testament prophecy of Messiah (FJOT), this one describing yet another geographic reference – each one reducing further the probability that any other Jew could be rightly associated with this many specifically-prophesied places and therefore qualify as God’s promised Messiah.

The chapter concludes with Matthew describing how Jesus called the first four members of His twelve apostles, and how, in the wake of John the Baptist’s arrest, Jesus established His own ministry – not only attracting even bigger crowds than John, but also performing miracles, which had never been a part of John’s ministry.

Mt 4:1-11 – For additional insight, see also Luke’s version of Jesus’ temptation in the wilderness (Lk 4:1-13) and accompanying BSN notes. ***** “The Spirit” in Mt 4:1 is “the Spirit of God” in Mt 3:16. Likewise, Satan’s use of “the Son of God” in Mt 4:3 and Mt 4:6 is his reaction to the voice out of the heavens saying “This is My Beloved Son…” in Mt 3:17. (Don’t be distracted by the Bible’s chapter and verse divisions.) Just as Jesus taught us in the parable of the sower, when the word is sown, Satan comes immediately to take it away (Mt 13:19; Mk 4:15; Lk 8:12) – just as he did with Eve (Gen 3:1). The Lord doesn’t want us to be ignorant of Satan’s schemes (2 Cor 2:11).

Mt 4:1-2 – As Moses spent forty days and forty nights preparing himself to receive the Law (Ex 34:27-28), so Jesus went through the same sort of preparation Himself to reinterpret the Law (as demonstrated in the Sermon on the Mount, which we’ll read in Mt 5-7).

Mt 4:3 – Connect with “Son of God” in Mt 3:17 and Mt 4:6.

Mt 4:4 – Jesus is quoting Deut 8:3. Jesus’ pattern is to answer every temptation from Satan with the word of God.

Mt 4:5-7 – In this temptation, Satan tries to use the Scripture against Jesus. But Jesus fights fire with fire. Described another way, Jesus is not going to let Satan be the arbiter of Scripture. Neither should we capitulate when Satan twists Scripture to harm us. Satan was insinuating that God’s promise in Ps 91:11-12 should be a license for Jesus to do stupid stunts and expect God to rescue Him. Jesus set him straight by quoting Dt 6:16 which warns us against trying to arbitrarily try to force God’s hand. The promises of God are balanced with the commands of God; we have no right to claim the promises if we are not obeying His commandments. This is the nature of a covenant: a balance of commandments and promises, responsibilities and privileges.

Mt 4:6 – Connect with “Son of God” in Mt 3:17 and Mt 4:3

Mt 4:8-10 – Fights off Satan by quoting Dt 6:13.

Mt 4:11 – If we resist the devil, we’ll get respites from him (Jas 4:7). Those breaks don’t last forever (Lk 4:13). We just need to resist in the way that Jesus did – by invoking the word of God.

Mt 4:12-16 – Matthew quotes Isaiah 9:2 to check off yet another geographic reference in the messianic prophecies (FJOT), which I described in the opening notes to Mt 2 above.

Mt 4:17 – Jesus encapsulated His teaching with the headline: “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” This is exactly the same headline that John the Baptist used for his teaching (Mt 3:2). If the kingdom was “at hand” in the 1st century, it’s surely here in the 21st century! And, indeed, the Scriptures (Mt 24:34 and elsewhere) confirm that the kingdom was to come before the generation of Jesus and His apostles passed away. Therefore, His message to us today is “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is here.”

Mt 4:18-22 – Over seven centuries before, the prophet Jeremiah had said this on behalf of the Lord: “Behold, I am going to send for many fishermen,” declares the Lord, “and they will fish for them…” (Jer 16:16)

Mt 4:23 – With Jesus, teaching went hand in hand with healing. He was as good at one as He was the other.

Mt 4:24-25 – Jesus quickly became well-known throughout 1st-century Israel.

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Matthew 5

Sermon on the Mount Introduction: Chapters 5, 6, and 7 of the Gospel of Matthew constitute His famed “Sermon on the Mount.” In other words, this is Matthew’s version of Jesus’ stump speech on the kingdom of God – specifically, on entering the kingdom of God. I say “stump speech” because He was teaching everywhere He went and the kingdom of God was His constant theme. This is the longest exposition on this subject that can be found in the New Testament. And it all comes directly from the mouth of the King of that kingdom, delivered in the years leading up to His “coronation” (that is, His resurrection from the dead and ascension into heaven). Thus this discourse is like the party platform a president runs on – as in “This is the way things will be if I’m elected.” (Of course, only one vote mattered in that election, and Jesus received it when He was raised from the dead and elevated to heaven.)

In this first chapter of the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus’ main point is to present His teaching as the replacement for Moses’ teaching. It wasn’t that Jesus was contradicting Moses; rather, it’s that He’s bringing to Moses’ writings the spiritual lens that God intended all along would come, and would come through the Messiah. This was according to Moses’ prophecy of the Messiah in Deut 18:15; in this regard, see also Jn 5:41-47, including the accompanying BSN note.

Mt 5:1-2 – Through Matthew, the Holy Spirit not only paints a picture for us of Jesus’ delivering the Sermon on the Mount, He also is showing us what it is like for Jesus to be teaching us from heaven as the prophets Isaiah and Micah described it (Is 2:3; Mic 4:2). That is, Jesus taught us from earth in the Gospels, but He’s been teaching humanity from heaven ever since. ***** Everything in Jesus’ ministry – and especially in Matthew’s portrayal of the Sermon on the Mount – is a pivot for Jews…from Moses to Jesus. See the Sermon on the Mount as a pivot for Jews from Moses to Jesus and it will make the most sense.

Mt 5: 3-12 – This section of the “sermon” is called “The Beatitudes.” They are like the blessings Moses laid out in Deuteronomy 28.

Mt 5:6 – The Bible is a feast of righteousness…but who these days has an appetite for that sort of thing? (Don’t be like the world. Stay hungry!)

Mt 5:13-16 – Moses’ disciples were the ancient Israelites; they were God’s salt and light for a time. Going forward, Jesus’ disciples would be the salt and light. Moses himself had prepared the way for this when he prophesied of Messiah and told the people to listen to Him when He came (Deut 18:15).

Mt 5:17-20 – Jesus has to say these things because He knows His fellow Jews will think He is turning His back on Moses. Instead, what Jesus is actually doing is building on the foundation Moses laid. He’s taking what Moses taught to the next level. Jesus took Moses literal words and revealed their spiritual application. The initial Jewish reaction to Jesus was to accuse Him of teaching licentiousness or “anything goes,” but He was doing the opposite. That is, Jesus’ teaching required a degree of morality from Jews that even the most dedicated Jews (who were the Pharisees) were not achieving…or even seeking.

Mt 5:21-47 – Jesus gives seven examples of how His teaching differs from Moses’ teaching. What’s common to all seven is that what Moses taught about outward behavior, Jesus applies to thoughts and motives of the heart. Moses taught very little about Jews’ thought lives; but Jesus goes straight to the heart and stays there. Only by cleansing us from the inside out will we ever be clean, and Jesus is the only human being ever qualified to tell us how to fully clean our hearts. His heart was pure from the beginning; ours have to be laundered to get to that state.

Mt 5:21-26 – 1 of 7 – Jesus takes one of Moses’ Ten Commandments – the one against murder – and applies it to our thoughts and words.

Mt 5:27-30 – 2 of 7 – Jesus takes another of the Ten Commandments – the one against adultery – and also applies it to the heart.

Mt 5:31-32 – 3 of 7 – Many Jews had assumed that, because the Law of Moses called for a certificate, whenever there was a divorce, God had no problem with it. But Jesus was setting them straight. He never liked the idea. It was only an accommodation to hardened hearts (Mt 19:7-8).

Mt 5:33-35 – 4 of 7 – Many assumed that because the Law of Moses talked about vows that truth mattered more in some situations than others. Jesus made clear that God wanted all words to be truthful.

Mt 5:36-37 – 5 of 7 – As with vows, so with oaths.

Mt 5:38-42 – 6 of 7 – A nation should seek to have its punishments vary to fit the crime (in other words, not an eye for a tooth), and that’s what Moses taught. But Jesus taught individuals, and it’s not their place to go around making citizen’s arrests all day long. Instead, they should be merciful in their personal dealings.

Mt 5:43-47 – 7 of 7 – Moses never taught that Israelites should hate their enemies, which is why the second part of the quotation is not in small caps like the first part. People just assumed that hating one’s enemies was appropriate. Jesus shows there’s a higher way – the way of God, which is the way of mercy.

Mt 5:48 – In the Bible, the number of seven is associated with fullness, completion, achievement, perfection, and such. This association can be seen from the very beginning of the Bible with its account of creation week. Certainly, there was accomplishment and rest. The net effect of Jesus’ teaching would be to make His disciples mature, finished, perfect like their heavenly Father. Moses taught from earth, but Jesus would teach from heaven. Moses taught to form a nation; but Jesus taught to form a man. This teaching from a “mount” was just a foreshadowing of Jesus’ teaching ministry from heaven. The goal would be to fulfill the original intention of God – that we would be truly and permanently made in His image – which is Jesus (Gen 1:26-27; Col 1:15). That would take a lot of training. He’s up for it. Are we?

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Matthew 6

In reading this chapter, we’ll do well to keep in mind that it is giving us the middle of the Sermon on the Mount. That is, Matthew 6 does not stand alone; rather, it is the logical connection between Matthew 5 and Matthew 7. In other words, we want to be sure to read this chapter in context. Otherwise, we’ll limit our understanding of what we read in any of the three individual chapters.

The Sermon on the Mount – and especially this chapter – are about transitioning away from an earthly perspective on life to a heavenly perspective, from a focus on outward actions that people can see to the motives behind the actions that only God can see. The resurrection of Jesus motivates us to adopt this perspective because heaven was His destination when He came up from the dead. When we die and it’s time to account for the life we lived, it will not matter what the earthly audience thought of it – it will only matter what the heavenly audience thought of it. That’s what the resurrection of the crucified Jesus proved to be true – the reward of heaven’s highest place for the way He had lived on earth. Therefore, let this chapter help us look upward and inward.

Mt 6:1 – In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus is speaking to His Jewish disciples – those who come to Him (Mt 5:1) in order to hear His word (Mt 5:2)…and stick with it (Jn 8:30-32). His statement in this verse is related to the statement He made in the previous chapter right before He gave seven examples of how His teaching could be contrasted with all the teaching they’d received in the past. That statement (Mt 5:20) was that unless their righteousness exceeded that of the Pharisees, they’d never enter the kingdom. The connection between the two statements is that the Pharisees did all their good deeds to be noticed by men (Mt 23:5) which is the very opposite of the instruction in this verse. Even today in the 21st century, society hasn’t seemed to have graduated beyond virtue signaling. Jesus is now going to give three specific examples of how His disciples could avoid virtue signaling and instead attract the favor of God: 1) in almsgiving, 2) in praying, and 3) in fasting

Mt 6:2-4 – 1) How to practice almsgiving before God and not men

Mt 6:5-15 – 2) How to practice prayer before God and not men

A digression on the Lord’s Prayer:

Mt 6:9-10 – Note how this verse comes full circle:

Our Father who is in heaven
…
on earth as it is in heaven.

Then notice, with one phrase inversion, that this triad sits in between that full-circle framing:

Your name be hallowed.
Your kingdom come.
Your will be done.

Mt 6:12 – In addition to the symmetry noted above, notice the symmetry in this verse as well. ‘

And forgive us our debts,

as we also have forgiven our debtors.

Mt 6:14-15 – Of all the lines in the prayer, verse 12 is the only one He chooses to explain and emphasize. Must be important, or else easily missed. He wouldn’t single it out without a good reason.

Summary of the Lord’s Prayer: The Lord’s teaching of this prayer is a digression from the point Jesus is making (“practicing prayer before God and not men”), but it is a very edifying digression. The prayer’s beautiful order calls us out of the chaos of our own thoughts. It’s a good “place” in which to pray.

Mt 6:16-18 – 3) How to fast before God and not men

Summary of the chapter so far: The Lord has explained that practicing our righteousness before people is unrewarding, but that practicing it before the Lord is just the opposite. This is fundamental, but the error is ingrained deeply in us and takes concentrated and sustained effort to change. That lays the groundwork for the rest of the chapter.

Mt 6:19-24 – The Lord is calling His Jewish disciples to a complete reorientation of their thinking about life. The physical dimension consumes so much of our attention that the Lord had to come on His unique once-in-an-eternity mission to call our attention away from it. Moses taught the Israelites to live in a nation where everyone had to obey the same laws – laws from God. As Messiah’s disciples, however, they would have to live under all kinds of governments with all kinds of neighbors. We must live on the earth, but it must cease to be our fixed point of reference. We’ll only get vertigo if that’s the case. The one who is in heaven – He must become our fixed point of reference.

Mt 6:25-34 – Learning the lesson of the previous passage begins with trusting that God will provide for us. This should not be difficult given that He revealed Himself to Abraham as “The Lord who will provide” (Gen 22:14). If we can’t learn that simple lesson, we’ll hardly be able to learn more complicated ones.

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Matthew 7

In this chapter, Jesus concludes the Sermon on the Mount. We do well to remember what we’ve read in Matt 5 and Matt 6 when reading Matt 7. It all goes together. Of course, this applies to any transition from one Bible chapter to another – but especially in this instance where a single discourse spans three chapters.

When Jesus was preaching the Sermon on the Mount, He was describing a kingdom to come. This kingdom did actually come – on just the time line He laid down, which was before everyone of His generation passed away. Thus this kingdom is in our midst right now. We must simply seek and find it; there is no more waiting for it.

Matthew finishes this edition of Jesus’ stump speech on the kingdom with some general instructions (verses 1-11) followed by some concluding instructions (verses 12-27).

Mt 7:1-2 – Many people take this instruction out of context and insist that it means Jesus doesn’t want us to exercise judgment. That would make Him self-contradictory, for He also said, “Why do you not even on your own initiative judge what is right?” (Lk 12:57). Such an interpretation would also make us brain dead, for who can be a conscious human being without making moral judgments about other people’s actions? Rather, what Jesus is counseling here is that we make no judgments of others that we don’t first apply to ourselves. For the Pharisees and other hypocrites, the last thing they ever want to do is to be judged according to the rules they expect everyone else to follow. Let us measure ourselves each and every time we’re taking the measure of someone else.

Mt 7:3-5 – The same people who say Jesus doesn’t want us to ever judge also tell us He doesn’t want us to tell other people what to do. Does Jesus really want everyone to go around with foreign objects in their eyes? If He wanted that, He could have saved Himself the trouble of coming to earth and being treated like dirt. What He wants is people to succeed at improving their own behavior before telling others how to do it. He’d be pleased as punch if we got ourselves on the right path and then turned and helped our neighbor get on it, too. (His brother James confirms this – Jas 5:19-20).

Mt 7:6 – Not everyone wants foreign objects removed from their eyes. Withhold godly advice from people who place no value on godly advice. They act like animals when you present it to them.

Mt 7:7-11 – Luke’s version of this segment (Lk 11:9-13) is set in a different context (not the Sermon on the Mount). The last line of Luke’s version has “…the Holy Spirit…” in place of Matthew’s “…what is good…” It’s reasonable to assume that Jesus gave most of His teachings multiple times at various locations and that He did not usually repeat Himself word for word.

Mt 7:12 – It is a great help to have long, complicated texts (in this case, the entirety of the Old Testament) summarized for us by someone who knows what he’s talking about.

Mt 7:13-14 – As I wrote in introducing the Sermon on the Mount at the beginning Matthew 5 above, its subject matter is entering the kingdom of God. Mt 7:13-14 is an appropriate concluding remark, given that practically every instruction He has given in the Sermon on the Mount is something you seldom see anyone doing. However, we should not allow that to discourage us from following these instructions. We’ll be blessed if we do! (Mt 5:3-12)

Mt 7:15-20 – Not only will few people enter the kingdom (per the preceding two verses), many people will falsely claim to be speaking for the Lord and the kingdom without even being in it. The Lord is telling us not to accept people based on their claims about themselves, but rather by the evidence and effects of their actions.

Mt 7:21-23 – Continuing in the same vein as the previous eight verses, Jesus is warning His disciples that many people will falsely claim Jesus as their Lord – and will ultimately be judged for lying about it. ***** See also BSN: The Posture of Jesus.

Mt 7:24-27 – Hearing the Sermon on the Mount (or any other teaching of Jesus) is one thing; doing it is another. There is a vast difference in the outcomes between people who hear and obey Jesus versus those who hear and don’t obey Him. The same flood that drown the world made Noah’s ark rise to safety.

Mt 7:28-29 – (See similar crowd reactions in Mk 1:22, 27; Lk 4:32.) ***** Jesus “was teaching them as one having authority” because He was both “Teacher” and “Lord” (see Jn 13:13 and BSN note on it). ***** Jesus’ listeners were not used to hearing a rabbi who did not claim another more respected rabbi as his mentor. Jesus was unique. The only other true prophet they’d heard first hand was John the Baptist; he spoke this way, too, but at least his dad was a temple priest. Jesus’ earthly father was a tradesman. Jesus’ authority stemmed from the same source as the Old Testament prophets: God Himself. (See Jn 7:16 and the BSN note on it. See also the opening notes for Matthew 19 below) That gave Him a distinctive voice in His time and place.

