The King’s defence This is it. The last of my blog posts on Matthew's Gospel. When I wrote a poem in January of 2015 based on the beatitudes in Matthew 5 I had no idea what I had let myself in for, I had no idea it would be a series of posts. When I …
Continue reading Matthew 22:41-46 4 questions 4) Whose son is the Christ?
Psalms in Book 1 Psalms in Book 1 (Psalms 1 to 41) are mostly personal songs, so I will be looking at how they apply to us personally. Social and communal aspects of life and work do not come in until the later books of psalms. The first two psalms introduce themes that set the …
The King’s defence When people believe in urban legends and conspiracy theories and someone confronts them with the truth they will not listen and change, they just personally attack. That is all over social media, you find it in the editorials of newspapers and in blogs. There is nothing new about that. The religious and …
Continue reading Matthew 22:34-40 4 questions 3) The great Commandment
The King’s defence The religious and political leaders are trying to trip Jesus up. The first was the Pharisees and Herodians; now it is the Saddusee's turn. They hope they will stop Jesus, but they have no idea what Jesus' mission is and they are actually helping Jesus. Jesus came to be God's sacrifice for …
Continue reading Matthew 22:23-33 4 questions 2) Sadducees and the resurrection
The King’s defence After three parables where Jesus said the chief priests had been shown up before the people for rejecting God Matthew's account moves on to three questions to attack Jesus, followed by a question to them by Jesus. I have mentioned a few times in this series how Matthew likes to group things …
Continue reading Matthew 22:15-22 4 questions 1) Paying Taxes to Caesar
The King’s judgements Jesus cleared the temple and the chief priests, who ran the temple, did not like this, so on Jesus' next visit they ask Jesus where his authority to do this came from. Instead of giving a direct answer Jesus tells three parables against them — in the first, the parable of the …
Whistle blowers and the church When I was in secondary school one of the teams we played against was from the Verona Fathers, a Roman Catholic seminary where boys were being trained as prospective priests. We cheered our team and jeered theirs during the game but before and after the game things were OK between …
The King’s judgements Following Jesus clearing the temple of market traders, Jesus was asked by the Temple authorities where he got his authority. The answer seems to be evasive until you realise that the three parables that follow form the bigger part of the answer. The first was covered in the last post, the gist …
The King’s judgements Matthew has a thing about the number 3 when it comes to parables. The parables in chapters 8 and 9 are grouped in three groups of three, and here there are another three parables. The context is that Jesus has come back into Jerusalem. The last time he overturned the tables of …
Continue reading It’s not what you say, it’s what you do — Matthew 20:28–32
40 Names of Jesus in 40 days of Lent — Day 43 Sunday after Ascension 2022 Christ has died,Christ is risen,Christ will come again. Heart-shaped cloudImage from Pixabay In the first book, O Theophilus, I have dealt with all that Jesus began to do and teach, 2 until the day when he was taken up, after he had given commands through the …
Making an ass of myself 