Matthew

 

LeRoy Eims

 

 

There is no doubt as to the purpose of the Gospel of Matthew. A clue to the whole book is given in the first verse: "The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham." (Matthew 1:1). The genealogy of the Lord Jesus is taken back to Abraham, and this is the gospel for the Jew.

 

It presents Jesus not only as the greatest prophet and lawgiver, but also as the one who fulfilled the Law and the prophets. He is the messiah of the Old Testament predictions, the covenant that God made to Abraham, and the king of Israel in the line of David.

 

The four gospels do not describe our Lord Jesus and they express very few personal opinions regarding Him. They present Him in such a way that He speaks and acts for Himself.

 

The four gospels are, by all odds, more important than all the rest of the books in the world put together. We could better afford to be without the knowledge of everything else, than to be without the knowledge of Christ. All the books of the Bible that precede the gospels anticipate His coning, and those that follow explain much about it. But it is actually in the gospels that we see Christ in all His fullness. This is the only part of the Bible where there are four books about the same person.

 

The design of this gospel is to present Jesus in a manner that will speak to the Jew. The one fact that had been impressed upon the Jewish mind from the beginning of their history was that they were divinely chosen and set apart as a peculiar people through whom the redemption of the world would be achieved. They made a special point of this when they said "we be Abraham's seed and heirs to the promise of God."

 

To present Jesus to the Jew required an understanding of their religious system. It was symbolic. It was the shadow and not the substance. Jesus must be clearly shown as the fulfillment of it all. It must show prophecy as being fulfilled in the Lord Jesus. It must be presented in such a way as to satisfy people who were familiar with the prophecies of the Messiah.

 

In the very beginning, Matthew does this. He takes the Jew back to the founding of His nation and the covenant that God made to Abraham. Matthew keeps before us the Old Testament scriptures and refers to them over 100 times.

 

It abounds with statements that show how Jesus fulfilled the prophetic scriptures. The Jews would require this and only in this way could the Messianic claims of Christ be established.

 

Thus in His person, His words, and His works, proof is given that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah. Small things appear to show Jesus as King. In the record of Matthew, He is led of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.

 

In the book of Mark where Jesus is presented as a servant, He is driven. Obviously a slave can be driven, but not a king. A king is led.

 

This gospel ends with the risen Christ giving the greatest commission to a band of men that was ever uttered: "All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." (Matthew 28:18‑20).

 

 

 

© Copyright 2002, LeRoy Eims