Dr. Alexander Roman alex@unicorne.org

The Gospel of Matthew truly does focus on the work of Christ as the fulfillment of the Messianic Prophecies contained in the Old Testament.

We remember that Matthew was a tax collector and the person least likely, therefore, to dedicate himself to preaching among his own Jewish people.

Tax collectors were the consummate traitors of the Jewish people. They had two basic categories of sinners. There was the "general sinner" that included everything from theft to adultery. But these could be forgiven . ..

Then there was the second and most reprehensible category, the tax collector, or the person who worked with the Roman authorities to further oppress and repress his own people through the heavy system of taxation of Imperial Rome.

This is why the Pharisees often criticized Jesus for even eating with "sinners and tax collectors (publicans)."

We can just imagine the great shock of the people when they heard Christ's parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, in which Jesus praised the penitence of the tax collector over and above that of the Pharisee, or strict adherent of the Jewish Law.

And yet, when Jesus called Matthew to join his disciples, Matthew simply got up and left his civil service job!

Matthew the traitor/tax collector soon became a true son of his people and nation. His Gospel has more quotes from the Old Testament, the Hebrew Scriptures, than any other, and he makes every effort to show how Jesus' actions fulfilled messianic prophecies foretold long ago.

The Gospels themselves highlight the fact that the image of the Messiah, the special Prophet whose coming was foretold by Moses, Isaiah's "Suffering Servant" and others, had, by His time, become somewhat politicized. The Messiah was seen by the Jews of Jesus' time more in terms of a political saviour who would defeat the Romans and become a new, earthly king of Israel.

Christ Himself confronted this political role and rejected it outrightly.

Interestingly, the Jewish leaders who conspired to condemn Jesus had to find a charge against Him that the Romans would consider worthy of the death penalty and they found it in the charge that Christ made Himself out to be the "King of the Jews" - precisely the role that was the antithesis to Christ's true mission!

There are excellent scriptural commentaries on the Gospel of Matthew that show the connections between the life of Christ and the Old Testament prophecies concerning the "Suffering Servant."

Even Christ's words, "My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?" are actually the beginning words of the messianic Psalm 22 that Christ prayed in its entirety from the Cross and whose words He fulfilled right there and then!