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Matthew 8

In this chapter, Matthew reports of many healings by Jesus, describing several of them in some detail. Matthew also declares this healing work to be fulfillment of Old Testament prophecy about the Messiah.

Mt 8:1 – Disciples were a subset of crowds. Crowds could include lots of people who were merely observers of, and listeners to, Jesus. A disciple was, by contrast, someone who also sought to put Jesus’ words into practice. Disciples were harder to come by than crowd members. Still are.

Mt 8:2-3 – No one ever made healing seem so simple and straightforward as Jesus of Nazareth. Fraudsters embellish their supposed healing acts.

Mt 8:4 – Even though the professional religious class in Israel was mostly opposed to Jesus, He still wanted them to have evidence of His rightful claim to be representing the one true God. After all, Jesus loved His enemies…just as He tells us to do.

Mt 8:5-13 – Jesus shows through His interaction with this Roman soldier that faith is a matter of understanding spiritual authority and spiritual words. That a Gentile could grasp this while respected Jews like the Pharisees were missing it made the professional religious class all the more hostile to Jesus. Jesus’ expression “the sons of the kingdom” referred to His fellow Jews. Jews had enjoyed a privileged position with God ever since Abraham, but Jesus was bringing in an age in which faith would be the great equalizer. Distinctions between Jews and Gentiles would no longer matter in His kingdom. Thus, Jesus’ healing of this centurion’s servant was not a sign of His preference for Gentiles over Jews, but rather of His preference for faith over unbelief.

Mt 8:14-15 – Apparently, Peter had no “mother-in-law problem.” Good for both of them! Peter displays hospitality and she displays a servant’s heart.

Mt 8:16-17 – Peter is quoting Isaiah 53:4. Isaiah’s prophecy speaks not just of a healing here and there, but of a wave of healing that would accompany Israel’s Messiah wherever He went.

Mt 8:18 – Luke reports that sometimes “so many thousands of people had gathered together that they were stepping on one another” (Lk 12:1). Perhaps Jesus’ quick exit here was for the purpose of crowd safety.

Mt 8:19-22 – Since Jesus seems to treat the first guy as if he’s too ambitious and the second as if he’s not ambitious enough, I take this passage to indicate that Jesus treats us as individuals, that He gives us direction appropriate to each individual case.

Mt 8:19-20 – This sounds like a promise from the scribe that he has not fully thought through. Let us not make promises to the Lord rashly.

Mt 8:21-22 – This sounds like a request from the disciple to hold off service until the death of his father and banking of an inheritance is secured. Let us not try to bargain with the Lord.

Mt 8:23-27 – What I find most amazing about this passage is not that Jesus calmed the storm and did so by merely rebuking it – amazing as those two things are – but that He seems put out with His disciples because they were afraid. The first two things were within His power – He’s saying the third is within ours!

Mt 8:28-34 – We human beings behave so irrationally! The demoniacs “were so extremely violent that no one could pass by that way,” and yet, once Jesus cast out the demons, making the area safe, “the whole city came out…and…implored Him to leave their region.” Huh? But we shouldn’t be surprised, American is in a free fall of cultural collapse right now and yet the last thing people want to hear about is Jesus. They prefer to live in cities with people who have lost their minds and become dangerous to themselves and others than to see the country return to the faith of its founders.

***

Matthew 9

In this portion of Matthew’s Gospel, we see abundant evidence of both the precedented and unprecedented aspects of Jesus’ ministry. Men of God had said and done things in God’s name throughout biblical times – great men including Moses, Joshua, David, Elijah, and many others. Through them, God was supplying precedents of word and deed that would enable the descendants of Abraham to recognize Messiah as a man of God when He finally came because they had so many examples of men of God who came before Him. But all the words and deeds of those men were more than surpassed by those of Jesus, making many of His words and deeds unprecedented as well. That is, Jesus was saying and doing things in God’s name that had never even been imagined before. This is why it’s fair to say that Messiah was both precedented and unprecedented.

Mt 9:2-8 – The question Jesus asks His critics in verse 5 is a very powerful one. This is because, of course, it is much easier to say “Your sins are forgiven” because no one will know whether your words actually worked or not. On the other hand, if you say, “Get up, and walk,” and the person doesn’t get up and walk, you’ll look like a fool or a charlatan. After asking His rhetorical question, Jesus then says, “Get up, pick up your bed and go home,” and the paralytic did just that. It’s hard to imagine a more powerful affirmation that Jesus was speaking and acting with God’s blessing. No wonder the crowds were “awestruck” and “glorified God!”

Mt 9:2 – Re: “son,” see #Hints.

Mt 9:9 – This is the author of the Gospel of Matthew talking about himself. Notice how little of that he does, and how matter-of-fact he is about his role. The apostles were truly humble men. Alas, we’re not accustomed to seeing men like that (Heb 11:38).

Mt 9:10-13 – The Pharisees did not see themselves as sinners. They saw themselves as righteous, and people who were not like them as sinners. The reality is that compared to God, we are all sinners. The Pharisees were leaving God out of consideration. That’s why He came as Jesus – that is, as one of us – so we would stop leaving Him out of our equations.

Mt 9:14-17 – Some people have wondered why Jesus didn’t try to work through the existing teachers in Israel to spread His teaching instead of choosing tradesmen who had commercially fished, collected taxes, and so on to spread His message. Here, He explains why. And we can see His rationale proven true throughout the pages of the Gospels. It was the professional religious class that most opposed Jesus. They resisted learning anything. By contrast, people willing to admit their sinfulness would soak up His teaching like a dry sponge soaks up water.

Mt 9:14 – There were disciples of John, disciples of the Pharisees, and disciples of Jesus. How are they distinguished? Jesus said we are disciples of the one in whose word we abide (Jn 8:31). Therefore, disciples of John abide in the word of John, disciples of the Pharisees abide in the word of the Pharisees, and so on. I have known many people who claim to be disciples of Jesus but who actually abide more in the words of others. Whose words occupy most of your thinking?

Mt 9:18-26 – These two stories of healing – Jairus’ daughter and the woman with a hemorrhage – are also recorded in Mk 5:22-43 and Lk 8:41-56.

Mt 9:18-19 – Mark’s and Luke’s record of this event tell us that the synagogue official’s name was Jairus. 

Mt 9:20-22 – The woman’s focus on Jesus’ garments calls to mind the prophecy of Zech 8:23.

Mt 9:23-26 – The “noisy disorder” and “laughing” were sufficient reason to usher the crowd out of the room before Jesus did what He came to do. 

Mt 9:27-31 – Living in a culture where it seems everyone is looking for more likes and subscribers, a statement like “See that no one knows about this!” seems really self-limiting. But Jesus always knew what He was doing.

Mt 9:32-35 – The juxtaposition of verse 33 and verse 34 illustrates not just a huge opinion gap on Jesus between Israel’s common folk and their ruling elite, but also how heartless the ruling elite had become. The man could not speak and was possessed by demons, for crying out loud! You can’t be happy for him? Lord, please deliver us from hard-heartedness!

Mt 9:36-38 – Men, don’t let your children be “distressed and dispirited.” Be their shepherd and feed them with Jesus from the Bible. This book you are reading, including the notes you are reading right this minute, are equipping you to do just that.

***

Matthew 10

In this chapter, Matthew tells of how Jesus chose His twelve closest disciples, whom He named apostles, and how He instructed them to go out and minister in His name. Matthew – author of this Gospel – was one of those twelve.

It’s clear from these instructions, and from many other things that Jesus said, that His coming would occur before all His apostles had died – in other words, in the 1st century AD.

Mt 10:1-4 – Jesus calls twelve of His disciples and appoints them as apostles.

Mt 10:5-6 – Throughout the four Gospels, we see Jesus and His apostles ministering strictly to Jews, with only a few exceptions. Not until Acts 10, through Peter, do we see ministry opened up to include the Gentiles. Therefore, when reading the Gospels we have to be sure we don’t take instructions given for 1st-century Jews and automatically assume they apply to 21st-century Gentiles without qualification. We also don’t want to take instructions given to apostles and assume they apply to disciples. Making these distinctions will be the theme of my notes throughout the rest of this chapter, which consists entirely of Jesus’ instructions to the twelve for the mission on which He is sending them.

Mt 10:7 – The kingdom of heaven is no longer at hand – it is here and now in the 21st century! Therefore, we still need to repent. We still need to be disciples. We just don’t need to wait any longer to do those things. 

Mt 10:8 – I don’t know about you, but I can’t do any of this stuff…at least not yet. If you can, you don’t need to be reading my book, I need to be reading yours.

Mt 10:9-14 – These are traveling instructions that make sense for 1st-century apostles going throughout Israel, but it’s not direction a 21st-century father can give his children over the supper table.

Mt 10:15 – Jesus spoke these instructions in the early 30’s AD. Jerusalem would be destroyed later in that generation. But just because that was a unique situation, it doesn’t mean that we can’t extract principles for our own generation. Without a doubt, we know that our country is inviting judgment on itself. We must do something. We can’t go throughout the country warning others unless Jesus specifically instructs and sends us as He did these twelve, but a man can live a life of repentance and teach his family to do the same.

Mt 10:16 – This is certainly a principle we can apply in our time to ourselves and teach to our children. We live in a society whose values are corrosive to children’s lives. Truly, they are being groomed by culture to think that the nuclear family and sexual fidelity are obsolete. We do not want to teach our children to be distrustful of others, but the reality is that there are currently an increasing number of people in the world who should not be trusted. We can and should pray for revival, but until that comes, we have to train children to extend their trust to others only when and as appropriate.

Mt 10:17-18 – In this passage, Jesus is alluding to when the door of faith would be opened for the Gentiles (starting with Cornelius through Peter’s preaching in Acts 10).

Mt 10:19-22 – Things got very, very difficult for the apostles. We can hope and pray they will not be as bad for us

Mt 10:23 – This is one of the many indications in the New Testament that Jesus’ Second Coming was to occur in that age – not some later one. 

Mt 10:24-33 – There are certainly principles in this passage which can easily be seen as timeless for believers in Jesus Christ.

Mt 10:34-39 – Speaking of timeless principles, we regularly see these dynamics at work in our age. Jesus’ instructions open our eyes to what is happening in and around us, spiritually speaking. He is imparting important knowledge and we should treasure and ponder it.

Mt 10:40-42 – In these closing words of Jesus’ mission briefing for His twelve apostles, we see Jesus Himself as the common thread to all these instructions. If we are truly disciples of Jesus, daily following Him, it is people’s reactions to Him that are the primary drivers of their behavior toward us. We should not take their hostility personally. 

***

Matthew 11

This chapter gives us the opportunity to compare and contrast the lives of John the Baptist and Jesus.

The two men had much in common.

• Both were Jews.
• They were about the same age.
• Both came from good families, but were of modest means.
• They were definitely relatives and probably cousins.
• Both claimed to have been sent by God.
• Both preached…
  • repentance for the forgiveness of sins.
  • that judgment was coming on Israel.
  • that the long-awaited kingdom of God was at hand.
• Both were generally regarded as…
  • righteous men and true prophets of God by the common folk, but…
  • heretics and troublemakers by the ruling elite.
• Neither man ever left Israel.
• Each man held the other in high esteem and respected the other’s role in the plan of God.
• The two men had the same political opponents and both were murdered by them.

These two men also differed in noteworthy ways.

• One lived an ascetic lifestyle wearing unusual clothing and eating unusual foods…while the other lived normally.
• One chose a lonely place for ministry and let the people come to him…while the other traveled throughout the cities of Israel to reach the people where they were.
• One performed no miracles…while the other performed more miracles than could be counted.
• One was the forerunner of Messiah…while the other was the Messiah.
• One said God had sent him to baptize in Israel…while the other said that God had handed the whole world over to Him.
• One told people to go to the other…while the other said “Come to Me.”
• One doubted…while the other reassured him.
• One was honored as a martyr…while the other rose from the dead.

Given how great Jesus said John the Baptist was, how great must Jesus be?

This chapter builds as it progresses, increasing in intensity until it almost explodes at the end.

Mt 11:1 – Having given in the previous chapter instructions to the twelve about their mission, we now see Jesus sending them out. He does not then take a break; rather, He keeps right on preaching and teaching, too.

Mt 11:2-6 – From prison, John the Baptist sends messengers to Jesus with a question. Jesus then sends the messengers back to John with His answer.

Mt 11:2 – Re: “the works of Christ” see #TGTC.

Mt 11:3 – The “Expected One” was a messianic title – like Messiah, Christ, Son of God, etc. An NASB footnote on this verse says that the literal rendering of that expression would be “the Coming One.” Both terms are helpfully descriptive.

Mt 11:4 – Jesus’ answer to John was to quote Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah that He was fulfilling. These are probably the same “works” (v. 2) John had already heard about but now he’d receive the additional witness that would come with the messengers seeing these works firsthand. In other words, Jesus was telling John something he already knew but adding eyewitness confirmation for him. John had previously identified Jesus as the Messiah, so he’s looking for confirmation – thus Jesus’ answer should strengthen John’s faith, even though by modern cultural standards it may not seem sufficiently “affirming.”

Mt 11:5 – Jesus adds a warning to John that he should be on guard against being disappointed in what He was doing – that is, what Messiah was doing…and not doing. John might have doubted what Jesus was doing, but it’s more likely his doubts were caused by what Jesus was not doing. I can put myself in John’s shoes: “If you’re the Messiah, why am I languishing here in prison?” The messianic prophecies included that the Messiah would be a descendant of David who would reign with even greater power and glory than what David had (FJOT). John probably figured, David would surely have found a way to get Jonathan out of jail, so why isn’t He getting me out of jail? This is why Jesus needed to warn John not to take offense. Just as God doesn’t do everything we expect when we expect and in the way we expect, so the Messiah can also surprise us. The “Expected One” does not always do what is expected when it is expected. in the way it is expected. In the end, however, He always exceeds expectations. Therefore, if we’re ever disappointed in Him, it must not be the end (Rom 10:11). 

Mt 11:7-19 – Having shown tough love to John the Baptist with His reply, Jesus now turns to the crowds, perhaps with John’s messengers still within earshot, and praises John to the heavens. What prophet while on earth ever received such a ringing endorsement as the one Jesus gave John the Baptist!

Mt 11:9 – Jesus confirms that John was a prophet, and then adds that he wasn’t merely a prophet. He was more.

Mt 11:10 – With this quotation, Jesus is saying that Malachi had prophesied of John and his role (Mal 3:1).

Mt 11:11 – Jesus now tops out His praise of John…and then amazingly says that being in the kingdom of heaven will make a person greater than John!

Mt 11:12-13 – Jesus is saying at least a couple of things here: First, John is the last in the line of prophets. Every prophet, including Moses and including John, announced that a greater one would come. When Jesus, who was also a prophet, came, He didn’t say a greater one was coming. He said He was coming again! Second, violent men – including Herod and Pilate – could take the kingdom of God by force, by, among other things, murdering the prophets. However, once Jesus was raised from the dead, the kingdom of heaven would never again be subject to violence. The King would be above it all – ruling from heaven. 

Mt 11:14 – Jesus is saying that John the Baptist fulfills the prophecy of Malachi about “Elijah” (Mal 4:5). From Moses to John the Baptist there was a long march of Jewish prophets who foretold of Messiah – Messiah was now here. Related, see multiple references to Elijah in the BSN notes for Mt 17 (the Transfiguration) below. He is mentioned also in Mt 27:46-47 with BSN notes further below.

Mt 11:15-19 – Jesus has been saying some amazing things so He acknowledges that only some will believe these things. He chastises those who don’t believe by pointing out that He and John gave out the same call for repentance, but there were people who didn’t respond – even though Jesus and John presented themselves very differently. In other words, whether it was the stern messenger (John the Baptist) or the gentle messenger (Jesus of Nazareth), their response to God’s call for repentance was going to be “no.” Such people thus demonstrate that it’s useless for us to worry “If I’d only said it this way instead of that way, they would have believed me.”

Mt 11:20-24 – Jesus continues His criticism of those who would not repent at either John the Baptist’s preaching or His by pointing out that God doesn’t do miracles for the entertainment of crowds. He does so to confirm the trustworthiness of the prophets calling the crowds to repentance. This does not bode well for Israel’s coming judgment, which came on Jerusalem terribly in 70 AD – some 35-40 years after Jesus spoke these words.

Mt 11:25-30 – Jesus continues saying amazing things, but now expressing them as a prayer to God. Jesus is essentially acknowledging that God is going to put Him – that is, Jesus – in the place of God. God is doing this by “handing all things over” to Jesus. Thus, Jesus was “the heir of all things” spoken of in Hebrews 11:1-2. As if to confirm this, Jesus in mid-sentence stops speaking to God and starts speaking to people: “Come to Me…” Human imagination would have expected Jesus at this point to say “Go to God,” but amazingly says, “Come to Me.” But the plans of God are not limited by human imagination. If Jesus said “All things have been handed over to Me by My Father,” then said “Come to Me” instead of “Go to the Father,” then He was declaring a pivotal point in human history – and in divine history. The New Testament marked the handing over of the world from the Father to the Son. In that age, the Father was becoming the Son in the same way that an acorn becomes an oak tree. ***** See also BSN: The Posture of Jesus.

