Saturday, March 7, 2015

March 15, 2015 – The Great Commission – A Study of Matthew – A House of Prayer and Exaltation

March 15, 2015 – The Great Commission – A Study of Matthew – A House of Prayer and Exaltation


Matthew 28:18-20 – New International Version (NIV) – The Great Commission
18 “Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”

A House of Prayer and Exaltation

Matthew 21:12-17 – New International Version (NIV)
12 “Jesus entered the temple courts and drove out all who were buying and selling there. He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves. 13 “It is written,” he said to them, “‘My house will be called a house of prayer,’ but you are making it ‘a den of robbers.’”
14 The blind and the lame came to him at the temple, and he healed them. 15 But when the chief priests and the teachers of the law saw the wonderful things he did and the children shouting in the temple courts, “Hosanna to the Son of David,” they were indignant.
16 “Do you hear what these children are saying?” they asked him.
“Yes,” replied Jesus, “have you never read,
“‘From the lips of children and infants
    you, Lord, have called forth your praise’?”
17 And he left them and went out of the city to Bethany, where he spent the night.”

Where did Jesus enter (verse 12)?

Who did He drive out (verse 12)?

How did He treat the money changers and the sellers of doves (verse 12)?

What did He say that “My house” would be called (verse 13)?

In your opinion, why did Jesus say they were making it “a den of robbers” (verse 13)?

Who came to Jesus in the temple courts (verse 14)?

In your opinion, why did the chief priests and the teachers of the law become “indignant” (verse 15)?

How did Jesus reply to the question “Do you hear what these children are saying” (verse 16)?

Where did Jesus go to spend the night (verse 17)?
In your opinion, what does this passage from Matthew 21:12-17 show us about the Great Commission?

Isaiah 56:3-8 - New International Version (NIV)
“Let no foreigner who is bound to the Lord say,
    “The Lord will surely exclude me from his people.”
And let no eunuch complain,
    “I am only a dry tree.”
For this is what the Lord says:
“To the eunuchs who keep my Sabbaths,
    who choose what pleases me
    and hold fast to my covenant—
to them I will give within my temple and its walls
    a memorial and a name
    better than sons and daughters;
I will give them an everlasting name
    that will endure forever.
And foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord
    to minister to him,
to love the name of the Lord,
    and to be his servants,
all who keep the Sabbath without desecrating it
    and who hold fast to my covenant—
these I will bring to my holy mountain
    and give them joy in my house of prayer.
Their burnt offerings and sacrifices
    will be accepted on my altar;
for my house will be called
    a house of prayer for all nations.”
The Sovereign Lord declares—
    he who gathers the exiles of Israel:
“I will gather still others to them
    besides those already gathered.”

Who is not to say “The Lord will surely exclude me from his people” (verse 3)?
Who is not to say “I am only a dry tree” (verse 3)?
In your opinion, why is the promise to the eunuchs in verses 4 and 5 an amazing promise?
In your opinion, why does the promise that the “foreigners who bind themselves to the Lord to minister to him, to love the name of the Lord, and to be his servants . . . their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar” represent a seismic shift in temple worship ideas (verses 6 and 7)?
Whose house will be “a house of prayer for all nations” (verse 7)?
Who has the Sovereign Lord already begun to gather (verse 8)?
Who else will the Sovereign Lord gather (verse 8)?
In your opinion, how does understanding the promise of a temple for foreigners and eunuchs in Isaiah 56:3-8 help to understand why Jesus would become upset at the limitations to worship that the money changing and the buying and selling would have represented to the gentiles by having their court taken up with these activities in Matthew 21:12-17?
In your opinion, what does this passage from Isaiah show us about the Great Commission?

John 17:20-26 – New International Version (NIV)
20 “My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, 21 that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you. May they also be in us so that the world may believe that you have sent me. 22 I have given them the glory that you gave me, that they may be one as we are one— 23 I in them and you in me—so that they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me.
24 “Father, I want those you have given me to be with me where I am, and to see my glory, the glory you have given me because you loved me before the creation of the world.
25 “Righteous Father, though the world does not know you, I know you, and they know that you have sent me. 26 I have made you known to them, and will continue to make you known in order that the love you have for me may be in them and that I myself may be in them.”

Who is Jesus praying for (verse 20)?
What is the request of Jesus for those He was praying for (verse 21)?
How has Jesus made it possible for His request to be fulfilled (verse 22)?
In your opinion, why will the world know that God sent Jesus and loved Christians because of the unity of Christians (verse 23)?
Where does Jesus want “those you have given to me” to be (verse 24)?
What do those given to Jesus know about the Righteous Father (verse 25)?
Why will Jesus make the Righteous Father known to Christians (verse 26)?
In your opinion, how is the promise to gather those who do not have the right parents or who are flawed and incomplete in Isaiah 56:3-8 become even more wonderful when we understand that all of these who don’t have the right parents or who are flawed and incomplete are included into being one with Jesus and the Righteous Father in the prayer of Jesus in John 17:20-26?
In your opinion, how does the love and sense of oneness that Jesus feels with the Righteous Father and with all who believe in Him as shown in His prayer from John 17:20-26 help us understand the passion that He displayed in Matthew 21:12-17 against the corruption of the place where gentiles could go to worship?
In your opinion, what does this passage from John show us about the Great Commission?
    
Philippians 2:5-11 New International Version (NIV)
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
“Who, being in very nature God,
    did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
    by taking the very nature of a servant,
    being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
    he humbled himself
    by becoming obedient to death—
        even death on a cross!
Therefore God exalted him to the highest place
    and gave him the name that is above every name,
10 that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow,
    in heaven and on earth and under the earth,
11 and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord,
    to the glory of God the Father.”
In what are we to have the same mindset as Christ Jesus (verse 5)?
What nature did Christ Jesus have (verse 6)?
How did Christ Jesus take “the very nature of a servant” (verse 7)?
Where did the humbling and obedience of Christ Jesus take Him (verse 8)?
In your opinion, what is it about the obedience of Christ Jesus that caused God to exalt “him to the highest place” (verse 9)?
How great is the “name of Jesus” (verse 10)?
What will every tongue acknowledge (verse 11)?
In your opinion, how amazing is the request that Jesus makes in John 17:20-26 that I want those you have given me to be with me where I am” when you consider that God exalted him to the highest place” in Philippians 2:5-11?
In your opinion, how does the wonderfully all-encompassing prophecy in Isaiah 56:3-8 that my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations” take on an even more amazing tone when combined with the promise of Philippians 2:5-11 that “at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord”?

In your opinion, how are the praises of the children in Matthew 21:12-17 that said “Hosanna to the Son of David” like the promise in Philippians 2:5-11 that “every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord”?
In your opinion, what does this passage from Philippians show us about the Great Commission?


Next, back to Matthew 21:18 – (sprucewhispers.blogspot.com)

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