Sermon Tone Analysis

Good morning.

Please turn in your Bibles to The Gospel According to Matthew.

We are embarking on an exciting journey through the New Testament beginning with Matthew.

Today, we will look at a broad introduction to the Gospels and then narrow in on Matthew, and we will begin to look at the Genealogies of Jesus Christ.

Stand with me...

We are going to read Matt 1:1 all the way down to verse 1.

Let's pray!

The New Testament begins with 4 Gospels.

The word "Gospel" means "Good News."

Gospel is derived from the Anglo-Saxon godspell denoting "glad tidings" or "good news."

* So, what is this good news?...well of course it is THE good news that Jesus, the Christ...the Messiah has come into the world for the forgiveness of sins and the redemption of all mankind who look to Him in faith.

All 4 Gospels, Matt, Mark, Luke, and John proclaim this good news with variations in their styles based on their audience.

The Four Gospels:

* The first three (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) are called the Synoptic...derived from Greek sun, "together" and opsis "view"...Lit.

"together view."

They see together with a common view.

They capture Jesus' Galilean Ministry, but individually are quite different and especially different from John's Gospel... who wrote much later, looking back from a quite different vantage point.

Why Four Gospels?

* Because God loved the various people groups in the first century, just as He loves you and people of the world today.

Each Gospel was written to a different audience- Jews, Romans, Greeks or Gentiles, and, depending on how you see John's audience, either to all people or to His church.

* In the four Gospels, the Holy Spirit, through the writers of the Gospels, presents different portrayals and characteristics of Christ.

The early church likened Jesus' characteristics, and the four Gospel's characteristics, to the Cherub in Ezekiel 1.

o The Cherub in Ezekiel 1 is described as having four faces... "...the face of a man...the face of a lion on the right side...the face of an ox on the left side...and the face of an eagle..." (Ezek 1:10).

o The early church used an image of a Cherub to secretly indicate where they met, in lieu of persecution.

o In the OT, the faces of the Cherubim were used on the banners of the four major tribes as they camped around the Tabernacle in the days of Moses...no doubt prophetic to Christ.

o The Gospels are also portrayed by the faces of the Cherub.

Not that the Gospels reflect the Cherub, but that the faces of the Cherub reflect Jesus Christ, and the Gospels also reflect Jesus Christ.

* Matthew wrote to the Jews and portrayed Jesus as the King, thus this Gospel is assigned the Cherub's face of a Lion, as the lion is king of the animals, and Jesus is the King, the Lion of the Tribe of Judah.

* Mark wrote to the Romans and portrayed Jesus as a Servant, thus this Gospel is assigned the Cherub's face of an Ox, the beast of burden, a servant willing to serve and work.

* Luke wrote to the Greeks and portrayed Jesus as a man, thus this Gospel is assigned the Cherub's face of man, as Jesus is God incarnate and His humanity is seen in Luke's gospel.

* John wrote to either to all people or to the Church, and portrayed Jesus as God, thus this Gospel is assigned the Cherub's face of an Eagle, as the Eagle symbolize the majestic and divine, soaring and transcendent.

An overview of the Four Gospels

Matthew and John were the only 2 direct Apostles of Jesus of the Gospel writers.

In Matthew's Gospel...

* First Miracle: Cleansing of a Leper- Matt 8 (spoken of in Leviticus 14, but we have no record of the Priests ever cleansing a Leper in the Old Testament...this was a healing very particular to a coming Messiah).

o Matt 4:23-24 does mention general miraculous healings of sickness and demon possession, but Matt 8 shows the first specific healing.

* Conclusion: Resurrection.

Which was debated between the Jewish leaders the Pharisees and Sadducees.

* Style: Lecturer.

He included 3 major discourses of Christ: "Sermon on the Mount," "Parables of the Kingdom," and the "Olivet Discourse."

More topical than chronological.

* Key Phrase: "Fulfilled" 17x (often "that it might be fulfilled") as Matthew often goes back to OT prophecy directly citing or alluding to prophetic verses.

He also spoke about the Kingdom 57x in 55 verses.

Mark was thought to be a secretary for Peter, documenting the life of Christ from Peter's perspective.

* First Miracle: Demon Cast Out (Humanity healed)- Mk 1:23-26

* Conclusion: Ascension

* Style: Photographer.

His Gospel is quick and action packed like a modern movie.

His is the shortest of the Gospels with only 16 Chapters (Matthew (28); Luke (24); John (21)).

He shows more doing or miracles of Jesus, and less teaching...less words in Red, as a servant was a doer, and the Roman audience was more action oriented and less Philosophical (very similar to America today).