Mt 11:29 – As for Jesus referring to Himself as humble, see where Moses foreshadowed this in Num 12:3 and accompanying BSN note.

We know that none of the Bible’s authors – including Matthew – thought or wrote in chapter or verse, so it’s all the more amazing that this chapter builds as it progresses, increasing in the knowledge it is dispensing until it almost explodes with information at the end. It began with John the Baptist fearing that Messiah was going to be less than he expected…and ended with Messiah indicating that He was going to be much more than anyone expected.

***

Matthew 12

Submitting to Jesus brings great peace to our souls, but it simultaneously puts us at odds with those who remain at odds with Him. In fact, knowing and serving Jesus in a world that is hostile to Him can make for significant turbulence in our lives. This chapter gives us examples of the various shapes and sizes that this turbulence can take – mainly coming in the form of opposition to, and criticism of – good deeds, especially those done in the Lord’s name.

Jesus did not wither and crumple in the face of opposition, and neither must we. In this chapter, Jesus heals a man’s withered hand – and His opponents respond by forming a conspiracy to destroy Him. Then Jesus casts demons out of a man who had been blind and mute because of those demons – and His opponents accuse Him of being a tool of the devil. Such are the irrational and over-the-top responses of an evil generation. Good is considered evil, and evil is considered good. Jesus is our foremost example of how to keep ourselves grounded in a world that prefers to live upside down.

Mt 12:1-8 – In 1st-century Israel, the Pharisees were considered the experts when it came to the Bible. Yet Jesus reveals them to have very little grasp of the Scriptures. They not only miss points Jesus’ considers obvious from history; they also have no appreciation for prophecy and how Jesus is fulfilling so much of it right before their eyes.

Mt 12:6 – What was “here” – Jesus in the kingdom of God – was something greater than everything in the Old Testament. This is because everything in the Old Testament pointed to Messiah and moments like this.

Mt 12:7 – Jesus is quoting the prophet Hosea (Hos 6:6).

Mt 12:8 – The “Son of Man” is another title for Messiah. Jesus wasn’t saying that the Messiah was going to be in charge of one day a week. He was telling the Pharisees that the weekly Sabbath foreshadowed a much greater and longer lasting day of rest to come – but they weren’t getting it.

Mt 12:9-21 – After the disagreement with the Pharisees above, Jesus goes into one of their synagogues where the argument intensifies.

Mt 12:11-12 – May it shake you up and bring you to your senses if you should ever find yourself valuing animals more than people. 

Mt 12:14 – Why aren’t they running up to Jesus pleading, “How’d you do that? Teach me, please, teach me!” 

Mt 12:18-21 – Jesus is quoting the prophet Isaiah (Is 42:1-4).  

Mt 12:22-37 – The Pharisees’ criticism of Jesus is escalating in this chapter.

Mt 12:23-24 – Jesus was called many, many names – some extremely complimentary, some extremely derogatory. No one seemed neutral where He was concerned, but this is just what was prophesied about Him (Luke 2:34-35). That is, the Messiah would polarize people. In a world of good and evil, such as we have, it can be no other way.

Mt 12:23 – “The Son of David” was one of Messiah’s many titles. Therefore, the people were, in effect, wondering if Jesus was the Christ.

Mt 12:24 – This was but one of the many disapproving ways Jesus’ critics spoke of Him.

Mt 12:25-30 – Jesus’ kingdom and Satan’s kingdom are fully opposed to each other. 

Mt 12:31-32 – In essence, blasphemy against the Holy Spirit is calling good, evil and calling evil, good. See Isaiah 5:20. When someone goes this far, he’s gone too far.

Mt 12:33 – No one says, “I’ve got this really good apple tree, but somehow it only produces bad apples.”

Mt 12:34-35 – The Law of Moses was all about behavior; Jesus’ law is all about the heart, where behavior is shaped.

Mt 12:36-37 – For an example of the importance of our words, see the story of Isaac’s blessings of his sons Jacob and Esau in Gen 27.

Mt 12:38-45 – The scribes and Pharisees were demanding a sign from a man who was showing them more signs (healings, miracles, and such) than any one generation of history had ever previously seen.

Mt 12:46-50 – Everyone expects leaders of movements to show partiality to their kinfolk. It’s commonplace. Yet Jesus left it to God to assign the privileges of place. We’ll see a specific example of this in Mt 20:20-23 in the case of the two sons of Zebedee. Here in this chapter, we see Jesus deny privilege of place to His own nuclear family. Yet, before the New Testament is completed, His mother and His younger brothers James and Jude will all have earned privileged places in the kingdom of God. And when we get to heaven, we will not be surprised to see Joseph along with Jesus’ other brothers and sisters in similar places. There is no partiality with God (Rom 2:11).

***

Matthew 13

As a teacher, Jesus was known for His use of parables. This being the first time Matthew has mentioned them in his Gospel, he bunches several of them together. In some cases, Matthew shares the explanation Jesus privately gave to His disciples, but in other cases he just presents the parable without explanation. We should look to the Lord to enlighten us about those (Mk 4:33-34).

Parables are mini-stories, and it’s natural for people to remember stories more easily than any other kind of prose. In fact, I recall from my 15 years as a credentialed preacher that people were more likely to remember the illustrations I used than the points I was trying to make with the illustrations.

The purpose of a parable or illustration is to be the “protective carrying case” for an idea. It helps us preserve and hold on to that idea. The Pharisees and other opponents of Jesus ended up with nothing but empty carrying cases – but, if they ever repented, they’d be able to fill those cases and use them just like the common folk did (Mt 13:52)!

(Matthew 13 is paralleled in Mark 4 and Luke 8.)

Mt 13:1-2 – The scene Matthew has painted in these two verses give us a sense of how compelling Jesus’ teaching must have been. How long would you stand on a beach listening to someone talk while he was seated in a boat? Sure the acoustics would be good, but all that standing…and in the sun?

Mt 13:3-8 – This is the parable of the sower. It is perhaps the most important and well known of all Jesus’ parables. I say this for four reasons: 1) Matthew begins his chapter on Jesus’ parables with it, 2) Mark (Mk 4) and Luke (Lk 8) do the same, 3) what Jesus says about it in Mk 4:13, and 4) its subject is how the word of God works in human hearts which means, by definition, that it describes how it and every other parable from God works on us.

Mt 13:9 – Jesus calls us to be alert listeners. We’re going to miss things if we’re not paying close attention when He’s teaching. His teaching does not reward lazy listeners.

Mt 13:10-17 – In this section of the chapter, Jesus answers His disciples’ question: “Why do you speak to them in parables?” By “them,” the disciples mean “the crowds” – the people who came to see the miracles Jesus performed and hear what He had to say. Not everyone in the crowd was or became a disciple. In any case, disciples would be a subset of the crowd. Of course, crowd members were being converted to Jesus all the time as they saw what He did and heard what He said. Still, many did not want to become His students and would not become His students. The point of all this was that when Jesus spoke to a crowd, He was speaking to a mixed audience. There were even hostile characters there to catch Him in something He said if they could. The parables were a way to make the teaching valuable, or at least potentially valuable, to disciples and non-disciples – a la Mt 13:52 as I described in the opening notes to this chapter.

Mt 13:11 – Disciples gain insights that uncommitted observers miss.

Mt 13:12 – Nothing stands still in creation except God. We’re either growing in our knowledge of Him or shrinking. 

Mt 13:13-15 – Jesus is here quoting from the short chapter of Isaiah 6. In that chapter, Isaiah asks the Lord how long he will be preaching his message of repentance to his fellow Israelites. The Lord’s sobering answer was, in essence, until the country was destroyed. In other words, while a certain number of people took to heart Isaiah’s preaching, enough would not – and especially its leaders would not – that the nation would fall to Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC while the repentant ones would find God’s protection through that process. (Think Noah’s ark and the flood, or Joseph providing grain in Egypt through a famine, or Daniel being preserved in Babylon.) Jesus saw Isaiah’s situation as foreshadowing His own, with the Roman Empire in His time being like the Babylonian Empire in Isaiah’s time. Therefore, things weren’t looking good for the nation of Israel in the run-up to 586 BC (when Babylon conquered it) or the run-up to 70 AD (when Rome conquered it), but for those who repented and followed the teaching (that is, became disciples of Isaiah or Jesus), salvation could be found. The same is true today as America runs up to destruction.  

Mt 13:16-17 – Jesus assures His disciples that they are qualifying for the salvation that comes to the subset of people who believe and obey. (Remember the narrow gate and wide gate He spoke of in the conclusion to the Sermon on the Mount – Mt 7:13-14.) There are indeed some voices rightly crying out “Revival or bust!” but their few voices are being drowned out by the many who either like the direction the country is going or else think there’s some other way to save it than turning to Jesus.

Mt 13:18-23 – Jesus explains the parable of the sower. He always explained His parables to disciples who asked Him for an explanation.

Mt 13:24-30 – Jesus tells the parable of the wheat and tares. Later in the chapter, His disciples will ask Him for an explanation of it and He will accommodate them.

Mt 13:31-33 – Jesus tells two short parables about the kingdom of heaven indicating that it works like seed and like leaven. This should dispel any notion that the kingdom is going to show up as an instantaneous physical manifestation that halts history in its tracks – but some people nonetheless continue to expect Jesus to appear one day coming from the sky riding a white horse. (For the truth of the matter, see Jesus Christ Has Already Come Again.)

Mt 13:34-35 – Matthew is quoting Psalm 78:2.

Mt 13:36-53 – Jesus gives the explanation of the parable about the wheat and tares (which He told in verses 24-30) and then immediately gives the disciples three more short parables. In those three parables, He likens the kingdom of heaven to 1) a treasure hidden in the field, 2) a merchant seeking fine pearls, and 3) a dragnet cast into the sea. The common thread of these three parables, and of the parable about the wheat and tares, is that God allows good and bad things to coexist until an appropriate time for separation. The Lord spoke similarly through the prophet Jeremiah using the phrase “extract the precious from the worthless” (Jer 15:19). In a world of good and evil, governed by a patient and merciful God, it’s only natural that He works this way.

Mt 13:43 – Jesus is quoting from the point of Daniel 12:3, but not the same literal phrasing.

Mt 13:51 – Like a good teacher, Jesus asks His disciples if they’ve understood His response to the request they made in verse 36. 

Mt 13:52-53 – A “scribe” in that day was someone who worked with the Bible (though they called it “the Scriptures” or “the Law and the Prophets” or something similar). If such a person became a disciple of Jesus, he would begin to hear new things he’d never heard before but also echoes of old things he’d long known. In our age, the Bible is accessible to anyone who can read, so you probably have already had the experience Jesus is describing. That is, you read something from the Bible that opens your eyes and yet at the same time reminds you of something you already knew. Even seeing a New Testament idea embedded in the Old Testament, or an Old Testament idea that blossoms in the New Testament, demonstrates this dynamic of discovering “treasure” that is simultaneously “new and old.”

Mt 13:54-58 – Although the point Jesus is making here about a prophet having no honor among the people you’d most expect it from is made in all four of the Gospels (Mk 6:4; Lk 4:24; Jn 4:44), the apostle John also provides this corollary of the principle: “He came to His own, and those who were His own did not receive Him” (Jn 1:11). Alas, familiarity can indeed breed contempt, and America’s familiarity with the Bible relative to other nations has led us to give its Author insufficient honor. We’re on the same track ancient Israel was on. They were an exceptional nation, too.

***

Matthew 14

Today’s chapter begins with the gruesome murder of John the Baptist. His fate was like that of many Old Testament prophets. There was a line of godly men stretching all the way back to Abel who died at the hands of ungodly, resentful, and jealous brothers. The fate of Jesus would match them all – save for the add-on aspect of His death, which was rising from it.

Jesus sought solitude in the wake of John the Baptist’s death. Consider the impact on Him:

• John was a close relative.
• John was His only well-known public advocate.

In spite of whatever grieving and recalculating of strategy Jesus had to process in the wake of John’s death, He did not stop helping others with His miracles. He even concerned Himself with feeding a multitude when no one would have thought less of Him for just walking away.

We also read in this chapter that Jesus walked on water, including the reason He did so, which was not to perform some sort of magic act but rather to put Himself in harm’s way in order to rescue His disciples.

What’s perhaps even more notable in this chapter, however, is that someone besides Jesus walked on water – even if only for a short distance. I’ve always marveled at people who will criticize Peter for ever doubting Jesus when he was the only one in the boat that night who had enough faith to get out of it and start taking steps in imitation of, and in obedience to, his Master.

Two of the greatest men in the New Testament – John the Baptist and Peter – both had notable moments of doubt. I’m not promoting or excusing doubt. We should do everything we can to eliminate it from our lives. I’m only saying that he who never tries to believe Jesus will never doubt Him either – just as he who never steps into the batter’s box will never strike out. Therefore, don’t focus on the strikes against great men of God; rather, focus on the devotion and courage it took for them to stand firm in the batter’s box against a major-league fastball…and take a swing. That’s the way Jesus looks at such men. He appreciates courage and He can’t help noticing those who risk their lives by trusting Him.

Mt 14:1 – For some background on this man, see HEROD.

Mt 14:2 – Before Jesus was raised from the dead, people held various ideas about what resurrection of the dead would look like. We may consider some of these speculations as strange, but we have the benefit of hindsight. The resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, including His ascension into heaven, was an unprecedented event. We should not be surprised that Herod, Jews in general, and even Jesus’ disciples would struggle to understand what the expression actually meant.

Mt 14:3-5 – In addition to Herod’s fear of public uproar if he executed John the Baptist, he also, oddly enough, enjoyed listening to the preacher (Mk 6:20).

Mt 14:6-12 – Herodias did not like what John the Baptist’s condemnation of her for abandoning her husband to marry his brother was doing to her reputation in the countryside. It’s a reminder that men and women are equally capable of savage violence. Herodias did not wield the sword, but she might as well have. As for this Herod, he thought he was preserving his reputation by keeping his foolish oath, but he was only signaling to everyone (like the emperor who thought he was wearing clothes) what a weak and spineless man he was.

Mt 14:13-14 – Jesus needed time alone to grieve over the loss of the only respected religious voice in Israel that had supported Him. Yet when a large crowd followed Jesus, He “felt compassion for them and healed their sick.” This is a time when most of us, if in His shoes, would have screamed, “Can’t you people give me some time alone!”

Mt 14:15-21 – Not only did Jesus heal the sick in His time of grief, He fed their bellies. If ever a man knew how to keep his mind off his own troubles so that he could help others, it was this man.

Mt 14:22-33 – This night, not one, but two men would WALK on WATER! It was, of course, a powerful and unforgettable sign of how unique Jesus was (because the second man was able to walk on water only because of the first), but it was also a foreshadowing of how the descent to death (into Sheol/Hades) that had been inevitable for every human being was coming to an end. Because of Jesus, we all now, spiritually speaking, walk on water while on earth because we never sink at death; we can only rise (because Everyone Is Going to Heaven).

Mt 14:22-27 – I take it that because Jesus wanted to relieve His disciples of their dangerous ordeal, He took the most direct path to them. 

Mt 14:28-33 – For me, the most significant word in this passage is “command.” For once we’re sure that Jesus has commanded us to do something, it ceases to matter whether or not it seems impossible.

Mt 14:33 – They worshiped Him? Hmm. See BSN note on Mt 28:9 below. #Hints

Mt 14:34-36 – Apparently, the story of how the woman with the hemorrhage had been healed by touching the fringe of His cloak (Mt 9:20-22) was making the rounds.

***

Matthew 15

This chapter reveals the fundamental argument between Jesus and Israel’s religious rulers. These rulers deemed Jesus to be departing from the Law God had given through Moses, but Jesus demonstrated that they were the ones who had departed from Moses’ Law, while He was bringing a new and greater law based on those same texts.

Over the years, Israel’s religious leaders had added their own man-made provisions to the Law that Moses had given – provisions that actually violated God’s original provisions. Thus did the Pharisees and Sadducees actually chip away at the Law of Moses with their traditions which they accumulated from one generation to the next. Since these men were the official teachers of Israel, common folks couldn’t question them – until John the Baptist and Jesus came along.

John the Baptist sought to return Israel to the requirements of Moses’ Law in order to prepare them for the Messiah, and Jesus – the Messiah – was the pivotal figure of all history who sought to give Israel a new law that they would then take to the whole world. Thus Jesus’ ministry was only to Israel, but through the Jews He won to His side by that ministry, He would go on to reach the Gentiles as well.

Mark covers this same interaction in Mark 7. Although Mark’s Gospel is considerably shorter than Matthew’s, Mark 7 actually provides a little more coverage of this material (23 verses) than Matthew 15 (20 verses).

Mt 15:1-20 – One way to break this passage down is to recognize four major points that are being reported, and the sequence in which they occurred: 1) the Pharisees and scribes accuse Jesus’ disciples of violating Jewish traditions, 2) Jesus accuses the accusers of having traditions that violate the Law of Moses, 3) Jesus tells the crowd that He is teaching the Law of Moses in a new way, applying it to the heart, and 4) in response to a request from His disciples, Jesus explains the point He was making to the crowd. Let’s go step by step through this sequence. ***** Cautionary note: Although the Gospels only record Jesus speaking about traditions negatively, Paul uses the word “tradition” in a positive sense as well as in a negative sense. See traditions for a breakdown. (An example of a positive tradition was the Lord’s Supper, but even it had an expiration date.)

