Day 17, Matthew 8
We return to Matthew’s gospel, but slightly out of chapter order, to read more about the healing of the Roman officer’s son.
Note: a chronology of the gospels is not necessarily a matter of aligning the sequence of each gospel and merging them. Each gospel writer has a different purpose and assembles his account under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit in different ways. Matthew constructs five blocks for his gospel, in the form of a preacher. He is writing of Jesus the King, for a Jewish audience, emphasizing that Jesus is the Son of David and the Son of Abraham. His time view is the past. Mark, the writer of the simplest and earliest gospel, strings together 100 pearls of wisdom. His style is that of a chronicler. He is describing Jesus the servant, the Son of God, and his time view is the present. Luke writes for Gentiles as an historian, recording Jesus the man and the form of his gospel is selected colors, with a time focus on the future. Finally, John writes of Jesus as God, the Son of the Father. His gospel is written in the style of a philosopher and is epigrammatic (built around thought-provoking statements or sayings). His time view is eternal.
Thus the reader must gather the different elements of the four gospels into one whole to understand the full revelation of Jesus as given by the Holy Spirit. This is akin to the process with a good whodunnit: different facts and insights combine from different perspectives and it all makes sense in the end!
So the story we read today is in Matthew 8, but we will return to Matthew 5 through 8 next week when we get to the teaching often called the Sermon on the Mount.
Much of this chapter is about healing and deliverance. These were predominant needs in that day; there was no medical understanding yet, and no clear path to freedom from spiritual oppression either. Whether physical, mental, emotional or spiritual, this is a people with great needs, and Jesus comes to show that God cares enough to set people free. His name means “God saves”, after all!
Matthew takes the trouble to record in detail the faith of the Roman officer: “I’m a man under authority” show us that he truly understands how authority works: I only have authority when I’m under authority. This is partly why the religious leaders struggled and resented Jesus, because they believed their structures and lineage gave them authority. Jesus, by contrast, sees authority as submission (to His Father) and thus recognizes the faith of the officer who knows that Jesus’ higher authority is all his son needs.
Yet, even after much healing and deliverance in Cana, the disciples have not yet got the message: they are afraid in a setting familiar to them (a storm) while Jesus slept. He rebukes them for their swirling fear, then rebukes the storming winds and waves, giving them yet more reason to recognize Him as God in human flesh.
And finally Matthew records how they are met on the other side of the lake by two demonized men. We’ll read more of this encounter, and the fruit of it, in another gospel later, but for today notice how the supernatural is afraid of Jesus in the same way that a motorist brakes hard when seeing a trooper!
Jesus has no fear, because He is in relationship with His Father through the Holy Spirit. And he will always do what it takes to set humans free from oppression, even at the cost of a herd of pigs!
What will He do for you and through you today?
Have a great day!
Mark.