There are so many amazing stories about Jesus in the Gospels that they can vie for precedence and obscure somewhat from our minds their individual greatness. This problem of over familiarity certainly applies to the Temptation of Jesus. I shall follow Matthew’s report[1]: Now when the tempter came to Him, he said, “If You are the Son of God, command that these stones become bread.” But He answered and said, “It is written, ‘Man shall not live by bread …
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John the Baptist and Elijah There is no doubt that John’s chief function was to announce the arrival of the Coming One of OT expectation. Yet by his own admission he did not know Jesus as such until Jesus’ baptism (Jn. 1:33). Hence, for some time prior to his pointing to Jesus as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.” (Jn. 1:29), John preached less specifically of the imminent arrival of Israel’s Messiah. He …
John the Baptist Preaches the Kingdom The Puzzle Jesus testified of John the Baptist that, “if you are willing to receive it, he is Elijah who is to come.” (Matt. 11:14). John the Baptist was the forerunner of the Lord. Therefore, when Jesus will later speak in reference to John the Baptist, as “Elijah…come already” (Matt. 17:12-13), He is saying that John was an Elijah-figure, even though John himself had told the people that he was not Elijah (Jn. 1:21). …
After Matthew has completed his narration of Jesus’ birth, ending at His family’s relocation in Nazareth, he plunges straight in to John the Baptist’s preaching of the Kingdom. Both the Gospels and Josephus[1] accord John the Baptist a place of honor as a highly respected (at least among the general populace) and powerful influence in Judea and Galilee in the twenties A. D. From Luke 3:7, 15, 21, Matthew 3:5, and Mark 1:5 it is clear that he drew a …
The Preeminence of Christ the Logos in John’s Prologue Along with the startling claims of John’s prologue there are other texts in the NT which convey the same essential facts. In Colossians 1 the apostle Paul refers to Jesus this way: He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities …
The Annunciation in Matthew (2) Although it is not an annunciation story, it is proper to include here some thoughts about how John begins his Gospel. John self-consciously invokes the creation narrative, but he introduces the “only begotten Son” (Jn. 1:18), Jesus Christ (Jn. 1:17), as the Logos or “Word” as a Principal in the making of the world: In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the …
Part One The Flight to Egypt Joseph is told to leave for Egypt before Herod finds the child and tries to kill it. He and Mary take Jesus away that night “until the death of Herod.” What Matthew does next appears interpretively strained. He claims that Hosea 11:1 is fulfilled in this incident (Matt. 2:13-15), or at least in the return from Egypt. But Hosea 11:1 in its original setting is speaking about Israel not its Messiah. What is …
Part Two The Annunciation of Jesus’ Birth in Matthew Matthew famously begins his Gospel with a stylized genealogy. Placing a genealogy upfront like that bespoke a narrative rooted in the Jewish heritage. Starting your book off with a genealogy hardly seems to us to be a great attention-grabber, but Matthew’s Gospel certainly didn’t suffer on account of it (by all accounts Matthew was the most popular Gospel in the early Church.)[1] Certainly, this way of beginning a narrative about a …
Part One As one comes to Luke’s second chapter the census is mentioned, but only because it furnishes the reason for Joseph and his family to go south to Bethlehem, the town of David’s birth (Lk. 2:4-5), while also giving the location for the extraordinary vision of the shepherds in Luke 2:8-20. That event is also filled with covenant expectation. Notable is that the angel announced, “good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.” (Lk. 2:10). The …
The annunciation passages in Matthew and Luke are our first introduction to the way the Holy Spirit will pick up the threads of the OT and join them with the new revelation that came with the advent of Jesus Christ. We start with those passages where angels announce the birth of the Savior. I am going to begin with Luke’s account, and move on to Matthew’s Gospel. Even John could be considered since his account, although it skips the birth …