Mt 15:1-2 – The scribes and Pharisees accuse Jesus’ disciples of not following the traditions they are following.

Mt 15:3-9 – Jesus responds that the accusers’ traditions are violating the Law of Moses which they claim to uphold.

Mt 15:3-4 – Jesus reminds the scribes and Pharisees of how Moses clearly taught that children should honor their parents, quoting from the Ten Commandments (Ex 20:12; Dt 5:16) and from other provisions of the Mosaic Law (Ex 21:17; Lev 20:9).

Mt 15:5-6 – Jesus then briefly describes a specific tradition that allowed grown children to set aside funds as designated for God that they did not have to give to elderly parents in financial need. Presumably, these funds could be donated for temple maintenance, support of the Levitical priests, etc. This tradition clearly undermined God’s desire that parents be honored as it advanced the interests of organized religion. 

Mt 15:7-9 – Jesus then quotes Isaiah 29:13 to emphasize how the scribes and Pharisees were undercutting the word of God with their own word (traditions). Isaiah and Jeremiah preached during the run-up to destruction by Babylon, while John the Baptist and Jesus were preaching during the run-up to destruction by Rome.

Mt 15:10-11 – Jesus then turns to the crowd and contrasts His teaching with the original accusation made by the scribes and Pharisees. That is, Jesus doesn’t burden the crowd with the example He gave the scribes and Pharisees – the example of how one of their traditions was undermining one of God’s commandments. Rather, He simply deals with the accusation made against His disciples – which was that they were eating food with unclean hands. 

Side note: Of course, we know that, for scientific reasons and irrespective of religious issues, it’s always better to eat with clean hands. However, there are times of working outside when the ability to wash ones hands are limited and we do the best we can not to eat dirt along with the food. We can assume Jesus’ disciples didn’t want to eat dirt either.

Jesus does not defend Moses’ original presentation of the Law as He did with the scribes and Pharisees, but instead makes clear to the crowd the new spiritual interpretation He is bringing to it. Moses’ teaching was concerned with defilements of the flesh while Jesus’ teaching is concerned with defilements of the heart – that is, the spirit, the inner man. Jesus has come to clean men from the inside out.  This is a point Jesus will make directly and emphatically to the scribes and Pharisees in Mt 23:25-28. For the time being, He’s speaking to the crowd and making sure they understand that His teaching is concerned with defilements of the heart, in contrast to the scribes and Pharisees who are concerned only with defilements of the flesh – which means  defilements that can be seen by other people. Remember that the fundamental error of the scribes and Pharisees was to seek the approval of people instead of the approval of God (Mt 5:20; 6:1).

Mt 15:12-14 – Jesus doesn’t want His disciples to become distracted with the fool’s errand of trying to correct their accusers. He wants His disciples to stay focused on teaching the crowds, who are more open-minded than the scribes and Pharisees.

Mt 15:15-20 – Because Jesus’ disciples asked for an explanation, they got one (Mk 4:34). Since we’re disciples, we can ask Him for explanations, too. 

Mt 15:21-28 – Jesus had made clear to His disciples when He sent them out on their first mission that they were to minister to only to Jews (Mt 10:6). He even used the same expression to describe the Jews with them that He’s now using with this woman: “the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” (Incorporation of the Gentiles would not occur until after Jesus was safely ensconced in heaven and a sufficient number of Jews had been converted to the movement; that doesn’t happen until Acts 10, well after the time period covered by all four Gospels.) There was yet another inhibition to healing this woman’s daughter, and it was that they were not just Gentiles – they were Canaanites. In the early days of Israel, the Canaanites had a terrible reputation for morality – Sodom being the most notorious example. This woman bucks that reputation, for it is her persistent faith that eventually convinces Jesus to make an exception for her and her daughter – and He seems pleased to make it. His comment about the children’s bread and dogs was a test of her faith – and she passed that test! This was an exception that actually kept Him on mission because the crowd that witnessed this exchange was full of Jews. They might come to their senses by seeing an example of great faith. Jesus similarly healed a centurion’s servant (Mt 8:5-13), though, unlike this Canaanite woman, that Gentile was someone the Jews considered respectable because he had built them a synagogue (Lk 7:2-5).

Mt 15:29-31 – There is no record of Jesus either refusing to heal someone or being unable to heal someone.

Mt 15:32-39 – The disciples go through this experience with no apparent memory of having gone through something similar before (Mt 14:13-21). We struggle to understand how this could be since we ourselves never forget anything miraculous the Lord has done for us when we encounter a problem similar to one we have experienced before.

***

Matthew 16

This is the pivotal chapter in the Gospel of Matthew. Everything before this chapter was preliminary to what is about to unfold in the remaining chapters – which is Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection. In the chapters up to now, we’ve seen how Jesus did one good deed after another for the people of His country, even in the midst of complaints and criticisms. In the remaining chapters, we’ll see how the nation that benefited from His unprecedented kindnesses will return the favor.

In this chapter, Jesus affirms His identify as Messiah to His disciples but instructs them not to proclaim it. The time for that would come after His resurrection. This was the key fact about the messianic mission as outlined in the Scriptures that no one but Jesus seemed to understand. Israel knew that God had promised them a great king – a descendant of David who would have an even greater kingdom than David had (FJOT) – but they expected their king, like David, to die at the end of his kingdom – not before He even began to reign! Therefore, the disciples were perplexed…even though Jesus was telling them in advance everything that was going to happen to Him.

Matthew 16 is paralleled in Mark 8 and Luke 9.

Mt 16:1-4 – The Pharisees asking for a sign was, in a sense, not unusual. That is, there is a history in the Scriptures of God granting signs that He was with a man – such as in the case of Moses. Moses would throw his staff to the ground and it would turn into a snake. Paul acknowledged the Jewish interest in signs when he wrote “Jews ask for signs and Greeks search for wisdom” – 1 Cor 1:22). However, a great deal of Scripture had accumulated since Moses, chronicling the times of Israel. Certain patterns could be detected, just as over time certain weather patterns can be detected – and Jesus mentions one of those weather patterns as an example. The Pharisees, in spite of their reputation for being zealous for the Scriptures, were actually quite dulled to them. One of the themes of Jesus preaching was that Israel in His time was like Israel in Isaiah’s time: decadent and unrepentant, headed for judgment and destruction. That’s why he quoted Isaiah so often. The Pharisees wouldn’t recognize the obvious parallels and so, Jesus said, they only sign they’d get is a preacher preaching “Repent” – which is what Jonah preached to Nineveh. Only Jonah preached after he’d been “raised from the dead,” which is what Jesus would do through His apostles. What “weather” patterns do we find in the Bible that match up to what we see taking place in our age? Let us recognize the patterns and act accordingly. Those who hear storm warnings take shelter. Let us be like “men who understood the times, with knowledge of what Israel should do” – 1 Chr 12:32.

Mt 16:5-12 – Elsewhere, Jesus said, “Do not work for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life” – Jn 6:27. He similarly said, “Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?'” – Mt 6:31. He is making that same point here. One of the biggest struggles Jesus had with the twelve was prying their minds away from the physical dimension so that He could show them the things He was seeing in the spiritual dimension. Here, He was wanting to use “leaven” as a metaphor to illustrate the hypocrisy of the Pharisees (Lk 12:1) that polluted their teachings. With Jesus’ explanations, the disciples did finally get the point in this case. However, Jesus yearned for them not to be so slow on the uptake. He yearns the same for us, for surely He is our teacher just as much as He was theirs (Jn 11:28).

Mt 16:13-19 – This is the pivotal moment of which I spoke in the opening to this chapter’s notes.

Mt 16:13-14 – Proverbially, Israel extended from Dan to Beersheba the way the US extends from New York to LA. Caesarea Philippi was near Dan – that is, in the northernmost part of the country. This was north of Galilee and as far from Jerusalem as you could get without leaving the country. Jesus obviously wanted to make a point to His disciples that would require their undivided attention in order to grasp it. He starts the conversation with a focus on public opinion about Him.

Mt 16:15 – Jesus then quickly narrows the focus and puts them on the spot. There comes a time when have to stop relying on the opinions of others and form one of our own.

Mt 16:16 – As was so often the case, Peter was first out of the gate. Just as he had walked on water while everyone else was just staring, he now lays down his cards on the table for everyone to see. And he does so emphatically, for, since “Messiah” and “Son of God” are biblically synonymous terms, Peter is, in effect, making the point twice. “You are the Messiah – you really are!”

Mt 16:17-19 – Jesus blesses Peter’s emphatic response with equally emphatic approval.

Mt 16:17 – Jesus recognizes that Peter is not just repeating something he’s heard, but is speaking with conviction something that the Holy Spirit has revealed in his heart.

Mt 16:18 – Recall that “Peter” is the nickname Jesus gave him (“Cephas” in the Aramaic language) and means “rock.” Since the Lord Himself is “THE rock” (1 Cor 10:4 and elsewhere), Jesus is speaking proudly of His most zealous disciple as, in effect, “a chip off the old block.” Jesus surely did build His church and the gates of death did not overcome it. Ever since the New Testament church passed, the kingdom of God has prevailed. And it always will.

Mt 16:19a – Peter did not retain these keys for himself but rather shared them with others in his teaching just as Jesus had, and thus even we who can read receive these keys which provide “entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” – 2 Pet 1:10-11.

Mt 16:19b – I take “bind and loose” to mean “disallow and allow.” Therefore, I take the words that follow to mean that heaven (the angels) would enforce whatever the apostles “disallowed and allowed” in the church (the church He just said He would build). Thus when Paul decided to ostracize the man who “had his father’s wife” in 1 Cor 5 (see especially verses 1 and 5), he could do so with confidence, knowing that the Lord (heaven) would back him up. Therefore, it seems the Lord is saying in Matt 19:28b  something very similar to what He’s saying here in Matt 16:19 – that the apostles were being given the authority, and the responsibility, to police the church so that at the Lord’s coming it would be a bride worthy of the bridegroom (Matt 25:1-13; Eph 5:25-27). This is yet another of the many differences between the NT church and the modern church. What modern church polices its membership? For another example of keeping discipline in the church, see the first chapter of 1 Corinthians where Paul is pleading with the congregation to abandon its divisions and become united once again as he had left it. According to the principle that instructions to the NT church should be, to the degree practical and understandable, applied to the family, parents should have confidence that as long as they are walking in the spirit, heaven will back up the disciplinary choices they make regarding their children. Results can vary because the wrongdoer (no matter the age) always has a will, but this is what it means whenever the Bible says “the Lord was with David (or whoever) in his battles.” The Lord doesn’t just want us to do righteousness, He wants to co-labor with us in it.

Mt 16:20 – Jesus wanted events to unfold just the way the Scriptures said. He didn’t want His disciples proclaiming Him as Messiah until after His resurrection and ascension. That might have set off a revolt that distracted the nation from the spiritual problems that needed to be addressed. The Messiah needed to be crucified for the sins of the world, not installed as a mere earthly king.

Mt 16:21 – Jesus prophesies in very specific terms what is going to happen to Him – and the disciples just don’t get it. Neither will they get it when He repeats this prophecy to them in Mt 17:22-23 and Mt 20:17-19 and Mt 26:1-2.

Mt 16:22-23 – We get a revelation from God one minute and we’re right back to thinking worldly in the next.

Mt 16:24-28 – Unfortunately, the disciples did not understand these words until after Jesus was raised from the dead. Jesus wanted His disciples to be comforted throughout His entire ordeal and that’s why He was disclosing these things to them. But they were too fleshly-minded to process what He was telling them. They were expecting a king like His great ancestor David and the plan Jesus was describing wasn’t matching that template. David reigned as king for forty years before he died; Jesus was telling His disciples He wasn’t even going to become king until after He died. This must have sounded like gibberish to the disciples.

Mt 16:27 – As for the fact that Jesus was going to “come in the glory of His Father,” this was prophesied by Isaiah in Is 22:24 (see BSN note on same).

***

Matthew 17

In this chapter, the apostle Matthew reports on the Transfiguration. This incident was witnessed by the three apostles who spent the most time with Jesus – Simon Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, James and John. The event is called “The Transfiguration” because, while the four men were on a mountain top, Jesus was transfigured before the three apostles – with Moses and Elijah appearing in the vision alongside Jesus. Peter, James, and John did not know what to think, and Jesus told them not to tell anyone about what had happened until He had risen from the dead.

It is reasonable to assume that the three apostles followed Jesus’ instruction to report the incident only after He was raised from the dead. I say this because 1) there’s no evidence in the New Testament that they disclosed the incident prematurely, and 2) there is evidence that they did disclose it after He rose from the dead. Regarding that evidence, consider how the two who wrote for the New Testament (Peter and John) both seemed to refer to the vision as if their readers would know what they were referring to. I’m speaking of 2 Peter 1:1:16-18 and John 1:14, where each man spoke cryptically about experiencing Jesus’ glory – although, of course, John’s comment could be referring to much more than just that one mountain-top experience. Both men wrote what they did long after they began preaching about Jesus; this is why I think they could make such brief references and expect to be understood. That is, they had made enough previous references to the story in their oral preaching and teaching that they didn’t need to go into detail when writing.

Besides the more subtle references by Peter and John, there is also the fact that both Matthew and Luke report the Transfiguration in their Gospels while they are not named as being present. Thus, Peter, James, and John had to have reported the incident at some point for Matthew and Luke to know about it. (As for the other two Gospels, recall that Mark’s Gospel was based on Peter’s testimony, and John does not explicitly mention the Transfiguration in his Gospel.) Mark and Luke report the Transfiguration in Mk 9 and Lk 9.

Matthew, Mark, and Luke all link the Transfiguration to the disclosure the week before of Jesus’ messianic identity in Caesarea Philippi (Mt 17:1; Mk 9:2; Lk 9:28). Therefore, the pivot in the Gospels of which I spoke in the introduction to Matthew 16 should incorporate the Transfiguration. Since the Transfiguration is separated from the messianic disclosure by a chapter division in Matthew and Mark but not Luke, we should therefore consider the pivot as occurring in Mt 16-17, Mk 8-9, and Lk 9.

Mt 17:1-8 – The Transfiguration

Mt 17:1 – This was a week after Jesus had confirmed to His disciples that He was indeed the long-awaited Messiah of Israel and “that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day” (Mt 16:21). Thus is Matthew telling us that the Transfiguration is linked to the revelation Jesus gave His disciples at Caesarea Philippi. That’s why I say it’s part of the pivotal moment in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke – and, more fundamentally, in Jesus’ earthly ministry which the Gospels record.

Mt 17:2 – The word “transfigured” is why we call this event “The Transfiguration.” The scene is somewhat like what John describes at the beginning of the book of Revelation. John’s is more spectacular, which should be expected because it came closer to the Second Coming. That is, from the time Jesus was raised from the dead and He ascended into heaven, more and more of His glory as Messiah was being revealed. The Second Coming would be the greatest revelation of His glory of all – which was that He was God and Father (Isaiah 9:6).

Mt 17:3 – The appearance of Moses and Elijah symbolizes how, as the Messiah, Jesus had been informed by both the Law (Moses) and the Prophets (Elijah). This scene is reminiscent of Jesus as a young boy in the temple “sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions” (Lk 2:46). 

Mt 17:4 – Peter, bless his heart, doesn’t understand what’s going on but tries to be helpful. 

Mt 17:5 – As Jesus had listened to Moses and Elijah, so the disciples should listen to Jesus – at least so says heaven!

Mt 17:6 – These men had earned a living as commercial fisherman, a physically demanding and sometimes dangerous trade. That this sight and sound so terrified them indicates the gravity and force of the experience.

Mt 17:7 – As always, when we are afraid, Jesus says, “Do not be.”

Mt 17:8 – The Law and the Prophets come together in Jesus. Jesus alone. The Old Testament and the New Testament come together in Jesus. Jesus alone. All the individuals in the Bible – like Moses, Elijah, Peter, Paul, and the others – are like stars in the night sky.  And Jesus is like the sun that rises so brightly that the stars all “disappear.”

Mt 17:9-13 – The Follow-up to the Transfiguration

Mt 17:9 – Recall from the previous chapter that the disciples do not understand what Jesus means when He says He’s going to rise from the dead. Throughout the history of man, death has always come after a king achieves glory, not before. 

Mt 17:10 – The confusion and uncertainty about timing brings to mind something the Jewish scribes had said about timing: that “Elijah comes before Messiah.” This expectation was set by the prophet Malachi in Mal 4:5-6. Malachi was the last prophet to speak in the Law and the Prophets (that is, the Old Testament). 

Mt 17:11-13 – Jesus declares that John the Baptist fulfilled the prophecy of Mal 4:5-6. John the Baptist was prophesied as “Elijah” by the prophet Malachi in the same way that Jesus was prophesied as “David” by the prophets Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Hosea (Jer 30:9; Ezek 34:23-24; 37:24-25; Hos 3:5).

Mt 17:14-18 – The contrast between “they could not cure him” in verse 16 and “the boy was cured at once” in verse 18 could not be greater. What’s even more stunning is Jesus’ comment. He is not the namby-pamby nice guy that so many modern people portray Him to be. His love is tough.

Mt 17:19-21 – Ask Jesus a simple question and He’ll give a simple answer.

