Software Vault: The Gold Collection/Software Vault - The Gold Collection (American Databankers) (1993).ISO/cdr19/olbpnt1.zip/PNT.001/V00900

Text File | 1993-04-21 | 20KB | 493 lines

00901
 # Mt 25:37-39
    \\Then shall the righteous answer him\\, etc. The saints in
 all ages, in lands unknown when Christ was on earth, saints who
 had never seen him when he was in the flesh, he commends for
 feeding, visiting and entertaining him whom they had never seen
 in person. What more natural than for them to exclaim: "When saw
 we thee? When did we entertain thee?" etc.
 (PNT 139)
00904
 # Mt 25:40
    \\Inasmuch as ye have done [it]\\, etc. The righteous
 understood well that they had often, in the name and from the
 love of Christ, ministered to his brethren, the poor and
 suffering saints, but they had never understood that their Lord
 accepted this as a personal service to himself. It should be
 distinctly noted,
 (1) that the saved are the \\righteous\\, or those whose sins
     have been washed away by Christ;
 (2) they are those who have lived and acted in the name of
     Christ, or have been obedient to his will;
 (3) they have been full of the love of Christ and have
     faithfully ministered to the distressed, especially to
     those of the household of faith. The love of Christ implies
     love of the brethren, and of all mankind.
 (PNT 140)
00905
 # Mt 25:41
    \\Depart from me.\\ Those that have sought the Lord on earth
 shall be with him forever.
 # 1Th 4:17
 Those who have turned away from him shall be turned away from
 him forever. The punishment is everlasting banishment from his
 presence.
 # 2Th 1:9
    \\Ye cursed.\\ Under the Jewish law, anything irretrievably
 condemned and devoted to death was called "accursed."
 # De 13:17
 The same term applied to the wicked is a sentence of eternal
 death.
    \\Into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his
 \\angels.\\ Fire is probably used, as in many other places in
 the Scripture, as symbol of the bitter punishment of the wicked.
 Note,
 (1) it is everlasting;
 (2) prepared, not for man, but for the devil and his angels.
 Those who choose his service will have his portion.
 (PNT 140)
00906
 # Mt 25:42-43
    \\For I was hungry\\, etc. The reasons of this awful fate are
 given. The judgment of the wicked is pronounced, not for what
 they have done, but what they neglected to do.
 (PNT 140)
00908
 # Mt 25:44
    \\Then shall they also answer him\\, etc. These, too, inquire
 if this is possible. If they had seen him in his splendour they
 certainly would have denied him nothing.
 (PNT 140)
00909
 # Mt 25:45
    \\Then shall he answer them.\\ The answer is exactly the same
 as that given to the righteous, save that it introduces \\not.\\
 # 25:40
 (PNT 140)
00910
 # Mt 25:46
    \\And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but
 \\the righteous into life eternal.\\ We shall not enter into the
 discussions that have arisen over this controverted passage.
 These things are certain:
 (1) A separation between the righteous and the wicked takes
     place at judgment.
 (2) The righteous inherit the kingdom; the wicked "depart into
     everlasting fire."
 (3) The state of the righteous is "life eternal"; the state of
     the wicked is "everlasting punishment."
 (4) The duration of these two states is the same, exactly the
     same Greek word being used in each case (\\aionios\\).
 Then if the state of punishment has an end, so has the life.
 (PNT 140)
00911
 # Mt 26:1
  SUMMARY OF MATTHEW 26
  \\The Preparation for the Lord's Death\\

  The Declaration to the Disciples That the Time Was at Hand
  The Wicked Counsel of the Rulers
  The Anointing at Bethany
  The Alabaster Box
  Judas Sells His Lord
  The Feast of the Passover
  The Traitor Revealed
  The Lord's Supper
  The Agony in the Garden
  The Seizure of Jesus
  The Trial before Caiaphas

    \\When Jesus had finished all these sayings.\\ The
 discourses recorded in the three preceding chapters. The time
 was Tuesday night, after the Jewish Wednesday began; that is,
 after sunset. Compare
 # Mr 14:1-11 Lu 22:1-6 Joh 12:1-8
 (PNT 141)
00912
 # Mt 26:2
    \\After two days.\\ After Wednesday and Thursday. The day
 indicated is Friday.
