Matthew

Holiday series: Matt 9:14-17

/ timmacbride

During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

(Continuing our series in Matthew chapters 8 & 9, and looking for the big picture Matthew’s trying to get across.)

Sometimes, my grandmother would speak a different language. Not a foreign language. It was still English. I understood the words – they just made no sense.

For example, a favourite saying of hers was: “I’m not as green as I’m cabbage-looking.” Right. Never thought you looked like a cabbage. More, say, cauliflower, if I had to make a vegetable comparison. What on earth are you saying?

Or if you were looking for something, and asked her where it was, she’d say: “up in Annie’s room, hanging on a tack.” Theirs was a single-story house, but I was for many years suspicious of a hidden attic containing a family secret.

She’d sometimes say we had “eyes like two burnt holes in a blanket”. I wouldn’t know. I don’t smoke in bed.

And my favourite, if my shirt wasn’t tucked in properly: “Giddy giddy gout, your shirt’s hanging out. Six miles in and seven miles out.” I used to point out that that meant there was only a net of one mile hanging out, which, proportionally, wasn’t so bad.

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Holiday series: Matt 8:18-22

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During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

Before we get to Matthew 9 next week, there’s one story we skipped over in chapter 8. As we’ve seen Jesus healing lepers, responding to the faith of outsiders, calming actual storms, and driving out demons – we’ve been asking how should we respond? That’s what today’s brief story is all about, nestled in amongst all these stories of Jesus doing miraculous things.

 8:18-22 When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he gave orders to cross to the other side of the lake. Then a teacher of the law came to him and said, “Teacher, I will follow you wherever you go.” Jesus replied, “Foxes have dens and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.” Another disciple said to him, “Lord, first let me go and bury my father.” But Jesus told him, “Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.” 

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Holiday series: Matt 8:28-34

/ timmacbride

During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

The next story in our look at Matthew chapter 8 looks like it’s unrelated to yesterday’s. But it’s basically the same story as the calming of the storm. In your Bibles it might be titled “the healing of two demon-possessed men”. Or in mine, “Jesus makes devilled ham.”* (I’m into boutique translations.) Either way, let’s read it now:

8:28-34 When he arrived at the other side in the region of the Gadarenes, two demon-possessed men coming from the tombs met him. They were so violent that no one could pass that way. 29 “What do you want with us, Son of God?” they shouted. “Have you come here to torture us before the appointed time?” 30 Some distance from them a large herd of pigs was feeding. 31 The demons begged Jesus, “If you drive us out, send us into the herd of pigs.” 32 He said to them, “Go!” So they came out and went into the pigs, and the whole herd rushed down the steep bank into the lake and died in the water. 33 Those tending the pigs ran off, went into the town and reported all this, including what had happened to the demon-possessed men. 34 Then the whole town went out to meet Jesus. And when they saw him, they pleaded with him to leave their region.

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Holiday series:Matt 8:23-27

/ timmacbride

During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

Matt 8:23 Then he got into the boat and his disciples followed him. Suddenly a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat. But Jesus was sleeping. The disciples went and woke him, saying, “Lord, save us! We’re going to drown!” He replied, “You of little faith, why are you so afraid?” Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and it was completely calm. The men were amazed and asked, “What kind of man is this? Even the winds and the waves obey him!” 

The power of nature is fearsome, unstoppable, and unforgiving. Even in this day and age with centuries of engineering and technological know-how, all we can do is observe it, make attempts at predicting it, and increase our odds of surviving it just a little.

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Holiday series: Matt 8:5-13

/ timmacbride

During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

We began a series yesterday working through Matthew chapters 8 & 9. Following on from Jesus’ first public words in the Sermon on the Mount, Matthew narrates Jesus’ first public actions. Throughout this series we’ll be looking for the big picture Matthew is building up by arranging these stories together.

Yesterday, we saw Jesus’ first healing: of a man with leprosy, an Israelite who was an outcast in his own society. It was a story of Jesus meeting people’s needs in the here-and-now, as a sign that he was fulfilling the “suffering servant” role spoken of in Isaiah 53.