Mt 17:22-23 – Jesus here repeats what He told the disciples at Caesarea Philippi (Mt 16:21). (He will tell them a third time in Mt 20:17-19, and then mention the crucifixion part again in Mt 26:1-2). They still do not understand Him. Their deep grief demonstrates that they had no conception of how rising from the dead (whatever it meant) could make up for His getting killed. What they would come to learn is that His resurrection would change everything – not just for Him, but for everyone.

Mt 17:24-27 – This was not a Roman tax but rather a Jewish tax handed down from Moses and used for maintenance and support of the temple. By implying to Peter that they were no longer bound by it, Jesus was proclaiming the same sort of freedom from the Law of Moses He was bringing to animal sacrifice, kosher eating, and other things. This is the freedom Paul took pains to explain in Galatians, making clear it was the freedom to serve (Gal 5:13). Peter himself would make the same point about not using freedom selfishly (1 Pet 2:13-16). As for the fund-raising mechanism Jesus used to pay this tax, all I can say is “Wow!”

***

Matthew 18

We could title this chapter…

“Jesus Teaches Us How to Get Along with God and Man in the Kingdom of Heaven”

…and that teaching can be summarized as…

“Be as a humble child with God, and be as a fellow traveler with adults.”

Mt 18:1-4 – Picture this scene, putting yourself in the shoes of the child Jesus called to Himself. Apparently, the child came forward because Matthew says Jesus then “set him before them.” So, Jesus calls the child, the child goes forward to Jesus, then allows Jesus to turn him around and present him to the adults who were present. How compliant would you have been in that situation? Would you have resisted going forward? Would you have gone along when Jesus wanted to present you to the adult disciples? We know that scene could have gone badly because we know how children can be when they’re put on the spot. That child must have trusted Jesus. We should likewise trust Him. What Jesus is demonstrating here is not a rare occasion; it is the way He calls us to live each day. This is walking in the spirit. That is, we are living in two dimensions – which means that there’s the reality we can physically see and the reality that we cannot physically see. Every day we are living before Jesus and the angels. They are watching and they are attentive. If we live like this young boy, we will incorporate that unseen reality into our thinking. That is what Jesus is calling for here. What makes Jesus’ request challenging is that we live in a world where most of the people we’re around do not think about the unseen aspect of reality. That is, they’re not thinking about Jesus and the angels watching them and us. And this is as true of many self-identifying Christians as it is of atheists. This is because we live in a secular world. By mostly unspoken agreement, we have agreed to live life with each other as if God is not present. It’s okay if you think about His presence as long as you don’t talk about it or try to act according to it. But it gets hard to think about it if neither you nor anyone else is allowed to talk about it or act on it. This is what keeps most people out of the kingdom of God – an unwillingness to be like this child that Jesus called to Himself and then presented to the group surrounding Him. Note also that while the disciples asked Jesus how they could achieve greatness in the kingdom, Jesus answer is focused also on entrance to the kingdom. So, we have to be like “a” child to enter the kingdom…and like “this” child to be great in it. Few people walk this path because it’s narrow and humanly lonely (Mt 7:13-14). Most people take the wide path to destruction because they feel better with human approval than divine approval. They won’t enter the kingdom until they die – for that is when this veil of flesh is finally removed and we can no longer hide behind it. Blessed is the man who humbles himself as a child before God…and who can withstand the abuse his fellow men will give him for it.

Mt 18:5-11 – A “stumbling block” is anyone who stands in the way of the child (or adult) who is responding to Jesus’ call of “Come to Me” (Mt 11:28) and allowing Jesus to “present” him to the world (which is walking in the spirit, which is also walking by faith – 2 Cor 5:7). In other words, anyone interfering with the scene Jesus acted out with the child in Mt 18:1-4 is, metaphorically speaking, a stumbling block. One of the great moral beauties of the kingdom of God is that it can be received by children (“Jesus is everywhere”) as well as adults. Contrast this with the temple system of animal sacrifice which would be hard to explain to young minds. But we shouldn’t take the kingdom of God lightly just because a child can embrace it. And that’s why Jesus is giving the warning not to be a stumbling block.

(By the way, there is an irony in this discussion. The irony is that in this exchange, the adults with Jesus thought the kingdom was for them and not children, yet today the problem is that adults think this Jesus/kingdom talk is for children and not adults.)

When Jesus talks about stumbling blocks being cast into “the eternal fire” or “the fiery hell,” He is not talking about something that happens after this life but rather something that happens in it (Judgment Is upon Us). “Hell” is on this earth in this life (Isaiah 33:14-16).

Mt 18:12-14 – Every human being – even the very least of them is worth keeping. (Recall that this exchange between Jesus and His disciples began when His disciples asked Him who was the greatest; He is telling them to focus not on the greatest but rather on the least…because that’s the way He thinks.)

Mt 18:15-20 – People who say that “Jesus accepts people as they are” do not take this passage seriously enough. It’s true that we can come to Jesus just as we are if we come with a readiness to change. But if we come to Jesus with no willingness to change, we are wasting our time as well as His. For one thing, just recall how He said, “Depart from Me, you who practice lawlessness!” (Mt 7:23). And there are many such verses which make this same point (such as Mt 22:1-14; Rom 3:8; 1 Cor 6:9-11; Heb 10:26-29). Jesus confronts us with our sins, and if we’re not willing to forsake them, there’s not much He can do for us – at least not until we die. ***** Notice that this passage applies specifically to the church age (see verse 17; see also Mt 28:18-20’s reference to the close of that age). Once the kingdom age began, the vision of Rev 21-22 was fulfilled and the Lord’s kingdom was “in the midst” of the entire earth. For this same reason, Jesus referred to the presence of the kingdom in His fleshly presence in Lk 17:20-21 – a presence that was expanded to the entirety of creation when He came spiritually in His kingdom. We no longer have to assemble two or three people to have Him be in our midst.

Mt 18:21-35 – The problem with some of Jesus’ parables is that we can’t understand them; the problem with others is that we can. This parable falls into the latter category. We clearly understand that God’s forgiveness of us is tied to our forgiveness of others. Some people do, however, get mixed up and, for example, don’t want to prosecute murderers which, of course, just leads to lawlessness. Governments have to punish criminals and parents have to punish disobedient children or else society and family break down. But none of us should be holding grudges. That’s no way to treat a fellow traveler – especially when we ourselves have been so freely forgiven for the One who was crucified for us.

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Matthew 19

In reading the four Gospels, it’s useful to keep ourselves mindful of the fact that all the events and discussions are taking place in a Jewish context. Jesus is a Jew, His supporters are Jews, and His enemies are Jews. This is especially important when it comes to a chapter like this one because, otherwise, we might not think about how striking it was in that context to hear Jesus declaring which parts of the Law of Moses didn’t go far enough and which parts were sturdy enough to be carried forward into the kingdom of heaven. For Jesus to speak as if He had more authority than Moses was startling to any Jew who heard Him.

Moses wrote the Law between the ages of 80 and 120…and his writings had been considered authoritative for well over a thousand years by the time Jesus came on the scene. Jesus was in His early 30’s when He taught on earth. Therefore, the authority Jesus was exercising when He spoke of Moses’ Law as if it was His own to apply as He saw fit was breathtaking for His countrymen to hear – whether they supported Him or opposed Him. (Of course, Moses prophesied in Deut 18:15 that just such a thing would happen, but people didn’t always remember a prophecy when it was being fulfilled.) The authority of Moses had been supreme in Jewish culture; therefore, we need to keep reminding ourselves of what a big deal it was for Jesus to speak with even more authority than Moses had. No one has made Jesus any more important than He made Himself. To grant Him more authority than He claimed to have would not even be possible. (See related comments Jesus versus Moses in the notes on Mt 7:28-29 above; in that passage, Matthew comments on crowd reaction to the Sermon on the Mount.)

Mt 19:1-2 – With a summary statement like this, Matthew not only records history, he also gives us the kind of divider we would normally expect from the chapter divisions in a regular book. If we’ve been digesting Jesus’ words in a string, a divider like this allows Matthew to begin a new string after it. Jesus’ words in the previous chapter were to be read as a string; and Matthew now gives us a new string. The transition from Mt 18 to Mt 19 is thus one of those occasions where the people who gave us the chapter and verse divisions in the Bible were able to match their dividing lines with the author’s.

Mt 19:3-12 – Jesus Asked about Divorce (I say a little more about this exchange in the notes on Mk 10:2-12.)

Mt 19:3 – The Pharisees never came to Jesus seeking knowledge, for they did not consider Him to have any knowledge that they wanted. They only asked Him questions hoping to “catch Him in something He might say” (Lk 11:54) – that is, to “test” Him as we see here. What motivated them was their envy of His popularity (Mt 27:18). Their goal was to get Jesus to say something that would turn the crowds against Him, or at least divide the crowds. For example, the subject of resurrection divided Jews between the Pharisees who believed in it and the Sadducees who did not. We’ll see Jesus tested on this subject in Mt 22. Divorce was another divisive subject for Jews. Moses had authorized it (Deut 24:1-4) but Malachi said God “hated” it (Mal 2:16). You can almost hear the Pharisees licking their chops as they asked Jesus their question because they saw no way that Jesus could resolve the two passages in a way that would satisfy all His admirers. 

Mt 19:4-6 – Like the Roadrunner outwitting Wile E. Coyote, or like Alexander cutting the Gordian Knot, Jesus doesn’t bat an eye. He goes to the Scriptures to resolve the tension between Dt 24:1-4 and Mal 2:16. Just as He had fought Satan’s quotation of Scripture with Scripture (Mt 4:5-7), so He resolves a tension in Scripture with Scripture.

(Never give up on finding answers in the Bible. Even when it seems to contradict, it doesn’t. Just because you don’t understand something today, doesn’t mean you won’t understand it tomorrow or next week or next year. That’s what trust is for. Once Someone has proven Himself to you, don’t keep making Him prove Himself over and over again. It’s a waste of your time as well as His.)

By quoting Genesis, Jesus shows God’s desire before the Law of Moses, before the word of Malachi, and even before sin came into the world. Therefore, we don’t reconcile Moses to Malachi or vice versa; rather we reconcile both to God’s original creation order mandate of marriage for men and women. And it is to the creation order (“THE TWO SHALL BECOME ONE FLESH”) Jesus came to restore us (Act 3:19-21). 

Mt 19:7-9 – At this point, the Pharisees don’t see that they have been checkmated. They just go to their prepared response: “Then why did Moses say what he said?” Their other prepared response, if Jesus had spoken positively about divorce instead of negatively, would have been to say, “Then why did Malachi say what he said?” They thought they had Jesus either way. But Jesus pulls the rug out from under them when He gives a perfectly reasonable explanation for why Moses said what he said. Just because something is regulated does not mean it is good. Gambling is regulated, but that doesn’t mean it is good. It is regulated for the same reason Prohibition only lasted from 1920-1933 – because the problems associated with prohibiting alcohol turned out to be far worse than the problems associated with regulating it. The Pharisees had no answer for this. They had no answer because they didn’t care about solving the problem – they were only using the problem to “catch Jesus in something He might say.”

Mt 19:10-12 – The disciples – not the Pharisees – followed up with a lament. For if God is against all divorces, then, they thought, no man can afford to marry because in this sinful world it is undeniable that certain unforeseen situations can arise in a marriage that cause it to be more harmful to continue the marriage than to terminate it. Jesus’ answer to the disciples’ lament is mercy: “Not all men can accept this statement,” He says. To reinforce His point, Jesus next makes a statement that goes perfectly with another Genesis statement about marriage: “It is not good for the man to be alone” (Gen 2:18). God’s will for man is marriage, for he was designed for it. Rare is the man who can or should live in celibacy. Martin Luther was a Roman Catholic priest who rightly broke his vow of celibacy to take a vow of marriage. For Paul rightly said, “It is better to marry than to burn with passion” (1 Cor 7:9). For the same reason, we can say “It is better to [re-marry after divorce] than to burn with passion.” 

One final point needs to be made before leaving this discussion of divorce and marriage held between Jesus, the Pharisees, and Jesus’ disciples. It is that all those present for the discussion were Jews, and they were interacting about how the Law of Moses applied to them. We today are not under the Law of Moses; we are under the grace of Jesus Christ. This does not mean “anything goes” for us; on the contrary, we are held to a higher standard. Specifically, we are held to the standard of love, and that standard must be applied to every thought we have, not just our actions. Therefore, it should be harder for us to divorce than it was for any Jew under the Law of Moses. Much harder. But prohibition against any divorce or against any remarriage after divorce would cause more harm than good – and that harm would be far greater than the harm brought on during US Prohibition. Society needs married men, which is a truth built on yet another creation order mandate in Genesis: “Be fruitful and multiply” (Gen 1:28).

Mt 19:13-15 – We know Jesus’ disciples were far better men than we are, but they are sometimes as dense and dull as we are. How could they object to children coming to Jesus after all Jesus said about children in His previous discourse (Mt 18)?

Mt 19:14 – #Hint 

Mt 19:16-30 – A Rich Young Ruler Comes to Jesus (I say a few things about this exchange in the notes to Mk 10:17-31, which I try not to repeat here.)

Mt 19:16-19 – The Old Testament quotations here are from the Ten Commandments. Jesus’ teaching is not a departure from the Ten Commandments; rather, Jesus’ teaching takes the Ten Commandments to the next level – the spiritual level, the level of the heart. I wrote a book to explain this: The Ten Commandments According to Jesus.

Mt 19:20-22 – Some think Jesus was here inviting the young man join the twelve, and that perhaps he could have eventually been the replacement for Judas Iscariot. (That honor actually went to Matthias, as recorded in Act 1:21-26.)

Mt 19:23-26 – Salvation is not our doing; it’s His. We couldn’t have done it; He did it. All we have to do is stop shrinking back from the entrance to His kingdom which He freely grants us.

Mt 19:27-30 – Subsequent Discussion

Mt 19:27 -Having observed Jesus’ exchange with the rich young ruler, Peter asks on behalf of himself and the others who were following Jesus with him, “What about us?” 

Mt 19:28-29 – Jesus’ answer echoes and embellishes 2 Chr 25:9.

Mt 19:28b – “binding and loosing” – The apostles would rule the church that Jesus was building. See relevant note above at Mt 16:19b.

Mt 19:30 – This verse is as linked to the first verse of the next chapter as it is to the previous verse in this chapter. (See Chapter and Verse Divisions)

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Matthew 20

In this chapter, Jesus continues His journey toward Jerusalem – the last such journey He would make. His days as an itinerant rabbi in Israel would come to an end here. Thereafter, He would teach the whole world from His throne in heaven (Isaiah 2:1-4).

Remember that, from the time that Jesus began His public ministry, He lived in Capernaum on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. This was in the northern part of Israel. Jerusalem – the capital of Israel – was situated in the south-central part. By the Law of Moses, Jewish males were called to appear at the temple in Jerusalem for certain annual feasts – such as Passover and Unleavened Bread. Thus did Jewish men generally travel to Jerusalem 2-3 times per year. Such travel to Jerusalem was all the more important to Jesus because He was regularly going throughout the entire country trying to reach as many of His citizens as possible with His good news and good deeds. Jerusalem, being the capital of the nation and the location of Israel’s temple – the only place God allowed animal sacrifice to be offered – was an obvious place, and a feast was an obvious time, for Jesus to reach the maximum of Jews.

(*Strictly speaking, Moses’ instructions were about coming to the Lord’s tabernacle, wherever it was. But when David and Solomon, by the Lord’s authority and direction, built the temple in Jerusalem, it took the place of the tabernacle and fixed the location for the feasts permanently. I say this in case someone complains that Moses never explicitly mentioned “Jerusalem” in the Law.)

Of all the places in Israel for Jesus to go, however, none was more dangerous for Him than Jerusalem. That’s because Jerusalem was where the greatest number of His opponents lived. These enemies were the priests and other professional religious people whose power was fully invested in the status quo. Jesus was offering change to the nation…and change was the last thing these leaders wanted. This trip, Jesus would be going to Jerusalem one time too many – at least from the perspective of His personal safety. Of course, Jesus’ resurrection brought Him to a Jerusalem infinitely more glorious than the one in which He was crucified. That was the Jerusalem that is heaven – the true capital city of God. The one on earth, where the stone temple was built, was just a foreshadowing. There was danger for Him in the earthly Jerusalem, but the way He handled it took Him to a Jerusalem out of danger’s reach.

Mt 20:1-16 – This parable is inextricably linked what Jesus was saying in the previous chapter. Don’t let the Bible’s chapter divisions blind you to this.

Mt 20:11-12 – Can you picture the righteous people we read about in the Bible – “men of whom the world was not worthy” (Heb 11:38) – complaining that we get the same benefits from God that they did? Neither can I.

Mt 20:15 – When we don’t fully appreciate how generous God is, we can misunderstand some of His actions. When we do appreciate it, we can recognize a lot more of His benefits to us.

Mt 20:16 – Note that this verse and Mt 19:30 are practically identical, thus confirming the fact that this parable is a part of the previous chapter’s discussion. 

