St. Matthew, Apostle and Evangelist

I do not have time to write at length about St. Matthew, whose feast is today. Instead, I will but mention my favorite passages from his Gospel:

Chapter 1: “The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” The wording of this first verse echoes the great histories and lineages of the First Book of Moses: Gen. 5:1 - “This is the book of the generations of Adam...”; 10:1 - “Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah...”; 25:19 - “And these are the generations of Isaac, Abraham's son: Abraham begat Isaac.” [What a remarkable “book of generations” that is: just that one verse, that one son of promise]; 36:1 - “Now these are the generations of Easu, who is Edom...”; 37:2 - “These are the generations of Jacob.” As if it were not enough to establish Jesus Christ as “the son of David, the son of Abraham,” heir to the promises given to these two friends of God, and legal heir of the throne of David (by the royal lineage, unlike St. Luke's genealogy), we have the second half of the chapter: “Now the birth of Jesus Christ was on this wise...” It is brief, only seven verses (plus the subsequent action in Chapter 2), and magnificent.

The Sermon on the Mount (Chapters 5-7): This is, perhaps, the “stump speech” of our Lord, reflective of his teachings in village after village. There is nothing better to say about it than what St. Matthew writes at the end: “And it came to pass, when Jesus had ended these saying, the people were astonished at his doctrine: for he taught them as one having authority, and not as the scribes.” (7:28-29)

The Parables (Chapter 13): When I was twelve years old, my neighbor friends Keith and Darrell drug me along to the Vacation Bible School at their church. The school that week was based on the parables (these, plus the Good Samaritan from St. Luke). I had never heard anything like this, and by the grace of God these parables brought me to repentance and conversion, with baptism following a few weeks later. “I once was lost, but now am found, was blind but now I see.” As the years have passed, these little stories have taken on increasingly great meaning for me, and are windows into the kingdom, awakening the holy desire for its fulfillment. “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.”

More Parables (Chapter 25): These are more frightening, in their warnings to “Watch... for ye know neither the day nor the hour wherein the Son of man cometh” (v. 13). I have special affection for the first of these parables because of the hymn Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme.

The end of the Sabbath (Chapter 28): This passage is appointed as the Gospel for the Great Vigil of Easter. I look forward each year to its majesty as the fitting climax to that greatest of all liturgies, as well as the final word of promise:

“... and lo, I am with you alway even unto the end of the world. Amen.”

The Collect of the Day:

We thank thee, heavenly Father, for the witness of thine apostle and evangelist Matthew to the Gospel of thy Son our Savior; and we pray that, after his example, we may with ready wills and hearts obey the calling of our Lord to follow him; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Afterword:

I would be remiss were I to overlook the St. Matthew Passion setting by J. S. Bach. As I grow older, I have more of a love for the St. John Passion, especially its final sections, but my astonishment at the St. Matthew Passion is greater, especially in the use of the Passion Chorale and other chorales, always at precisely the right moment in the story, and most of all in the opening, Kommt, ihr Töchter, for triple chorus. Even by Bach's standards, it would be hard to name any passage more astonishing than this.