Today, we see Jesus’ second healing, which is equally significant: a non-Israelite, who nevertheless displays the key requirement for experiencing the blessing of the kingdom – faith.

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Holiday series: Matt 8-9

/ timmacbride

During the school holiday break, we’re reliving some posts from 2014 which look at Matthew chapters 8 & 9.

We begin a new series through Matthew chapters 8 and 9. In our last look at Matthew’s Gospel (chapter 5), Jesus was saying a lot of stuff. Here, he’s doing a lot. It’s the walk that backs up the talk. We see healings, exorcisms, provocative encounters, and even someone raised from the dead. Although this might seem to be just a random collection of cool stories involving Jesus, there’s a very deliberate point being made by the Gospel author throughout these chapters. Our task will be to work out what that is.

In the meantime, we’ll look through the stories one-by-one, to build up a picture of what Matthew is telling us. Keep this quest for the big picture in mind, as any application we find in each story will mostly be secondary to this larger point being made.

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Resurrection: flash-forward (Part Four)

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In our Easter-week series, we look at a rather unusual and often overlooked Good Friday event: three “flash-forwards” that point to what would happen on Easter Sunday. It’s best to begin from part one, on Monday.

Our third flash-forward at the death of Jesus is the reaction of those who witness the first two signs. Have a listen to their response:

27:54 When the centurion and those with him who were guarding Jesus saw the earthquake and all that had happened, they were terrified, & exclaimed, “Surely he was the Son of God!”

‘How is this a flash-forward?’ you might ask. Is this a case of a preacher getting third-point-itis. Where the last point is always a bit of stretch to fit in with the pattern of the first two. (The first two started with the same letter, lets get the thesaurus out…)

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Resurrection: flash-forward (Part Three)

/ timmacbride

In our Easter-week series, we look at a rather unusual and often overlooked Good Friday event: three “flash-forwards” that point to what would happen on Easter Sunday. It’s best to begin from part one, on Monday.

The second flash-forward we see in the account of Jesus’ death is a mini-resurrection. One that points forward to the defeat of death itself. Read from verse 52:

Mt 27:52-53 The earth shook and the rocks split. The tombs broke open and the bodies of many holy people who had died were raised to life. They came out of the tombs[, and] after Jesus’ resurrection [and] they went into the holy city and appeared to many people.

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Resurrection: flash-forward (Part Two)

/ timmacbride

In our Easter-week series, we look at a rather unusual and often overlooked Good Friday event: three “flash-forwards” that point to what would happen on Easter Sunday. It’s best to begin from part one, yesterday.

The first little flash-forward we’re given is the torn temple-curtain. Pointing us to the fact that Jesus’ resurrection will bring us direct access to God. Let’s read from verse 50 again:

27:50-51 And when Jesus had cried out again in a loud voice, he gave up his spirit. At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom.

The first preview, the first sign happens the instant Jesus dies. Miraculously – from top to bottom – the temple curtain is torn in two. What’s that all about?

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Resurrection: flash-forward (Part One)

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In our Easter-week series, we look at a rather unusual and often overlooked Good Friday event.

One of my favourite TV shows is NCIS. If you haven’t seen it before, that stands for ‘Naval Criminal Investigation… Somethingorother.’ Clearly that’s not important for enjoying the show. But the reason I mention it this Easter week is one of it’s characteristic film-making techniques. As you come out of every ad break, the first thing you see is a one-second scene in black-and-white. It’s a very brief, flash-forward to the final scene before the next ad break. It gives you a little taste of where the next eight minutes or so of action is heading. So that when you get to that scene, your brain goes – oh, so that’s what that little snapshot was all about. (The producers call it the “foof,” named after the sound that accompanies it, made by the producer hitting a microphone with his hand.)

Now this technique on NCIS is pretty subtle. It took me half a season to realise that’s what was happening. But if you pay attention, you’ll see that our entire media culture is filled with flash-forwards. And often far more obvious ones.

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