What It Takes To Follow Jesus Christ

In this paper, there will be research on the Gospel of Matthew from Daniel Harrington’s commentary “The Gospel of Matthew”, This paper will explain the teachings of the “6 Antithesis” in chapter 5 verses 21-48, and the main point on “Jesus came not to abolish but to “fulfill” the Law and Prophets (Harrington 90).” This paper will also have Daniel Harrington interpretations of the writing of the gospel of Matthew. I believe that Jesus had a reason for his teachings and how he went forward to preach them to the congregation.

Bonhoeffer, Dietrick. The Cost of Discipleship, New York,NY 10022: The Macmillan Company, Published 1959. 344 pp. $1.95

Craig Blomberg, New Testament Scholar and Professor at Denver Seminary, provides an insightful commentary on the Gospel of Matthew. Blomberg investigates the text using a historical, literary, and theology analysis. The commentary begins with an introduction analyzing the following 7 topics regarding the entirety of the Matthean Gospel: (1) structure, (2) theology, (3) purpose and audience, (4) sources, (5) date, (6) author, (7) and historicity and genre. Blomberg, then, throughout the rest of the commentary, provides a verse by verse discourse on the text by breaking it down into 3 main sections: (I) Introduction to Jesus’ Ministry (1:1-4:16), (II) The Development of Jesus’ Ministry (4:17-16:20), and (III) The Climax of Jesus’ Ministry (16:21-28:20).

Jesus then goes from speaking to His disciples specifically, to calling out to the whole crowd, in which He goes from speaking plainly to once again speaking in metaphors and riddles. Within this passage Mark uses the words of Jesus to reveal the true cost of discipleship. He tells the crowd that if anyone chooses to come after Him then the condition of that decision is that they must take up their cross and follow Him. So one must ask: What does it mean to deny yourself? What does it mean to take up your cross? And when you follow Him where are you going? So then one must put this into context by looking at what has not yet happened in Mark. When Jesus denies Himself, He is essentially denying the human instinct to self preserve through a fight or flight response. When Jesus picked up His cross, He was deciding to be rejected, tortured, mocked and falsely accused on His way to Calvary where He died for the sins of all. Therefore, if you want to go after Jesus, you must be willing to commit to sharing the gospel with others at all costs, you must be willing to tortured, mocked, and falsely accused and you must also be willing to die, not necessarily for anything that you have done, but so that others can reach salvation. Historically, during this time period, the cross was a well known style of execution in Rome, and so although one reading this might see this as simply a metaphor, it is actually a foreshadowing of reality, which can be seen in the fact that all the

To truly comprehend a biblical passage, it is important to have knowledge of the ‘hermeneutics which enables an understanding of the locus of meaning and the principles of bible interpretation’ . The audience needs to have a clear interpretation of the biblical passage which includes ‘content and unity of the whole of Scripture if the meaning of the sacred texts is to be correctly worked out’ , this supports the argument that all worlds of the text are equally important. ‘Biblical passages are often taken out of context and interpreted to support a particular viewpoint of justify a particular action’ . It is imperative to note that ‘in order to discover the sacred authors' intention, the reader must take into account the conditions of their

The theme of this text seems to be centered on the cost of following Christ. God wants everybody; but with regards to discipleship, He wants only those willing and able. Jesus knows the hearts of those following Him and it is not the number of people He is concerned with, but the volume of their hearts. ?The audience has shifted from the Pharisees and dinner guests of 14:1-24 to the large crowds of people who were traveling with Jesus. Apparently Jesus has resumed his journey toward Jerusalem (9:51) and now will address the crowds? (Evans 228). He is on His final walk, a journey that will lead Him to a cross. This crowd is not ready. It is one thing to be part of a group,

Jesus had to carry his own cross, that probably weighed two times his size, all the way up to wear the crucifixion was going to take place. Already beaten and bloody, they lay him down onto the cross shaped piece of wood and begin by nailing his hands and feet into it and standing the cross up into the air. What a brutal sight it must have been for God to see his only son tortured like this, but the good news is that he knew what his plan was for Jesus and for his people and he knew what was going to happen after all this was over. Jesus died hanging from that cross, washing all of our sin away and paying the ultimate sacrifice. After he died he was wrapped in a white cloth and placed into a tomb with a boulder sealing the door to the outside world. Three days after being placed in there, the people went to check up on the tomb to find that the boulder was pushed aside and the white cloth was folded neatly where Jesus was laying. The son of God, the Messiah, rose again from the dead to fulfill his mission so that we may have everlasting life in God’s kingdom. God’s plan for our life and through Jesus he teaches us that if we follow in God’s word and make him our most prized possession and ask for him to be in our hearts that we may to “escape the penalty that God will execute upon all who have broken His

