Jesus has instructed His disciples that a kingdom harvest is ready but the laborers are few who are going into the fields to reap (Mt 9). Regarding their labor in those fields, Jesus gives His disciples specific instructions (in Mt 10).
Jesus has the authority to forgive sins. Authority to call a government tax collector away from his post. To abrogate fasting. Authority such that a ruler comes and kneels before him. Authority over every disease and every affliction, including death. Authority to walk into a crowd of mourners and tell them to go away. Authority over blindness, over demons, authority to teach in the synagogue and to proclaim the gospel of the kingdom. Such is the authority of Jesus
Jesus comes down from the mountain and crowds await him. The needy begin seeking Him out, those sick and dying and others with fear of dying.
In our previous post we considered the breadth of Jesus’s “Sermon on the Mount,” recorded in Matthew 5-7. Now we return to the center of the Sermon for a fuller reflection on Matt 6:9ff, often referred to as “The Lord’s Prayer.”
Chapters 5-7 of Matthew’s Gospel are well known as the “Sermon on the Mount,” the most extended recorded address, along with John 14-16, of Jesus. The Sermon is a discourse on the kingdom, a kingdom which is “at hand,” but is not yet finally and fully established. Jesus’s Sermon gives us glimpses into how things will be in that day by telling us how things should be, even today
Israel, God’s son, came out of Egypt and passed through waters of the Red Sea before being led to the wilderness, and there was tempted. Jesus, God’s son, came out of Egypt and passed through the waters of baptism before being led into the wilderness, and there was tempted
Years have passed since the return of Joseph and his family to Nazareth. The string of prophetic references, numbering five to this point, continues with a sixth citation, this on the lips of John the Baptist, quoting from the prophet Isaiah. What follows is the prophetic witness of John himself, including both a rebuke against the religious leaders and also a recognition of his cousin Jesus as one greater than he
Five times from the end of Mathew 1 through the end of Mathew 2 we hear about Jesus in relation to fulfillment of prophecies. Three are about places – Bethlehem, Egypt, and Nazareth – tracing the arc of birthplace, refuge, and home in the early life of Jesus
In Matthew 1, Jesus is the Jewish (“son of Abraham”) promised One (“son of David”), the fulfillment of that which was prophesied (v. 21, a quote of Isa 7:14), and he comes – “God with us” – to “save his people from their sins.
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