Overview of Matthew

The next gospel we’re going to read through is Matthew. Tradition links the author to Matthew the tax collector.

We mentioned how Matthew and Luke likely used Mark’s gospel as the framework for their gospels, so we will see a lot of similar content. But Matthew also has his own theological purposes and so there will be new material that’s added, and existing material that is changed with new or different details to fit that purpose.

When it comes to dating, this would put it after Mark, but there is much debate around whether it happened before 70 CE or after. The reason for this is the reference to the destruction of the temple in 70 CE. Others place the book as late as the 90s CE.

The author of Matthew is keen to link Jesus’ ministry to the Old Testament, and this bleeds into how the book is structured. The book opens with an introduction which ties Jesus to the line of David and unpacks the events around his birth, linking them to Old Testament prophecies. The book then ends with Jesus’ death and resurrection.

But the centre of the book, focused on Jesus’ ministry, is organised into five blocks, each ending with a section of teaching. These five blocks are to emulate the five books of the Torah.

Matthew 1-2 - Introduction: Connecting Jesus to the Old Testament

Matthew 3-25 - Blocks of Jesus’ ministry, each ending with teaching

• Matthew 3-7 - Jesus is prepared for his ministry and then starts teaching about the kingdom
• Matthew 8-10 - Jesus brings the kingdom into the lives of people and sends out his disciples to do the same
• Matthew 11-13 - The response to Jesus’ teaching and kingdom
• Matthew 14-20 - Jesus challenges expectations of what the Messiah is
• Matthew 21-25 - Jesus enters Jerusalem and clashes with the religious leaders

Matthew 26-28 - Jesus’ death and resurrection

Looking at Matthew’s theological leaning, like Mark, it names Jesus as the Messiah, the future king that the people have been waiting for. But Matthew also seeks to depict Jesus as a new Moses. There is an argument that Mark also did this, but in Matthew it is much more explicit.

We also see that it is those who are unimportant that encounter Jesus and are then transformed by him. This is linked to the upside down nature of Jesus’ kingdom, which seeks to flip the expectations of society on their head. Matthew's primary name for Jesus’s kingdom is the kingdom of heaven.

Matthew 1-2

Like Mark, Matthew sets out its stall straight away. It opens with ‘the genealogy of Jesus the Messiah’. As we said with Mark, this could also be read as ‘the genealogy of Jesus the king’. Matthew even explicitly links Jesus as a descendant of David, which was one of the qualities of the future king that the people were hoping for.

He then takes it further back and starts the genealogy from Abraham and journeys all forty-two generations from Abraham to Jesus. With each name, we are reminded of a different episode of the biblical story. There's Jacob with his twelve sons. Rahab, the prostitute that helped the Israelites defeat Jericho. We have Boaz and Ruth, David and Solomon.

Then there's the list of kings that we've read through, both in Kings and in Chronicles. And then after the exile into Babylon we have Zerubbabel, who was the governor that many of the post-exile prophets spoke about.

But what's interesting about this genealogy is that it mentions four women. Genealogies typically only acknowledged the men. But here we have Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, and Uriah's wife, also known as Bathsheba.

There are two possible explanations for this. One is that each of these women is associated with sexual sin. Tamar tricked her father-in-law into sleeping with her. Rahab was a prostitute. Ruth was a Moabite, who were the descendants of Lot sleeping with one of his daughters. And king David had an affair with Bathsheba and then killed her husband. By including these women in the genealogy of Jesus, it shows the redemptive power of God.

The other possibility is the fact that these women also represent foreign lands. Judah went outside of his own people to find a wife for himself and then for his son. Tamar wasn't an Israelite by blood. Rahab was a Canaanite living in Jericho that avoided the destruction. We've already mentioned Ruth was a Moabite. And Bathsheba was married to a Hittite, likely being a Hittite herself.

In other words, God's plan to save his people involved bringing in and including people from other nations. This was a theme that we saw introduced by many of the prophets, and a theme that Matthew is already emphasising here in his opening paragraph.

And so we begin the story. Matthew's introduction to the story looks at Jesus' birth and early childhood. And all the way through it weaves in Old Testament prophecy to show to his reader how Jesus is the one they have been waiting for.