Mt 20:17-19 – What Matthew writes here indicates that the prior discussion is now closed and he is moving on to different discussions he wants to report. (In other words, writing like this is often a better indication of a break in thought that chapter-and-verse divisions.) ***** This is now the third time that Jesus is giving the twelve the warning and prophecy about His death and resurrection He first gave His disciples in Caesarea Philippi (Mt 16:21), and repeated to them in Galilee (Mt 17:22-23). (He repeats the crucifixion part again in Mt 26:1-2.) This is remarkable for several reasons. For one, it shows that Peter needn’t have been shocked into denying the Lord the night He was arrested and tried by the Jewish court. For another, it shows that Jesus was a true prophet and a patient teacher. For yet another, Jesus’ repetition of this prophecy and the inability of the twelve to absorb and retain it shows us how alert we need to stay if we want to be able to follow the Lord closely while we are on this earth. Walking with Christ is not sleepwalking.

Mt 20:20-23 – In this interaction, Jesus tells the Zebedee family that they do not know what they’re talking about. And, with the benefit of hindsight, we can understand what Jesus means. Remember that the twelve apostles have all failed to understand Jesus’ detailed prophecy about being killed in Jerusalem and then raised from the dead. They don’t even know what “raised from the dead” means at this stage of things. The perception we have from the completed New Testament is, of course, that resurrection leads to heaven and that’s where all the lasting glory is. Of course, these folks had no New Testament, and the conception of heaven as a destination for humanity was unknown to Jews at this time. All their conceptions of resurrection – and those conceptions varied – were of a resurrection back to earth – not to heaven. And folks certainly didn’t imagine Jesus would become king of Israel only after He died. Rather, their conception followed the pattern of a normal king – like King David, who had “mighty men” (2 Sam 23; 1 Chr 11) to fight alongside him and bring him to power. This is the role that these eleven brave men sought for themselves. They were willing to die for this son of David because they were convinced that He was God’s answer for their nation. That’s why James and John could honestly say they were willing to “drink the cup” with Jesus. They thought He was talking about the risk of dying to make Jesus king. How could He explain to them at that time – especially since they just weren’t grasping what He’d been telling them about His impending death and resurrection – that they wouldn’t be fighting shoulder to shoulder with Him on earth, but they would they would be engaged in warfare for Him on earth while He was in heaven?! That meant they would have to have faith in Him like they’d never had before because they wouldn’t be able to physically see Him. Moreover, when violence came at them, they’d have to turn the other cheek and not fight back. Jesus couldn’t grant their mother’s request at this time because it would depend on how they performed going forward. (Likewise, we often want the Lord to tell us how things will turn out for us in the future, but some of that depends on how we perform between now and then.)

Mt 20:24-28 – The way of God is so different from the way of the world! Men see life as full of pyramids and so they strive to find one they can be atop. And thus they try to get as many men as possible under them. God turns that view upside down, looking to serve as many men as He can. Visualize the pyramid of humanity turned upside down, with the point at the bottom and at that point is Jesus, holding and balancing the entire pyramid on His shoulders, in Samson-like style. That’s what makes God so great: He’s not trying to be great. Rather, He’s serving and that makes Him great. And that He serves more than anyone else, He is greater than anyone else.

Mt 20:29 – If Jesus had wanted the kind of earthly kingdom the disciples thought He did, He had plenty of opportunities to seek it. Think of the army He could have quickly mustered from crowds like this! He wasn’t interested in that, but the disciples just had a hard time thinking beyond their prior conceptions. Jesus’ actual resurrection from the dead, of course, would alter their conceptions. (Similarly, when we die and go to heaven we’ll finally understand things the Lord has been trying to get through to us down here – but consider the possibilities if we could shed our dullness and understand more while we’re still down here!)

Mt 20:30-34 – Notice the references to the “son of David” in this segment of the chapter. We today see the “s” of “son” capitalized to “S,” but they couldn’t see beyond the lower case “s.” Therefore, they perceived Jesus as a David-like man with miraculous powers, not as God who was soon to resume His divinity after having demoted Himself to serving as a human being for over 30 years. Therefore, they asked only for physical sight to heal their physical blindness, when they could also have been asking for spiritual sight to heal their spiritual blindness. The patience God exhibits as a teacher is staggering. (Men, let us be this way with our children.)

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Matthew 21

This chapter describes Jesus’ final trip to Jerusalem, including the dramatic way in which He entered the city. He chose to ride in on a donkey’s colt, which was the traditional way that an Israelite signaled to his fellow citizens that he would be taking the throne as king. To be Israel’s Messiah was to be its king, so this action taken by Jesus was fitting. Many people agreed, shouting joyously that King David’s long-promised descendant had come to set them free from Roman oppression.

Notwithstanding all the support Jesus received, He had many enemies among the religious elite of Israel. They weren’t convinced of Jesus’ legitimacy as a man of God, much less Messiah, and had been asking Him for a sign that He was sent from God. The irony is that God had given them many signs that Jesus was His – including fulfillment of the prophetic scriptures that we read in this chapter, and there had been the many miracles, too – yet these opponents of Jesus were simply unwilling to believe. No amount of proof was going to convince them.

Just as Israel’s common folk, generally speaking, believed that John the Baptist had been sent by God, so they believed Jesus had been sent by God. And just as Israel’s leaders had rejected John the Baptist, so they rejected Jesus. And even that was a sign, because God had promised that His Messiah would not be accepted by Israel’s leaders (Ps 118:22) – a prophecy which Jesus points out to them at the end of this chapter.

Mt 21:1-3 – The Lord always seemed to have individuals serving Him quietly and effectively. They were not named like Peter, Paul, and so many others, but everyone in heaven will know the names of the anonymous. The man who humbly provided this transportation for the Lord was like the poor widow who “put in two small copper coins” into the temple treasury (Mk 12:41-44), and the woman who anointed Jesus with “an alabaster vial of very costly perfume” before His suffering (Mt 26:6-13). They are anonymous now, but won’t be forever.

Mt 21:4-7 – Jesus is quoting the prophet Zechariah (Zech 9:9). Jewish hopes for Messiah’s appearing in the 1st century AD were high. In just a few years, Jesus had gone from obscurity as a carpenter’s son in Nazareth to being famous throughout Israel as a teacher and prophet, with great miracles occurring through Him. It was known that He was a “son of David,” so speculation that He was the Messiah had already been rising. By riding the donkey into town, the intensity of that speculation would surge because 1) it was Israelite custom that this is the way their kings were introduced to the populace, and 2) this scene would immediately bring to most Jewish minds the specific and well-known messianic prophecy of Zech 9:9 (FJOT).

Mt 21:6 – “Whatever He says to you, do it” #FJOT

Mt 21:8-9 – Acknowledging what Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem on a donkey signified, the crowd begins quoting from Psalm 118, which they would have remembered from synagogue readings. “Son of David” was a messianic title and the specific words being quoted are from Ps 118:25-26 (FJOT). “Hosanna” is an Aramaic derivative from the Hebrew “do save.”

Mt 21:10-11 – After the crowd exuberantly ushers Jesus into Jerusalem, curiosity about Him rapidly spreads through the city. Being the capital of the nation, it was a “government town” – meaning its citizens would be even more sensitive to any potential change in the government than an average citizen in the countryside would be.

Mt 21:12-13 – Here, Jesus has a “There’s a new sheriff in town” moment. That the authorities did not try to stop Him indicates that they weren’t sure whether the citizenry would side with them or Jesus. The Old Testament quotation Jesus gave as a justification of His action was a mash-up of Isaiah 56:7 and Jeremiah 7:11. The contrast of “house of prayer” with “robbers’ den” was graphic and sharp; its force would not be lost on the people present…or the authorities. For Mark’s perspective on this Isaiah/Jeremiah combination see Mk 11:15-18 and for Luke’s see Lk 19:45-46. For other such combinations, see BSN notes on Mt 27:9-10 below and the ones on Mk 1:2-3 as well.

Mt 21:14 – How many candidates for king could heal the blind? If you were a 1st-century Jew looking for God to deliver Israel from Roman oppression through His Messiah, can you imagine a more impressive resume than the one Jesus had established?

Mt 21:15-16 – The Pharisees were always straining out gnats and swallowing camels (Mt 23:24). Notice that while the Pharisees don’t think much of children, Jesus and Matthew think about their importance quite a bit. Consider how they’ve been a topic of conversation in Mt 18, Mt 19, and again in this chapter. Jesus is quoting Psalm 8:2.

Mt 21:17 – It wasn’t safe for Jesus to spend the night in the big city, where who knows what might take place in this turbulent atmosphere and under the cover of darkness. The religious leaders will soon offer money to Judas Iscariot to locate Jesus so it’s easy to imagine that among the many neighbors one has in an urban environment there could easily be a nosy one who would eagerly report that he saw Jesus entering so-and-so’s home. Bethany was far enough from the action to avoid such intense scrutiny.

Mt 21:18-22 – Jesus here gives His disciples an audio visual aid to explain what is taking place right before their eyes during this crucial week in messianic prophecy. It is also a live action demonstration of the parable He had taught them in Luke 13:6-9. The fig tree represents the nation of Israel which was bearing no fruit for God – and had not for some time. Jesus pronounces that He will not look to it for fruit anymore. And indeed, He gave up on that nation and starting appealing to its individuals and families through His apostles on the day of Pentecost (which would take place 50 days hence). In other words, the kingdom of God would take on passengers and crew, but the ship itself was headed for shipwreck (which finally occurred in 70 AD). The disciples missed this point (because they still didn’t understand that Jesus was going to have to die and be resurrected in order to become king), and focused instead on His physical feat of making the tree shrivel…so Jesus used the opportunity to teach them about faith. (If our minds are closed to learning about one subject, Jesus will teach us on ones to which we’re more open.) If human words can have this much power, imagine how Adam could have farmed if he had not sinned. Instead of working the land by the sweat of his brow (Gen 3:19), he could have tended trees and leveled land by speaking his desires with faith in God.

Mt 21:23-27 – See BSN comments on Mk 11:27-33, which addresses this incident. (The only thing I will add to those comments is that we ourselves get bound up in double-mindedness and indecision when we insist on instant answers from the Lord and don’t take the time necessary to identify and iron out kinks in our own thinking.)

Mt 21:28-32 – Matthew adds some further explanation by Jesus that Mark did not include. If we are not periodically feeling remorse and changing direction, then we have stopped growing and maturing in the Lord. Notice also that the son who was initially disobedient did not subsequently announce his regret and newfound intention to work; he simply “regretted it and went.” The Lord has heard plenty of promises from us; He just wants to see action now.

Mt 21:33-46 – I wrote extensive BSN comments on Mark’s version of this incident (Mk 12:1-12). The only thing I will add here to what I said there is that identifying the “son” in the parable as the “heir” is significant. Jesus is called “the heir of all things” in Hebrews 1:1-2. This is a foreshadowing of Jesus becoming God, for that is the only possible meaning of “heir of all things.” The disciples’ minds were busy with many other concerns at that time, so this little point would have escaped their notice. But having had two millennia to reflect on the Lord’s visitation to planet earth, we have no excuse for not fully realizing this. (The concept of a trinity is only a partial recognition of it; if you’re doubtful see the book I wrote about this: 300 Reasons to Worship Christ and Not a Trinity.)

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Matthew 22

Today’s chapter begins with Jesus telling another parable intended to help explain the kingdom of heaven. This parable identifies two types of people who do not receive the benefits of attending a wedding feast: 1) those who reject their invitation to it, and 2) those who are themselves rejected when they fail to prepare properly for such a feast. Thus we should accept our invitation to the kingdom, and also not assume that nothing is required of us to participate in it.

The chapter then describes several memorable encounters Jesus had with challengers. These opponents had obviously spent a lot of time preparing their respective rhetorical traps with great care. Jesus, on the other hand, was able to answer them spontaneously in ways they never expected. Remember that we are in the final week of Jesus’ earthly life, and the setting is Jerusalem near the temple where crowds would gather. Those who approached Him with the intention of humiliating Him in public that week walked away so humiliated themselves that they never approached Him again – except to kill Him.

Mt 22:1 – Ps 78:2 foreshadows God’s use of this teaching method during His visitation .

Mt 22:2-7 – This is a picture of the world to this very day. Indeed, the wicked city has killed so many of the king’s slaves that it’s hard to find any of them anymore. The hearts of men have grown cold because lawlessness has increased (Mt 24:12), and the king’s slaves who remain are cowering in the shadows like Peter – too confused and afraid to admit that they know the king, much less sound forth boldly the message of his invitation. Meanwhile, the wicked city is ablaze with judgment, but its citizens are too blind and dull to see and hear what’s going on.

Mt 22:8-10 – The king sent his slaves first to those people most worthy to attend, which is also to say those most likely to attend. Such people have prospered under the king’s reign and have the most reason to heed his messengers. When such people don’t respond to repeated invitations, the king opens the doors to everyone.

Mt 22:11-13 – To come to the wedding feast in an inappropriate manner is as disrespectful as not coming at all. That’s why the man who didn’t wear wedding clothes ended up in the same place as those who turned up their noses at the invitation.

Mt 22:14 – The Lord calls every human being into His kingdom, but only those who come in the appropriate manner are allowed to stay. (This doesn’t mean everyone won’t go to heaven; it means that everyone doesn’t experience the benefits of the kingdom of heaven while on earth, and neither is everyone assigned the same glory in heaven as everyone else. For a fuller explanation, see the book The Implications of Everyone Going to Heaven.)

Mt 22:15-22 – Rendering to Caesar and to God

Mt 22:15 – The Pharisees had so many opportunities to learn from Jesus, but they squandered those opportunities by seeking only to win an argument with Him. The outcome was they did not learn anything and they didn’t win any arguments either.

Mt 22:16 – The Pharisees didn’t even go to Jesus themselves. They sent surrogates. They also compromised their own convictions by allying with their adversaries the Herodians. (The Pharisees were zealous for the Law of Moses, but Herod and the Herodians were only zealous for Herod.) Their flattering of Jesus before posing their trick question to Him is vomit-inducing.

Mt 22:17 – The design of the question was to catch Jesus no matter what His answer. If He said to pay the poll-tax, they could accuse him of collusion with the Romans which would alienate Him from the Jews; if He said to not pay it, then it would arouse the Romans against Him. If He equivocated or declined to answer, it would generate suspicion among both Jews and the Romans.

Mt 22:18-21 – Jesus’ answer is beautiful beyond measure. It not only grants that if you benefit from use of the king’s coin, it’s only fitting that you pay something to support it, but it also makes one of the most profound points that could ever be made on any subject: that every human being is made in the image of God (Gen 1:26-27). Most people today don’t seem to believe that human beings are made in the image of anything – they’re just the evolving result of random mutation and natural selection that fosters survival of the fittest. Ugh! No wonder abortion is one of secularism’s sacraments. Thus did Jesus’ answer turn everyone’s focus from worldly concerns to a far more important and true one. Every human being is a reminder of God the Creator.

Mt 22:22 – Since Jesus gave an answer for which the questioners were not prepared, they saw no benefit in continuing the conversation. But the watching crowd had been given plenty to chew on.

Mt 22:23-33 – The Sadducees’ Dilemma (To address this passage, I’m going to copy and paste, with some editing, parts of Chapter 7 in The Biblical Case for Everyone Going to Heaven.)

Mt 22:23 – The Sadducees represented a minority opinion in Israel that there would be no resurrection. They were a small but powerful group. Though they disagreed with the Pharisees on resurrection, they fully agreed with the Pharisees that Jesus of Nazareth was a menace. Both parties sought to discredit Him as He taught before large crowds in the temple area by asking Him questions designed to embarrass Him. On this occasion, the Sadducees approached Jesus with a question that they were sure would cause Him to lose face in front of the multitude that was listening to Him.

Mt 22:24 – First, they give Jesus the respectful greeting of “Teacher” (this is, of course, to set Him up for a fall in front of the crowd). Then they begin describing the problem. They quote a passage from Moses (Deut 25:5). This marital regulation may seem unusual to us today, but let’s avoid the temptation to study it because that would be a digression. Suffice it to say that it was indeed a part of Moses’ law to the Israelites and therefore was to be obeyed by them. Since Moses was considered authoritative by everyone present, this allowed the Sadducees to set up their question for maximum embarrassment to Jesus.

Mt 22:25-28 – You see now that it was not the regulation itself that was being questioned, but its seeming inconsistency with the idea of resurrection. The Sadducees were pointing out that if a Jewish family tried to obey God in a case like this, they would have quite a problem on their hands come resurrection day. Of course, the “seven” brothers exaggerates and dramatizes the dilemma but that’s fair game in a discussion like this. The Sadducees’ point is that the Scriptures are not implying resurrection, but rather that this life is all there is. We can suppose that the Sadducees considered their argument airtight, and that it was their very best one. People usually go up against the best with their best. However, to the amazement of everyone present, Jesus showed no hesitation in answering.

Mt 22:29-30 –  Can you hear the crowd gasp, see their jaws drop, and don’t you even feel your own heart in your throat as you hear the word “heaven”? “Heaven, did He say?” “Yes, dear, I think He said ‘heaven’.” “Oh my God!” We in the 21st century must pause and let ourselves hear what that crowd had just heard…in the way that they heard it! Being two thousand years from the scene and having some exposure to the good news of Jesus Christ, we today are somewhat insulated from the wondrous and thrilling shock they felt as they heard that the dead would not merely rise to earth again, but all the way to heaven! This was unexpected and unheard of. These Jews were doing good to maintain hope that the dead would be raised at all, especially in the face of disapproval from respected scholars such as the Sadducees. To hear that they and their loved ones would be in heaven once the resurrection occurred was more than anyone had hoped for (and certainly more than the Sadducees had ever contemplated). In the swirl of events that week, this deliriously joyful hope would momentarily be lost. But when the crucified Jesus of Nazareth came bolting out of the grave three days after His death, that hope came bolting out with Him. And when He ascended into heaven forty days after that, hearts were ablaze with excited hope that indeed this resurrection led to…heaven.

