Meeting God in Matthew

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Contemporary discipleship is also rather more promising. Lord Sugar says, “Follow me, and in this world you’ll be a millionaire.” Jesus says, “Follow me, and in this world you will have tribulation.”

Elaine Storkey is a philosopher, sociologist, and theologian who has held university posts at Stirling University, Scotland, Oxford University, Open University, Kings College London, and in the USA. She directed the London Institute for Contemporary Christianity for ten years. She has been a Senior Member of Newnham College, Cambridge since 2008 and is a Fellow of Aberystwyth University. She has lectured in Africa, Asia, Haiti, India, across Europe, North America, New Zealand and has received several international awards. It is to challenge the complacency and indifference that have led the rich sixth of the world to pump toxic gases into the atmosphere and increase the vulnerability of God’s creation and the planet that is our home. It is to signal the horrors of war, the fact that the 20th century was the bloodiest in history and the 21st century looks set already to overtake that; to challenge the way in which we make profit from arms, some of which are sold to tyrants and used against our brothers and sisters in far-off places. A conference attendee pelted me with these questions after I finished speaking on the second beatitude of Jesus’ famous Sermon on the Mount, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” ( Matthew 5:4) On those few occasions when I should have mourned — like after my grandfather died — it seemed everything that could be done to numb the pain of death was done already. I walked into a funeral home that was made to look and feel like a normal home. The rooms inside looked like calming bedrooms. The casket resembled a fancy mahogany bed frame with a silk-lined memory foam mattress inside. And my grandfather, who lay there sleeping, was dressed more nicely and looked significantly better than the last time I had seen him.

In teaching his disciples, Jesus was not, therefore, like other rabbis of his day, and many teachers of our own. He was not training heresy-spotters, grand inquisitors, judges of others. He was inviting people into the humility of sitting under truth, growing in knowledge, acquiring wisdom. The arrival of the wise men (more literally “magicians”) with gifts clearly designed for a king conveys powerfully both the Jewish and the global significance of this child. God’s call for people to worship him extends beyond the boundaries of Israel, for he has come to break down ethnic and racial barriers and open up a relationship with all people. What is undeniable is that we meet God in Matthew’s Gospel through the Hebrew Scriptures and in Jesus. Its roots are unmistakeably Jewish and its vision is Christian. Who was Matthew? Nevertheless, even though there is considerable confidence among scholars in dating Matthew’s Gospel after that of Mark, and in analysing the overlapping material among Matthew, Mark and Luke, difficulties over authorship remain. The later the dating, the more likely it is to be someone other than the apostle. So, apart from being reasonably sure that he was a well-taught Jew within an early Jewish-­Christian community, we can have no further certainty about his identity or his link with the apostle of that name. Matthew in art and music

Then, it’s pleasantly predictable. Today’s gurus say, “The life is cool, the beds are soft, and we can guarantee you a place in the sun.” Jesus says, “Foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” MATTHEW’s account also offers readers one other incident of momentous significance: the visit of the Magi. The story of the journey of sages from the East falls into the 20 per cent of material found uniquely in Matthew. Though not technically part of the birth narrative — Jesus would have been aged around two —this is seen as belonging to the nativity story. Clearly written, clearly structured, but if one favours a safety-first approach to Matthew, then this will appeal' I also admitted I had never felt such overwhelming sadness as I’d felt earlier that day. Clearly “blessed are those who mourn” does not mean we are happy in our sorrow because our sorrows, losses, pains, or sadnesses are not real or deeply felt. They are. What followed my eruption of sorrow in the car was a deep and almost indescribable feeling of consolation.In essence, He said, “How happy are those who are sad.” I confessed I had a lot to learn about what Jesus actually meant by those words. But one thing that I knew he did not mean was that grief, sorrow, and loss are not real or not painful.