    \\The passover.\\ For the origin of this feast see
 # Ex 12:1-14
 It was really the Jewish emancipation day, the greatest of their
 feasts, and the paschal lamb was a type of the slain Christ.
 (PNT 141)
00913
 # Mt 26:3
    \\Then assembled.\\ An official meeting of the Sanhedrin.
    \\The chief priests.\\ The high priests, Annas and Caiaphas,
 and the heads of the twenty-four courses.
    \\The elders of the people.\\ The heads of the great
 families, the princes of Judah.
    \\In the palace of the high priest.\\ The palace of Caiaphas.
    The body now about to assemble, the Sanhedrin, was the
 supreme court of Israel. According to Jewish accounts, it was
 composed of seventy-one members, the high priest being
 president. The "chief priests," or heads of the twenty-four
 courses, distinguished representatives of the "scribes," and
 "elders of the people," the heads of the great families,
 constituted the membership. It could try and condemn to death,
 but could not carry out capital punishment without the consent
 of the Roman authorities at this time. It was mostly composed of
 bitter, bigoted enemies of Jesus, determined at any cost to
 secure his death. In the trial the Jewish law was constantly
 violated.
    \\Caiaphas.\\ The reigning high priest, the son-on-law of
 Annas, who had been high priest, but was deposed by the Romans,
 but was still called a high priest. Both were Sadducees.
 (PNT 141)
00914
 # Mt 26:4
    \\Take Jesus by subtilty.\\ They were afraid of the people
 and wished to seize Jesus secretly and deliver him to the Romans
 to be crucified before the people knew of their designs. See
 # Lu 21:38
 (PNT 141)
00915
 # Mt 26:5
    \\Not on the feast [day].\\ During the passover there were
 millions of Jews in Jerusalem. Josephus says that in A.D. 65,
 three million were present. There were often tumults at the
 passover, and it was feared that the arrest of Jesus would
 arouse one. On such occasions the Romans suppressed the
 disturbance without mercy.
 (PNT 141)
00916
 # Mt 26:6
    \\Now when Jesus was in Bethany.\\ On the Saturday before.
 Matthew goes back to an event that occurred at Bethany before
 the Lord's triumphal entry into Jerusalem, because he is about
 to relate the treachery of Judas, and it was brought to a crisis
 by that event.
    \\In the house of Simon the leper.\\ Supposed to have been
 healed by Christ, and a relative of Martha, Mary and Lazarus.
 Compare the parallel accounts.
 # Mr 14:3 Joh 12:1-2
 It is not known certainly who he was.
 (PNT 141)
00917
 # Mt 26:7
    \\A woman.\\ Mary, the sister of Lazarus. See
 # Joh 12:3
    \\An alabaster box.\\ A vase.
    \\Of very precious ointment.\\ Of spikenard, very costly and
 precious. It was worth 300 pence, or denarii, equivalent, when
 we consider the change in money values, to $300 now.
    \\Poured it on his head.\\ She broke the vase and emptied it.
 See
 # Mr 14:3-9
 (PNT 141-142)
00918
 # Mt 26:8
    \\They had indignation.\\ John shows that it was Judas who
 voiced the indignation.
    \\This waste.\\ Judas thought that 300 pence had been
 squandered. Sordid men still often think what is spent for the
 Saviour is wasted.
 (PNT 142)
00919
 # Mt 26:9
    \\This ointment might have been sold for much.\\ Mark and
 John say, "three hundred denarii."
 # Mr 14:5 Joh 12:5
 Pliny says a pound, the amount in the vase, was worth 400
 denarii.
    \\Given to the poor.\\ A pretence. Judas wanted to get the
 money into his bag.
 (PNT 142)
00920
 # Mt 26:10
    \\Why trouble ye the woman?\\ By your murmurs, as if she had
 done a sinful thing.
    \\She hath wrought a good work.\\ What is done for Christ
 from love of Christ is always a good work.
 (PNT 142)
00921
 # Mt 26:11
    \\Ye have the poor always.\\ Always opportunities to do good
 to them, but what was done for Christ in the flesh must be done
 at once.
 (PNT 142)
00922
 # Mt 26:12
    \\For my burial.\\ It was customary to anoint the dead and
 lay the body in spices. See
 # Joh 19:40 Lu 23:56 2Ch 16:14
 Mary was probably impelled only her love of the Lord and desire
 to do him honour; but Jesus, about to die and be buried, declares
 the anointing a fit preparation.