Mt 22:31-32 – This part of Jesus’ answer is anticlimactic. It’s necessary because Jesus wants to fully answer the Sadducees’ question. But we should not let the lead be buried – resurrection was going to lead to heaven! (There is a point to be made about these two verses and I make it in the BSN notes on Mk 12:26-27.)

Mt 22:33 – The crowds were “astonished at His teaching” not so much because Jesus had bested the Sadducees just as He had the Pharisees earlier this day, but because of Jesus’ bold declaration that resurrection led somewhere that no one was expecting.

Mt 22:34-40 – The Pharisees haven’t had enough, so they caucus and come up with another question which they are sure – once again – will either stump Jesus or bring him disfavor from this or that faction in the crowds. Jesus gives a twofer answer that no one wants to contest. We have to know what the second greatest commandment is in order to properly understand the greatest. I explain how these two commandments fit together as well as how the Ten Commandments fit with them in the book The Ten Commandments According to Jesus.

Mt 22:41-46 – Note how biblically literate these 1st-century Jews were, even though they didn’t have the many advantages available to us. For example, Jesus could quote Psalm 110:1 without having to give chapter and verse numbers. Of course, they did not have chapter and verse numbers at that time. Nevertheless, they knew the passage Jesus was quoting and they all knew it was from a messianic psalm – that is, a psalm pointed to the Messiah. If they hadn’t known that, they could have simply rejected Jesus’ quotation as irrelevant. ***** Mark also reports on this exchange; please see BSN notes on Mk 12:35-37.

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Matthew 23

Jesus encountered many critics during the course of His earthly ministry – the most notable of which were the Pharisees. They were the strictest Jewish religious sect at that time. They wielded significant political power as well. They are mentioned 31 times in the Gospel of Matthew alone, and a total of almost 90 times in the four Gospels taken together. – more often than any other Jewish religious or political group. With few exceptions, the Pharisees were unified in their opposition to – and hatred of – Jesus.

Because the Pharisees were enemies of Jesus, their name carries a negative connotation in our day, but that name was highly respected in Jesus’ day. In the 1st century, that is, the Pharisees were deemed to be the Jews most faithful to God’s truth and the most zealous for His ways. Today’s chapter was therefore an incredibly shocking indictment at the time Jesus spoke it. Jesus was calling them out for preaching things that they themselves did not practice. Jesus was saying that their reputation for piety was undeserved…and they hated Him all the more for telling the truth about them. They had to shut Him up before He won over any more converts.

The Pharisees may have departed the scene, but there are always hypocrites in the earth. This entire chapter is given to describing the characteristics of hypocrisy, and there is no other single chapter in the Bible that deals with hypocrisy this extensively. We need to study it periodically and carefully so that we do not give Jesus cause to call us hypocrites. Hypocrisy can infect any of us, and we must always be on guard against it. It spreads like leaven (Lk 12:1). Jesus never gave hypocrisy even a toehold in His life, which, among other reasons, made Him worthy to be the world’s savior.

Mt 23:1-3 – The Pharisees skipped the second step in Ezra’s three-step formula for ministry (Ezra 7:10) – which was doing (1 study the Bible, 2 do it, 3 teach it). By contrast, Jesus practiced what He preached. (Men, we should teach our children not out of what we’ve read in the Bible, but rather out of what we’ve read and practiced in the Bible. Otherwise, we’re being hypocrites and, thereby, teaching them to be hypocrites. On how bad this is, see Mt 23:15 and the note on it below.)

Mt 23:4 – What a sharp contrast between this kind of behavior and Jesus’ behavior. Jesus does not lay heavy burdens on men’s shoulders; rather, His “burden is easy” and His “yoke is light” (Mt 11:28-30). And as far as being willing to help us with our burdens, He carries us all on His shoulders.

Mt 23:5 – See Mt 6:1-18 (especially the first verse, which is the headline of the entire passage) and the BSN notes on it above for the antidote to this problem.

Mt 23:6-7 – The signs of honor that preachers seek in the 21st century are different from the signs of honor that preachers sought in the 1st century – but the differences are only superficial. The same motivations and temptations are there, and they are not hard to recognize.

Mt 23:8-10 – These three verses make a triad. They all speak about Messiah – Jesus. (We must keep learning about Him; He is the point of the whole Bible.) ***** (Don’t follow the followers of the Leader – follow the Leader! Above all, don’t follow self-described followers of the Leader who don’t actually follow the Leader, but rather just follow each other.)

Mt 23:8 – Jesus is the Teacher (prophesied in Is 30:20). The purpose of gospel preachers like me is to tell other students how to get to class. That is, the preacher must be a student himself. And the preacher must be willing to raise up offspring for his fallen older brother (Gen 38:8-10). (By the way, “rabbi” = teacher, and student = “disciple”.) This is why I push you to read the Bible for yourself (Bible Reader’s Toolkit). 

Mt 23:9 – Jesus was already acting as a father with the apostles for He had adopted them. However, He would not be their heavenly Father until after He had been raised from the dead and had ascended into heaven and had taken the throne of heaven at the Second Coming. Only then would He be the “Eternal Father” that Isaiah had prophesied (Is 9:6). 

Mt 23:10 – Jesus was and is without a doubt “the leader” (prophesied in Is 55:4). 

Mt 23:11 – Jesus is repeating here a point He had made to the disciples earlier in Mt 20:24-28; see also notes on that passage above.

Mt 23:12 – None of us will ever be able to humble ourselves as much as God humbled Himself to become one of us; that’s why none of us will ever be as exalted as He is. He deserved this exaltation without having had to work for it, but, for crying out loud, He worked for it, too! All the more reason to fall on our faces before Him!

Mt 23:13-33 – Jesus now begins a series of “woes” which apply to Pharisaical behavior. That is, these are the negative consequences of hypocrisy. They are awful…and well worth avoiding.

Mt 23:13-14 – Jesus begins with a shocker. It’s not that there are hypocrites in the kingdom of God – it’s that hypocrites only think they’re in the kingdom of God. That’s a double whammy! 1) They’re outside the kingdom, and 2) they don’t even know it! This is why hypocrites are confused people. And you cannot help them gain any clarity until they’re willing to forsake their hypocrisy because the hypocrisy and confusion go together like garbage and stink. In fact, it’s appropriate to think of hypocrisy as stinkin’ thinkin’. It is disorder in the self because we were designed that our thoughts, words, and actions should all align in the same way that the vertebrae in our backs should all align. When things are out of alignment, nothing goes well.

Mt 23:15 – See related note on Mt 23:1-3 above. Consider also that if we’re hypocrites, our children won’t be as bad as us – they’ll be twice as bad! (Jesus’ reference to “hell” is not about the afterlife, but rather about the miseries and terrors that can come on us in this life. Let us therefore be “sons of heaven” by avoiding hypocrisy!)

Mt 23:16-22 – Hypocrites are like little children who say “Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in my eye.” That is, they want to certify certain statements they make as trustworthy. But God wants every single word that comes out of our mouths to be trustworthy! If we have to take an oath, or make a vow, or swear with our right hand on the Bible before we’re willing to be held accountable for our words, then we’re just looking for ways to get away with lying.

Mt 23:23-24 – Hypocrites major on minors.

Mt 23:25-26 – Hypocrites don’t live by faith, which is why they don’t try to clean their hearts.

Mt 23:27-28 – Hypocrites look for the approval of men because when we don’t sense God’s approval, we seek it elsewhere – for we are wired with the need for approval as we are wired with the need for food. 

Mt 23:29-33 – Like generals, hypocrites always fight the last war. The Pharisees portrayed themselves as defenders of the prophets while they were attacking the prophet in their midst. 

Mt 23:34-36 – Jesus now sums up His indictment of the Pharisees. When He says “all these things,” He’s talking about all the woes He’s been describing. That is, these woes are going to come on the Pharisees in that generation. Indeed, the Romans destroyed Jerusalem almost 40 years later in 70 AD. Of course, the Sadducees and scribes were included in this indictment because it applied to all those who had their hands on the levers of powers in Israel’s institutions.

Mt 23:37-39 – Jesus goes on to make clear that He takes no satisfaction in this awful outcome for Israel. This nation was His creation: He had seeded it through Abraham, birthed it through Moses, and preserved it through the prophets. He had done everything He could to spare His nation from destruction – but they would not have it! (Why are we so hard-headed when the Lord tells us to repent? Why is America forfeiting its divine ties as documented in its Declaration of Independence and Constitution?) Many individual Jews were being saved, and, in fact, almost everyone being saved in the Gospels and in the first 9 chapters of the book of Acts were Jews because preaching to Gentiles didn’t even begin until Acts 10. But the nation of Israel was being abandoned by God because they preferred what He had given them rather than preferring Him. Going forward, His house would be the church, it, too, would give way to something greater – the kingdom of God. And the church leaders would do just what we see the Pharisees doing – clinging to what God had given instead of clinging to God Himself. As Israel refused to believe that Messiah had come, the church has refused to believe that He has come again. For explanation, read the book The Biblical Case for the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact; or, if you’d prefer to start with something shorter, read Jesus Christ Has Already Come Again which takes less than five minutes for an average reader to read. As for us today, God forbid that we should ever love anything Jesus Christ has given us more than we love Him (Mt 10:37-39). ***** See also BSN: The Posture of Jesus.

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Matthew 24

The physical pride and joy of Israel in the 1st century AD was the complex of temple buildings in Jerusalem. While physically present there, in what would be Jesus’ final visit to the city, His disciples were admiring the buildings and inviting Jesus to share His perspective on the sights – almost as if they were all sightseers. Jesus tells them that this site which so inspires their awe will not even remain standing by the end of their generation.

By this point in their association with Jesus, the disciples are convinced that He is Israel’s long-promised and long-awaited special king: the Messiah. Since the temple complex included the king’s quarters, they would be assuming that Jesus would soon be dwelling here, with them residing somewhere in the complex as well or at least nearby; but now that He is telling them that everything will be destroyed, they must assume that Jesus – and they – would have to fight violently and heroically to put Him on the throne, and that, in that struggle for control, the temple complex would be destroyed. In any case, they were confused and uncertain. We know from other passages that at this point they still didn’t comprehend exactly what He meant by “rising from the dead.” Therefore, they ask Jesus about the sequence of events that would lead to what they saw as His taking control of the nation – which would be the end of the prior age and beginning of the new one.

This chapter consists of Jesus’ answer to these questions from His disciples. Jesus’ response was not what the disciples were expecting to hear or even something that they fully understood at the time He gave it. (They were probably overwhelmed by His response, which would explain why we don’t see follow-questions from them.) One thing Jesus did make clear to them that day, however, is that all the events He was describing would take place in that century. In other words, whatever was meant by Jesus “coming” and “the end of the age,” these were things that would occur before their generation passed away. Why so many people have tried to definitively interpret the somewhat enigmatic statements in this chapter while ignoring that very plain statement is an enigma itself. We’re not going to understand hard-to-understand parts if the Bible if we ignore the easy-to-understand parts.

The contents of this chapter parallel the content in Mark 13 and Luke 21. Regardless of which of these three Gospels is being discussed, because almost all the dialogue takes place on the Mount of Olives, it is sometimes called “the Olivet Discourse.”

Mt 24:1-51 – Rather than repeat here what I’ve written on the Olivet Discourse in Mark’s Gospel, please see the BSN notes there. Note, however, that Matthew continues his record of this conversation in the next chapter and I do make some comments there.

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Matthew 25

This chapter simply continues – without a break – the answer Jesus was giving His disciples in Matthew 24. This is one of those transitions from one chapter to another where, as sometimes happens with latitude and longitude lines of a globe, the navigational aid becomes more distracting than helpful. That said, the solution is not to remove or change the chapter-and-verse divisions, but rather to just regard them as what they are (aids to identify and locate a text) and not regard them as more than that (dividers and organizers of an author’s thoughts).

The three parables Jesus tells back-to-back are an indication that the coming of the Lord was to be a spiritual rather than a physical event. The spiritual insight being offered by these parables would hardly seem necessary if Jesus’ coming was to have been a worldwide physical spectacle. Therefore, the expectation that 1) Jesus’ return is still future as of the 21st century, and 2) will be a physical, tangible appearance is doubly wrong (Lk 17:20-21).

The contrast in focus between the beginning of the Olivet discourse (in Matthew 24), and the end (in Matthew 25) is striking. In the beginning, the focus was on glorious buildings; in the end, it is on simple acts of kindness, such as feeding the hungry and giving drink to the thirsty. The tower of Babel was all about human effort and glory, but our part in the kingdom of God is to perform humble acts that comfort and help.

As for the three parables that comprise Matthew 25, Jesus’ role is central in all three. We see Him first as a bridegroom, then as an employer, and finally as a king.

Mt 25:1-13 – The Parable of the Bridegroom – At the end of the previous chapter (Mt 24:42-51), Jesus was exhorting His disciples to “be on the alert.” Therefore, it stands to reason that He would follow that exhortation with this parable, which focuses on that very point.

Mt 25:14-30 – The Parable of the Employer – In the next parable, Jesus emphasizes to His disciples that they should be actively preparing for, and working toward, His return – not idly and passively waiting for it. While we no longer need to wait for the kingdom to come, we can respond to this parable by actively preparing for and working toward His judgment of our work on earth that will take place when we die and go to heaven. As they say, “Don’t get caught watchin’ the paint dry.”

Mt 25:31-46 – The Parable of the King – The last of the three parables emphasizes Jesus’ authority and that His kingdom is manifested in humble acts of mercy – not grand buildings as we saw in the beginning of this Olivet Discourse (Mt 24:1-2). Those who see the spirituality of the kingdom would find comfort in this point, while those who stayed focus on physical things would find themselves left outside the kingdom’s protective confines. Though the kingdom is in our midst, we must still prepare for our judgment in the transition from this world to heaven above. Therefore, let’s get busy with “good deeds to meet pressing needs” (Tit 3:14) because our time on earth, no matter how long we live here, is short.

For a more thorough explanation the Olivet Discourse, see the book The Biblical Case for the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact (especially the second chapter).

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Matthew 26

This chapter is long – relative to the others in Matthew. It covers the fateful events that occurred the night before Jesus died – including the Passover meal He shared with His disciples (that is also called the Last Supper). How Jesus kept His faith in God through this crucible should be a subject of intense interest for us (Heb 12:1-3; 1 Pet 2:21-23) because we need strong faith, too.

Mt 26:1-2 – In retrospect, it is startling how little of the messianic plan the disciples understood…even though Jesus told them key aspects in Caesarea Philippi (Mt 16:21), and repeated them at least twice (Mt 17:22-23 and Mt 20:17-19). And He’s repeating the crucifixion part again here. Yet they were caught completely off guard when it happened. (Forewarned is forearmed.)

Mt 26:3-5 – Like the prophets of old, Jesus knew what His enemies were speaking even in what they thought were their most private meetings. (The servants of the king of Aram had to tell him that the reason the Israelites were able to foil all his plans was that “Elisha, the prophet who is in Israel, tells the king of Israel the words that you speak in your bedroom” – 2 King 6:11-12.)

Mt 26:6-13 – Every time anyone reads this passage, the prophecy Jesus made in verse 13 is fulfilled.

Mt 26:14-16 – Like Judah before him, Judas saw a way to profit from the sale of a brother (Gen 37:25-28); though, unlike Judah, Judas faced a situation where this brother was worth more dead than alive. ***** Hundreds of years before, the prophet Zechariah hinted at what was taking place here (Zech 11:12-13); Matthew makes explicit reference to this prophecy in the next chapter (Mt 27:3-10).

Mt 26:17-19 – Like the woman with “an alabaster vial of very costly perfume,” this “certain man” has become famous by his service. These are the kind of celebrities who’ll light up heaven.

Mt 26:20-30 – The Last Supper

Mt 26:20-25 – Jesus foretells that He will be betrayed. This is yet another way to help the disciples understand that the crucifixion was not Plan B for the Messiah. God knew what He was getting Himself into.

Mt 26:26-30 – We call this the Last Supper, and that’s fine; but we should never lose sight of the fact that Jesus and the twelve were Jewish men and this was a Passover meal and the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread – both feasts prescribed by Moses. More to the point, this was the most momentous of such feasts – even more momentous that the very first ones celebrated on the eve of the Israelites leaving the slavery of Egypt. For this meal was to commemorate the departure from the slavery of sin that was about to be inaugurated for the entire human race.

Mt 26:31-35 – Whenever I read this passage, I like to remind myself that while everyone knows of Peter’s well-intended but utterly foolish and embarrassing boast, Matthew is humble enough to point out that all of them – which would have included Matthew – said what Peter did.

Mt 26:36-56 – Gethsemane

Mt 26:36-38 – Jesus didn’t ask all the disciples to pray with Him – only three. This makes their failure to stay awake all the more notable. That is, the three who were closest to Him were undependable in the time of His greatest need. (Therefore, let us not become discouraged if, when we go through a great personal trial, those from whom we expect the most support disappoint us.)  

