Gospel of Matthew

“And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised; and coming out of the graves after His resurrection, they went into the holy city and appeared to many.” (Matthew 27:52–53)

Imagine your shock. You mourned the death of a loved one. You watched him get buried. Not long afterward, the sky goes dark followed by an earthquake. Days later, still unsettled by these phenomena, your dead relative walks in the door.

Read the series.

Here are my personal picks for the most profitable commentaries on Matthew. I favor a modified ‘Dispensational’ approach to the book which takes seriously the way Matthew provides lines of continuity and discontinuity with the Old Testament. But I have little problem with including studies which do not handle eschatological issues as satisfactorily as I would like. There is, after all, more to Matthew than eschatology:

Matthew 24 is the longest discussion we have from Jesus about how “this present evil age” (Gal 1:4) will transition to the next. It’s important. It’s also difficult to follow. This article is my best attempt to simply explain what Jesus is saying.

Pastor, at some point this year you will be providing background context for the NT passage which you are about to preach, guiding your flock in properly visualizing the world of Jesus and the apostles, so that your people might better connect with the passage and also apply the background framework in their own studies. What will you teach them concerning the origin of the Gospels?

My goal in this article is to encourage you to pause and reflect on what will be said concerning the publication date of Matthew’s Gospel.

Matthew Through Old Testament Eyes, Grand Rapids: Kregel, 2024, 389 pages, paperback.

I have already reviewed the previous volumes from this series. All three were what I would call average to above average works, containing useful content, although my repeated refrain was that in my opinion they fail to live up to the title. If you want to write a NT commentary “through OT Eyes” then you really can’t superimpose the NT on it. At least you can’t unless what you meant to say was something like “How the NT Book of _____ Reads the OT.”

This is from the first draft of my book The Words of the Covenant: New Testament Continuity. Read the series.

Read Part 1.

The Kingdom to Come in the Lord’s Prayer

We are accustomed to treat the so-called “Lord’s Prayer” within our own “Church” context. And no wonder, for the guidance and hope it supplies are a great boon to the spiritual life. But if we situate it in its setting in the Sermon on the Mount we have to allow that it signified something a little different for the disciples, especially Matthew 6:10:

Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.