Matthew

This coming Sunday, I am preaching on the closing verses of Matthew's gospel, Matthew 28:16-20.

Here's R T France: ... Enjoy!

The risen Jesus, vindicated over those who tried to destroy him, is now established as the universal sovereign, and his realm embraces not only the whole earth, which was to be the dominion of the ‘one like a son of man’ in Daniel’s vision, but heaven as well. At the beginning of the gospel, Satan offered Jesus sovereignty over the whole earth, but his offer was refused (4:8-10); now Jesus, going the way of obedience to his Father’s will even to the cross has received far more than Satan could offer. (Page 1113)

John 8:12 is a familiar verse. It's one of Jesus' famous "I am" sayings. “I am the light of the world”, or   ̓Εγω εἱμι το φως του κοσμου.

Given which, Matthew 5:14 is a massive shock, is it not? I've read both passages many times, but never realised what a significant statement that makes Matthew 5:14: “You are the light of the world”, or   ̔Υμεις εστε το φως του κοσμου.

One of the statements in John, that we take to be one of Jesus' unique and momentous claims concerning himself, is applied to all his disciples. He is the light of the world, "I am", … and so are we!

People sometimes worry that the 4 Gospels don't tell the resurrection story in exactly the same way. This is to worry needlessly. If the 4 Gospels told the resurrection story in contradictory ways, that would be a different matter. As it is, we simply have a difference in perspective. Look at the story from different angles, you include different details and stress different things. It couldn't be otherwise. The four Gospels are not an assortment of favourite deeds of Jesus, thrown together haphazardly.

Doug Wilson's post on the star followed by the wise men is most thought-provoking and insightful.

Enjoy!

How do we pray the Psalms as new covenant Christians? What difference does it make that they have been prayed before — now not just by king David but by king Jesus?

Is there any mileage in seeing the Lord's Prayer as a key part of this answer?

See my earlier post weighing the textual options for Matthew 18:15.

Enjoying R T France’s commentary on Matthew yet again.

Reading him on Matthew 18:15-17.

I haven’t posted for ages – partly very busy, partly nothing to say.

But I thought I’d post briefly now, because this has encouraged me.

The parable of the weeds and the wheat in Matthew 13:24-30 shows (I think) that the world is a mixed place – it contains true disciples and it contains unbelievers. We need to wait until the end of the age to see truly who is who.

Doing some work on Matthew’s account of the first Palm Sunday, I’m struck again by how helpful R T France’s commentary on Matthew is.

Some highlights:

Doing some work on the birth narrative in Matthew at the moment, and enjoying the recently published commentary on Matthew by R T France.

He has a brilliant (if long) paragraph arguing that Matthew was not a poor Old Testament handler at all, but knew exactly what he was doing. So brilliant, it’s worth quoting in full (from page 45)