We start on a young Jewish girl named Mary who is betrothed to a man named Joseph. She then finds out she is pregnant through the Holy Spirit. Joseph, assuming that Mary had been unfaithful, planned to divorce her quietly. But an angel comes to him and encourages him that Mary has been faithful. This baby is from the Holy Spirit and he will save his people from their sins.

We then get Matthew's first Old Testament reference from Isaiah 7:14, "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel" (Matthew 1:23). You may remember when we read through Isaiah we pointed out that this prophecy had a fairly immediate answer, in the form of a woman who was a virgin getting married and then having a child.

But this early answer was merely a reflection of the greater answer that was to come now in Jesus. This is how most prophesy works. The readers who would have been familiar with Isaiah would have also been reminded with another passage from the book. “For to us a child is born, to us a son is given; and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace." (Isaiah 9:6).

So Joseph stays with Mary, and she gives birth to Jesus. Some wise men from the east came in search of the new king, because the stars had shown them that he had been born. Herod was king over the land, put in place by the Romans, and was terrified at the idea of another king.

He enquired from the scribes to find out where the future king is to be born. They quoted to him Micah 5:2, saying that the king will be born in Bethlehem, which is exactly where Jesus was born. Herod gathers the wise men and sends them off to find this king, in the hopes that he can kill him. How ironic that it is people from foreign lands who have the wisdom to find Jesus, while the Jews are unaware and just want to kill him.

The wise men eventually discover Jesus and bring him gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Those familiar with their Old Testament would immediately recognise these as gifts associated with Solomon's temple. A new temple where God's presence dwells is here.

The wise men left, going a different way to avoid having to report back to Herod. Joseph is warned by an angel to flee to Egypt and wait there till Herod dies. Matthew links this with Hosea 11:1, "out of Egypt I called my son." Originally, Hosea was talking about Israel being brought out of Egypt, but Jesus is to be a new Israel. He represents a new people of God.

Herod is furious that he has been tricked and orders all new born boys under the age of two to be killed. This is a reflection of Pharaoh, who also ordered that all newborn boys under the age of two be killed. Matthew quotes Jeremiah 31:15 referring to the women of Israel weeping for their sons. In Jeremiah, the prophet was talking about the women who had lost their sons in and battle and exile to Babylon. The same evil that took the Israelites to Babylon many years before is just as alive and real now.

Eventually, Herod dies, and Joseph and the family return to Israel, settling down in Nazareth. Bizarrely, Matthew also links this to a fulfilment of the prophets, but nowhere does any prophet mention the king growing up in Nazareth.

There are many theories as to what is going on, but either way, from this opening introduction we've seen Jesus' birth as miraculous, as God's presence with his people a new, and as a fulfilment of what the prophets had been speaking about hundreds of years before. Not only that, but he is a king to people from other nations, not just the Jews.

Psalm 87

This psalm is attributed to the sons of Korah and falls into the category of praise psalm. The focus is on celebrating Jerusalem (Zion) as the city of God.

Psalm 87:1-3 - Great is Zion

Psalm 87:4-7 - People from all nations will know God

The psalmist opens with eyes on Zion. It has been established on God’s holy mountain and so it is the place that God dwells more than any other. Lots of people speak very highly of Zion.

Then we get a verse from God’s perspective. There are people who know God and have a relationship with him; from Egypt (also known as Rahab), Babylon, Philistia, Tyre, and Cush. In other words, there are people in all the nations that know God. And currently each one is seen as a citizen of their country. ‘This one was born there’.

But Zion is God’s city, and God will continue to establish them. And as God surveys all the people that know him, while some are born to foreign nations, God will give them citizenship in Zion. They are all part of God’s kingdom. All people will be included in those who since and dance in praise to God.

This psalm is a short one, and due to the Hebrew turn of the phrase ‘This one was born there’ can be confusing to understand. But the point of the psalm is that while Jerusalem is the God’s chosen place to dwell, it’s his desire to bring all nations to him. While he is known as the God of Israel, all peoples belong to him.