Matthew: An Apologetic -- By: John Henry Bennetch
Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 103:410 (Apr 1946)
Article: Matthew: An Apologetic
Author: John Henry Bennetch
BSac 103:410 (Apr 46) p. 238
Matthew: An Apologetic
All the Bible faces the facts of life squarely. The many books are not mere expressions of mysticism or aspiration. Sin, the greatest blight on our race, is given prime consideration. Holy Writ denounces evil, traces its all-pervading influence back to Satan as the source, and identifies the remedy for it as Christ the divine Mediator. “When the enemy shall come in like a flood,” Isaiah predicted long ago, “the Spirit of the LORD shall lift up a standard against him” (59:19). And so it has always been. In New Testament days an apostle like Paul was “set for the defence of the gospel” (Phil 1:17) as well as for preaching “among the Gentiles the unsearchable riches of Christ” (Eph 3:8). The latter presentation includes the former, even if the one may sound rather negative in method. To be sure, “some men say loftily: ‘Do not be solicitous about the truth; the truth will take care of itself’! If that is correct, why does anyone ever take the trouble to defend and promote the truth? Why did the Son of God come into the world if it was not to make divine truth plain and appealing to men’s apprehension? Why did the apostles reason, preach, teach, sacrifice and even die, if it was not to uphold and disseminate the truth? Ah! the saying, ‘Truth will take care of itself,’ is the motto of laziness and apathy.”1
Matthew is the book to be viewed now as an apologetic of divinely inspired proportions. Even in its composition the author seems to have had an aim with defensive cast to it. In the words of H. C. Thiessen: “Matthew wrote to encourage and confirm the persecuted Jewish Christians in their faith, to confute their opponents, and to prove to both that the Gospel was not a contradiction of the teachings of the Old Testament, but rather a fulfillment of the promises made to Abraham and to David. The Epistle to the Hebrews
BSac 103:410 (Apr 46) p. 239
also shows how the Old Testament is fulfilled in the New, but from a different standpoint. It is evident that under the circumstances the Jewish Christians needed a clear proof of the nature of Christ’s person and mission, and a refutation of the objections of unbelieving Jews. Matthew undertakes to do this in his well-arranged Gospel.”2 The leading objections to be raised by Israel are all answered with a set formula, satisfying words for a member of this covenant people descended from Abraham, “…that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying—.”...
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