The crucifiers would drive a stake into the ground when whoever was being crucified arrived at the execution place. Sometimes they attached the victim to the cross only with ropes. In that case, the crossbeam, where they bound a victim’s arms, was fixed to the vertical beam. They then continued to tie their feet to the stake with a rope. If the victim was pinned down by nails, he was laid on the ground, with his shoulders on the crossbeam. They would hold out his arms and nail him to the crossbeam, which was raised. The victim's feet were nailed down against the previously nailed stake.

This five-step process begins by creating a definition for what it is we are addressing as disciples. It’s important to ask the question “what is…” because it helps us distinguish from other topics that are closely related. For example, if we are talking about what discipline is, we would want to distinguish if we are speaking about the punishment of a child, the act of training in a habitual manner, or a branch of knowledge. Our world is a very complicated, intricate, and interwoven place. Though people often want things to be straightforward, they’re not always that simple. It’s important to define exactly what we’re talking about in order to understand the topic as clearly as possible.

The direct teachings of Jesus give instructions of how to live as Christians and the Parables were used in the Gospel to immediately confront us with a truth and evoke a change. (Fee & Stuart,2003, p. 152). The five major discourses of Matthew’s Gospel are centred around five lengthy Sermons using parables to make a point and call the people to make a change.

In this article Harold Attridge examines Luke’s background, the scriptures Luke wrote, Jesus’s values, the context and purpose of Luke’s gospel and the treatment of Christians at the time of Luke’s writings. The article expresses that Luke’s Gospel was written before the destruction of Jerusalem and at a time when Christians were being persecuted for practicing their faith so consequently the purpose of his Gospel was to show an ethical example and imply that Christians could be good citizens. This source is relevant to the topic as it suggests the purpose of Luke's Gospel and the treatment of Christians before the fall of Jerusalem. A limitation of the website is that it has not been recently published, it’s publish date is April 1998 so it may not be up to date with the latest, accurate information. Nonetheless, this source is very beneficial and appropriate to the task as it provides facts and research on the chosen sacred text. This source will not be the cornerstone of my research but will add a good understanding to the purpose of the sacred text.

The Gospels of the New Testament contain 39 different parables told by Jesus (Phillips 2004, 18-19) and no doubt he spoke many more during his ministry. Jesus’ choice to use parables to teach his people is one that has intrigued many people throughout history. The aim of this essay is to get to discover why he chose to use those parables, and also what we can learn from this teaching method when evangelising today.

This is a summary of a No Travel Seminar on a Study of the Gospel of Matthew. The seminar was lead by Dr. John Dunaway who is a professor at NTS and has served as a pastor for over 50 years. After his brief self-introduction, he began his presentation with an overview of the Gospel of Matthew, followed by a more elaborated narrative summarizing the gospel, and he finished with brief closing remarks. Throughout this enthusiastic presentation, Dr. Dunaway made reference to remarks by multiple prominent commentators, which added substance to his narrative, even though none were explicitly stated upfront.

Each of the four Gospels contains points in ecclesiology. In the Great Commission, Jesus’ last instruction to the Apostles is to go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing and teaching people (Matthew 28:19-20). For Jesus’ mission to continue and for his Church to grow, discipleship is necessary. Discipleship is a prominent theme in all four Gospels, for purposes of this essay, only the Gospels of John and Luke-Acts will be analyzed. The similarities regarding discipleship in these Gospels include images of the net and fishing, and the sheep/shepherd/sheepfold. The differences include the preparing of the Twelve to carry on Jesus' ministry in Luke, and service to the community and passing of authority in John's Gospel.

The parable of the Pharisee and tax collector in Luke 18 is a cautionary story that Jesus teaches to a specific crowd of people. In it he deals with humility, righteousness, and justification. The parable describes two different types of people whose occupations are very familiar to any of Jesus’ audience, a Pharisee and a tax collector. The significance of this parable is that it is aimed at a certain type of person, which gives it the ability to be applied outside of Jesus’ immediate context. The type of audience described in this passage has two parts. The first is “those who trusted in themselves that they were righteous”, and the second: “and regarded others with contempt” (Luke 18:9).