* Key Phrase: "Immediately" 36x ("Straightway" in KJV)

Luke was a companion to Paul, and possibly served as a Dr. in Tarsus where Paul was from.

He was the only Gentile writer of the Gospel writers.

Thus, how appropriate he directs his gospel to the Greeks.

He also wrote Acts, and was one of the major writers of the New Testament, possibly the major writer of the New Testament depending on if Hebrews was written by Paul.

* First Miracle: Demons Cast Out- Lk 4:33-36

* Conclusion: Promise of the Spirit

* Style: Chronologer.

Luke observed and recorded great details.

He was a companion of Paul, who had contact with some of the original Apostles and James, the brother of Jesus.

And, Luke, no doubt, also met some of these same people.

* Key Phrase: "It came to pass" 10x

John was not just one of the 12 Disciples, but was also one of the inner 3 Disciples (Peter, James, and John).

He also wrote 1, 2, 3 John and Revelation.

The first 3 Gospels are called the Synoptic gospels

* First Miracle: Jesus turned water to wine at a wedding- John 2

* Conclusion: Promised Return

* Style: Discourse.

He writes in a way the leads the reader to have to make a verdict about Jesus by the end of his Gospel.

He uses the word "believe" 101x (Mth 11x; Mk 17x; Lk 10x).

* Key Phrase: "Verily verily" (KJV) or "Most assuredly" 25x

Of the Four Gospels, the New Testament begins with Matthew...

Why is Matthew listed first in the Gospels?

* Not necessarily because of chronology...it's difficult to know which Gospel was written first.

* In writing to the Jews, Matthew's Gospel best transitions from the OT to the NT.

It serves as a bridge.

* Matthew was seen as significant amongst early Christian as he includes greater detail of certain teachings of Jesus such as the Sermon on the Mount.

* Matthew was the only Apostle who wrote a Synoptic Gospel...and of the four Gospels only Matthew and John were Apostles.

o Mark was an eye witness to events in the life of Christ and wrote likely from the perspective of Peter, and Luke, the beloved Physician, was a travel companion to Paul...a respected historian and the only Gentile author in the NT.

* Jesus went to the Jews first, then the Gentiles.

How appropriate to follow this same order in the Gospels?

The Gospel of Matthew is the first inspired, God breathed, writing in the New Testament, and it breaks the 400 silent years between Malachi, the last OT book, and Matthew, the first NT book."

* There were other writings in the 400 silent years...what we call Apocryphal writings...a series of books found in Catholic Bibles, and even more in Orthodox Bibles....writings that Protestants reject as lacking inspiration from God, and failing certain canonical tests like being quoted from in the NT.

o The word apocrypha is from the Greek word for "obscure" or "hidden" and by dictionary definition apocryphal mean "of doubtful authenticity, although widely circulated as being true."

Some of them hold great historical value, like the books of Maccabees, but still they are not God-breathed.

* In your Bible, and in mine, you will not find these writings, the last book of the OT is Malachi...and notice...

* The final two verses of Malachi look forward to the Messiah...both His first and second advents.

And, look forward to His forerunner, partially fulfilled in John the Baptist as a type of Elijah, and finally fulfilled in the seven-year tribulation with Elijah's return as one of the Two Witnesses (Rev 11).

* Listen to these final words in the Old Testament Mal 4:5-6 "Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet Before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD.

And he will turn The hearts of the fathers to the children, And the hearts of the children to their fathers, Lest I come and strike the earth with a curse."

* You may recall in Luke 1:16-17, that an Angel of the Lord prophesied to Zacharias the father of John the Baptist, and in his prophecy, he referenced Mal 4:5-6

o 16 "And he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord their God.

17 He will also go before Him in the spirit and power of Elijah, 'to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children,' and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just, to make ready a people prepared for the Lord."

Luke 1:16-17

* So, after 400 years of silence, that silence is broken first with the coming of the forerunner of the Lord, and the prophecies over John the Baptist, and then with the visitation to Mary and later Joseph about Jesus, and how Mary has conceived this child by the Holy Spirit.

* For the Jew, they knew of the prophecies of the coming Messiah.

To name a few...the prophecies foretold of His virgin birth; his birth place, Bethlehem; and that He must be of the lineage of King David.

As such, Matthew, who writes to the Jews, so very appropriately opens this Gospel with the lineage of Jesus.

* We are going to look at the bulk of this lineage next week.

But, let's narrow in on The Gospel of Matthew looking at the "Who, what, and when?" of the background of this book.