GOD IS WITH US! Jesus the Messiah in Matthew’s Gospel
Christ in Glory: Franciscan Basilica, Split, Croatia
The Heart of Matthew’s Gospel:
Look, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall name him Emmanuel,” which means, “God is with us” (1:23).
She will bear a son, and you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins (1:21).
Jesus is able to save us from our sins because he is God with us, and we come to know him as God with us because he has saved us from our sins. This is the perspective by which we can look at the whole of the gospel.
Matthew also often references the Old Testament, to show that Jesus is the fulfilment of all the promises of God (see e.g. 1:1–17):
“Have you understood all this?” They answered, “Yes.” And he said to them, “Therefore every scribe who has been trained for the kingdom of heaven is like the master of a household who brings out of his treasure what is new and what is old” (13:51–52).
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