Mt 26:39-44 – This is Jesus, as always, practicing what He preaches. What I’m specifically referring to is how we can see Him following the pattern He laid down for us in the Lord’s Prayer (Mt 6 and Lk 11) – praying to His Father in heaven and subjecting His will to that of His Father.

Mt 26:45-46 – Jesus gives the needed reproof without resentment…and then keeps on trucking.

Mt 26:47-50 – Judas demonstrates how strong was the hold Satan had on his heart; otherwise, Judas might have said to the authorities, “Look, guys, I’ll lead you to him and I’ll take the money, but, for crying out loud, I’m not going to do it with a gesture of personal warmth; what kind of creep do you think I am?” Instead, Judas volunteers to identify Jesus by kissing Him. That was Satan speaking at that point; Judas had yielded completely to him. As the apostle John wrote, Satan “entered into Judas” while they were eating the meal earlier that night (Jn 13:27). 

Mt 26:51 – Matthew doesn’t single Peter out, but later on John (who was closer to Peter than Matthew was) reveals it was Peter who swung the sword (John 18:10-11). I think both men had good motives for their different choices. (The Lord looks at the heart, so you and I can behave differently without one of us necessarily being more righteous than the other.)

Mt 26:52-54 – Jesus makes clear that no one caught Him off guard that night, and neither did anyone overpower Him. He meant it when He prayed earlier, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” The only reason He was being taken prisoner was that He had had settled in His mind during that prayer that this was what His Father wanted to happen.

Mt 26:55-56 – Ever prodding people to think instead of just acting mindlessly, Jesus asks the crowds why this arrest is taking place at night when it could have been made easier and sooner in daylight. All that the religious authorities, the soldiers, and Judas were doing that night was being done mindlessly – they were only following their emotions, the main one being fear.  Jesus wants thinking followers, not dull ones.

Mt 26:54, 56 – The Scriptures, the Scriptures, the Scriptures! As Jesus was a man of the book, let us be men of the book. As He was an “as it is written” kind of guy, let us be “as it is written” kind of guys. To attempt to serve Jesus without the Bible is like going to war without a weapon. 

Mt 26:57-68 – The Trial

Mt 26:57-58 – “Peter was following Him at a distance” – We all know that Jesus said, “Follow Me.” But if we follow Him “at a distance,” we’re going to miss more than if we follow Him closely.

Mt 26:59-62 – If the Council had anything on Jesus, it surely would have come out at this point in the trial. When an accuser cannot produce evidence of the accusations, it’s time to stop prosecuting the accused and start prosecuting the accuser. Alas, these leaders were not righteous enough to take this course. They knew the verdict they were going to render; they we just looking for an excuse to render it.

Mt 26:63-64 – The high priest finally stumbles his way to the $64 question: “Are you the Messiah?” Jesus gives an emphatic yes with two well-known messianic scriptures: Psalm 110:1 and Daniel 7:13-14 (FJOT). The first one speaks to Jesus being raised from the dead and seated at God’s right hand, and the second speaks to the Second Coming (that is, the coming of the kingdom of God). These are the two bookends around the events recorded in Acts through Revelation. Both events occurred within one generation. Neither of these two events could be viewed with physical, earthly eyes. The events of Jesus’ 30+ years on earth should give us more than enough faith to believe in these two heavenly events. 

Mt 26:65-68 – Ha! These highly-educated leaders manage to convict a man and sentence Him to death for…telling the truth.

Mt 26:69-75 – Peter never sees this coming until it’s over – even though Jesus had spelled out the prophecy for him and the others in verses 31-35! (If we read the Bible more carefully, we’ll be surprised less often in life.)

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Matthew 27

Today’s chapter is almost as long as yesterday’s. This chapter covers the day Jesus died, or, to be more precise about it, the day He was executed as a criminal. The execution, by the gruesome means of crucifixion, was justified by both the Jews and the Romans as the appropriate government response to Jesus having claimed to be Israel’s long-promised great king (“Messiah”). Yet Jesus had no army and wielded no sword – why were His enemies so worked up and fearful of Him? We do well to think about that.

Mt 27:1-2 – Because it was subjugated to the Roman Empire at this time, Israel did not have the rights of an independent nation. For one thing, Israel had no right to execute capital punishment, as Rome had reserved that right exclusively to it’s own government. Since the ruling body of Israel – the Council (also known as the Sanhedrin) – wanted Jesus dead, they had to go to the Romans to achieve that goal. Pontius Pilate was the Roman governor of Judea at this time, so he had to give the order. Judea was the central region of Israel and Jerusalem was its capital. That city is where the last week of Jesus’ earthly life was spent.

Mt 27:3-10 – The remorse of Judas Iscariot, as strong as it was, included no sign of repentance; instead, he chose to kill himself. A similar but milder form of this kind of remorse is ascribed to Esau in Heb 12:15-17 (see also associated BSN note) because he was sorrowful to the point of tears about missing out on God’s benefits, but never sorry enough to repent (that is, change). Paul defines the kind of sorrow that Judas and Esau exhibit as “the sorrow of the world [that] produces death,” which he distinguishes from “the sorrow that is according to the will of God” that produces a repentance that leads to salvation in 2 Cor 7:9-11 (see that passage and associated BSN note for more explanation).

Mt 27:9-10 – Matthew seems to be quoting a mash up (combination) of Zechariah 11:11-13 and Jeremiah 19:1-13 (or possibly Jer 18:2-12 or Jer 32:6-9) but only referencing the major prophet. For further discussion on this practice, see OT Quotations in Combination.

Mt 27:11-14 – Jesus admitted at His trial by the Jews that He was the Messiah (Mt 26:62-64). Messiah was prophesied to be, among other things, Israel’s king. This gave the Sanhedrin the basis for asking the Romans for the death penalty because another Jewish king would be considered, in and of itself, seditious activity against Roman authority. Hence the emphasis on calling Jesus the “King of the Jews.”

Mt 27:15-18 – Pontius Pilate knew what was going on, but not because he was a righteous man. On the contrary, he was known as a savvy and savage political animal. His main concern was to keep the population in order because that’s what his Roman superiors expected of its regional governors. Pilate just wanted to find out whether the crowds were going to side with the chief priests and the elders…or with Jesus. That would tell him whom to appease.

Mt 27:19-23 – Pilate’s wife showed more interest in righteousness than he did. By this time, the chief priests and elders had won over the crowds, and worked them into a mob-like state of bloodlust.

Mt 27:24-26 – In a classic political move, Pilate sends an intentionally mixed message: that is, Pilate declares that his hands are clean of the blood of Jesus at the same time he is giving the order for the execution. No one challenges Pilate over the obvious contradiction because, by this time, the majority wanted Jesus’ death more than they wanted anything else.

Mt 27:27-31 – Crucifixion itself should be humiliating enough, but the Roman soldiers mocked Him, beat Him, and spat on Him. The Jewish guards had done the same things to him the night before (Mt 26:67-68).

Mt 27:32 – Mark’s Gospel (Mk 15:21 with accompanying BSN note) mentions Simon’s two sons by name as if Mark expected his readers to know the two men, at least by reputation. Thus it’s likely that even though Simon was from North Africa (which is where the city of Cyrene was located, in present-day Libya, and where there was a large Jewish population) and was only a passer-by that day (perhaps having made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover), that the experience had a profound effect on him and his family. There’s an ever so brief mention of a Rufus and his mother who may be related in Rom 16:13 (see accompanying BSN note as well). ***** A Roman cross weighed 30-40 pounds and Jesus’ scourging and beating had caused Him to lose a lot of blood; so assistance from a passer-by was probably required to get Him to the execution site alive. One of the main purposes of a crucifixion was to have a long, drawn-out death scene, and that couldn’t happen if the prisoner died before getting there.

Mt 27:22-39 – Jesus fulfills psalms that the people had been hearing read in their synagogues since they were children (Acts 13:27). Yet they’re too blind to see what’s right in front of their eyes (Mt 13:13-15; 15:14).

Mt 27:33-34 – Psalm 69:21 reads “They also gave me gall for my food And for my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.”

Mt 27:35-37 – Psalm 22:18 reads “They divide my garments among them, And for my clothing they cast lots.”

Mt 27:38-39 – Psalm 109:25 reads “I also have become a reproach to them; When they see me, they wag their head.”

Mt 27:40 – This is the same way Satan tempted Jesus in the wilderness: “If you are the Son of God…” (See Mt 4:3, 6.)

Mt 27:41-44 – Yet another Psalm fulfillment (messianic prophecy) here, for Psalm 22:8 reads “Commit yourself to the Lord; let Him deliver him; Let Him rescue him, because He delights in him” (FJOT).

Mt 27:45 – From noon until 3 pm.

Mt 27:46-49 – Jesus is reciting Ps 22 from its opening lines. We do not know how far He got – maybe just this line. He is speaking in Aramaic because that was the everyday language of the Jews in Israel at that time; Hebrew was reserved for the priests and scribes. Some of the people thought, by the sound of Jesus’ first two words, that He was crying out for Elijah the prophet – whom the Scriptures has associated with the coming of Messiah in Mal 4:5-6. Jesus had already explained the Elijah reference to His disciples in Mt 11:14 (see accompanying BSN note above).

Mt 27:50 – “Thank you, Lord.” (We can never say thank you enough for what He did.)

Mt 27:51-54 – There were plenty of signs given – it’s just that a lot of people weren’t paying attention to them. ***** (Those people who came out of the graves went back after the appearances for the dead would not be raised from Sheol (Hades) to heaven until the Second Coming.) ***** The centurion guard might not have understood all he was witnessing, and he might not have understood all that the Scriptures meant by the messianic title “Son of God,” (FJOT) but he knew this Man was unlike any other man he had ever executed.

Mt 27:55-56 – Matthew demonstrates that true appreciation of women does not involve the attitudes of feminism.

Mt 27:57-61 – This fulfills yet another OT messianic prophecy: “His grave was assigned with wicked men, Yet He was with a rich man in His death, Because He had done no violence, Nor was there any deceit in His mouth” – Is 53:9 (FJOT).

Mt 27:62-66 – The authorities needn’t have feared that Jesus’ disciples would steal His body in order to perpetrate a hoax about His resurrection. The disciples didn’t believe Jesus was going to rise any more than the authorities did! For none of the disciples were waiting at the tomb on the third day to see Him come out. No one! The faithful women were the only ones who came looking that Sunday morning, and even they weren’t looking for Him to rise; they just came to give His body a more suitable preparation for burial than they had time to give this day. Jesus did what He promised to do even when no one believed He would do it. Faith doesn’t make God do things; rather, it allows us to see how He’s keeping His promises (Jer 17:5-8; Rom 3:3-4).

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Matthew 28

After two long chapters depicting Jesus’ suffering, we now have a very short final chapter in Matthew’s Gospel depicting Jesus’ resurrection from the dead on the third day after His crucifixion. The suffering of Jesus – gruesome and humiliating as it was – took place over a couple of days, but His glory was just beginning with the resurrection. That glory has grown and grown, and will continue to grow, throughout all eternity.

Matthew has brought us a long way in his Gospel of Jesus. In the beginning, Jesus was just an unseen embryo miraculously placed in the womb of a young woman. In the end, He was Israel’s triumphant king – Messiah – victorious over death. Both Messiah’s beginning and end were unprecedented in human history…but extensively prophesied, foreshadowed, and hinted at in the Jewish Scriptures. His life – as outlined in the Old Testament and as described and explained in the New Testament – is more than worthy of worldwide human attention.

The resurrection of Jesus from the dead obviously triggered a transition in God’s communication strategy. In Matthew 10, Jesus told His disciples to take His message only to Jews, and in Matthew 15 He told a Gentile woman that the same sort of limitation existed even on His own personal ministry. But now, as a resurrected man and soon-to-be ascended Lord at the right hand of God, Jesus sends His disciples out to take His teaching to the whole world. Jesus resurrection thus marked the beginning of Messiah’s glory and of its communication to the world – it was the dawn of a new and eternal age for all of creation. We who live today are privileged to be a part of that unfolding glory.

Mt 28:1 – Day 1) Jesus was crucified on Friday, Day 2) the Jewish sabbath was on Saturday, and Day 3) Jesus came out of the grave on Sunday. Thus Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day. ***** The women had not come expecting to see a risen Jesus. They just came to continue the treatment of His body for a more permanent burial. They were rushed on Friday when all their work had to be completed by sundown because that was when the sabbath began. That is, the Jewish sabbath has always been from Friday sundown to Saturday sundown.

Mt 28:2-4 – Shock and awe!

Mt 28:5-7 – This is a message for the ages…and women get to be the first to hear it! Just as they are the first to receive every single human being who has come into the world since Adam – including Jesus.

Mt 28:5 – The first thing the angel tells the women is not to be afraid because being afraid would be their natural reaction to someone whose “appearance was like lightning,” whose clothing was “white as snow,” and whose entrance was accompanied by a severe earthquake. The next thing the angel does – and this, too, would be to settle these women’s hearts – is tell them he knows why they are there. 

Mt 28:6 – The angel next tells the women three things, each one very important:

“He is not here…” – Momentarily, he’ll invite them in to demonstrate this fact.

“…for He has risen…” – Meaning, among other things, He’s not dead anymore!

“…just as He said.” – (“You people should start paying more attention to what He says.”)   

Mt 28:7 – The women were given the privilege of being the first to tell the men. I take this to be a reward for their faithfulness to Jesus right to the end…and beyond. Part of what causes me to see it this way is the homage Matthew paid to them in Mt 27:55-56. ***** Recall that the base of operations for Jesus and His disciples was the region of Galilee in the northern part of the land of Israel. They were currently in the region of Judea, which covered the south-central part of the country; Jerusalem was the capital of Judea and of the nation. It would not be a short walk to Galilee. This meant Jesus’ resurrection had staying power. (Boy, did it!)

Mt 28:8 – Notice how wholeheartedly these women obeyed the angel’s command: “…they left the tomb quickly…and ran to report it…”

Mt 28:9 – Because the women were fully obedient to the angel’s command, they get the bonus benefit of running into Jesus on the way. ***** Peter refused worship (Act 10:25-26). Paul and Barnabas refused worship (Act 14:11-18). Even the great angel who showed the apostle John all the amazing things he saw in the book of Revelation refused worship (Rev 22:8-9). Jesus, however, did not refuse worship. Hmm. (See also verse 17 below.) #Hints

Mt 28:10 – As part of their bonus benefit, the women get to see and hear Jesus personally confirm the angel’s command. (Won’t the boys be even more flabbergasted when the girls show up with their news now!)

Mt 28:11-15 – The chief priests and elders are here exhibiting what nowadays is called “confession through projection.” That is, they plan a defense against a hare-brained scheme that the disciples would never consider undertaking: to steal Jesus’ body so they could tell everyone (falsely) that Jesus had been raised from the dead. As I said above in the note to Mt 27:62-66, the disciples themselves didn’t believe Jesus was going to rise from the dead. They didn’t even know for sure what Jesus meant when He said He would rise from the dead (Mk 9:10). And these disciples are going to try to convince a hostile world that a dead Jesus was actually alive? That’s not even plausible. What’s really going on is that the chief priests and elders are projecting onto the disciples their own mindset – which is a mindset that would stop at nothing to perpetuate a lie…because that lie keeps their power intact. By projecting the motivation for such a hoax onto the disciples, the chief priests and elders were only confessing their own end-justifies-the-means mendacity.

Mt 28:16 – (What were you thinking, Judas? It could have been twelve proceeding to Galilee!)

Mt 28:17 – As in verse 9 above, Jesus does not rebuke people who worship Him. Double hmm. There must be some reason Jesus didn’t refuse worship. #Hints

Mt 28:18 – This is what being named “Lord” means. Authority! All of it! (In other words, this is not at all like being the king of England where it’s all about fancy duds and ceremony.) ***** See this grant of authority to Jesus as foreshadowed by the grant of authority Joseph received from Pharaoh in Gen 45:8 and accompanying BSN note on that verse.

Mt 28:19 – Jesus had sent His disciples on missions into Israel, but this mission would be to all the nations. But if Jesus has all authority, then certainly all nations are within its scope. Notice also that the goal is for all these nations to become disciples (students, pupils, learners) of Jesus. In the Old Testament, only one nation was God’s – Israel. Going forward, gradually like leaven in lump of dough, all nations were to become God’s. Some people, especially in the news media today, get freaked out about America being considered a Christian nation. For crying out loud, all nations are earmarked to become Christian nations! ***** Both God and the Holy Spirit were revealed in the Old Testament; the Son is revealed in the New Testament. As God the Father was handing things over to the Son, the first thing He handed over was the Holy Spirit. During His earthly ministry, Jesus was directed by the Holy Spirit, but after ascending into heaven, it was Jesus who was directing the Holy Spirit! (See Acts 2 and There Is No Trinity; There Is Christ!)

Mt 28:20 – The word “teaching” goes with the word “disciples” (verse 19), and the word “commanded” goes with the word “Lord” (verse 18). The “end of the age” is the coming of the kingdom of God. That would mark the completion of the handover from Father to Son and the fulfillment of Isaiah 9:6 which says that the Son would become the Father. (For more, see Essays on the Gospel for several titles that address this subject.)

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