 (PNT 142)
00923
 # Mt 26:13
    \\This gospel.\\ The gospel of a crucified Saviour.
    \\In the whole world.\\ A prophecy that its preaching will be
 world-wide.
    \\A memorial of her.\\ Mary's loving deed has never been
 forgotten, but is today told in every quarter of the earth.
 (PNT 142)
00924
 # Mt 26:14
    \\Judas Iscariot went to the chief priests.\\ A comparison of
 all the accounts will show that when his avarice was thus
 disappointed, he went, at the first opportunity, to the priests.
 His Master was about to be crucified, he had not been permitted
 to enrich himself, there was now no probability that he would
 become the treasurer of Christ as an earthly king.
 (PNT 142)
00925
 # Mt 26:15
    \\What will ye give me?\\ He had deliberately decided. He
 probably knew of their wish to seize Jesus secretly, and that
 they would pay for a guide that would lead them where he rested
 at night.
    \\Thirty pieces of silver.\\ The price was agreed upon and
 paid. The pieces were silver shekels, temple money. The whole
 would contain about the amount of silver in twenty dollars,
 perhaps equal in value to $120 now. It was a fulfilment of
 # Zec 11:12
 Joseph was sold for twenty pieces of silver.
 # Ge 37:28
 (PNT 142)
00926
 # Mt 26:16
    \\From that time.\\ The time of the bargain with the priests.
 No one can tell certainly what day the bargain was completed.
 (PNT 142)
00927
 # Mt 26:17
    \\The first [day] of the [feast of] unleavened bread.\\
 Strictly speaking, the 15th of Nisan (part of our March and
 April), after the paschal lamb was killed, but here the 14th day
 (Thursday). See
 # Ex 12:16
 This suggests one of the most difficult questions of Scripture
 chronology, whether the Lord at the passover one day before the
 regular Jewish passover, or at the usual time. Pressense,
 Milman Ellicott, Townsend, Alford, Neander, Farrar, and many
 other great authorities, hold that he ate it the day preceding,
 and died on the day and about the time the Jewish passover lambs
 were slain. The statements of John, that the supper was eaten,
 the Lord betrayed and condemned before the passover, seem
 positive.
 # Joh 19:14
    \\Where wilt thou that we prepare . . . the passover?\\ The
 passover must be eaten in the place where the Lord's name was
 recorded, or where the tabernacle or temple was located,
 according to the directions given in
 # De 16:1-15
 (PNT 143)
00928
 # Mt 26:18-19
    \\Go into the city to such a man\\, etc. The disciples are
 directed to determine the place in the city by a certain sign.
 # Mr 14:13
 They do so and make ready in the guest chamber thus secured.
 (PNT 143)
00930
 # Mt 26:20
    \\When the evening was come.\\ The lamb was slain "between
 two evenings," that is, between three and five o'clock. See the
 margin of
 # Ex 12:6
 The supper followed on the same night. It was probably dark
 before the Saviour and the twelve came to the guest chamber. The
 band that "sat down" to this supper and this occasion have
 furnished the subject of one of the greatest paintings ever
 created.
 (PNT 143)
00931
 # Mt 26:21
    \\One of you shall betray me.\\ The meal, opened with
 "blessing," seems to have proceeded with solemn silence after it
 began, until the silence was broken by these startling words.
 (PNT 143)
00932
 # Mt 26:22
    \\Lord, is it I?\\ Not one of them ventures to question the
 truth of the Lord's prophecy; and each asks the personal
 question, "Is it I?" No one accuses, even by implication, his
 neighbour.
 (PNT 143)
00933
 # Mt 26:23
    \\He that dippeth [his] hand with me in the dish.\\ In
 Oriental meals, instead of plates being used, each one helps
 himself with his fingers from the dish as he needs. From John,
 we learn that these words were spoken to the disciple that
 leaned on the Saviour's bosom and were unheard by Judas and the
 rest.
 # Joh 13:23-26
 (PNT 143)
00934
 # Mt 26:24
    \\As it is written concerning him.\\ "As it was determined,"
 in prophecy.
 # Lu 22:22
    \\It had been good for that man.\\ A declaration of the awful
 judgment that would befall the traitor.
 (PNT 143)
00935
 # Mt 26:25
    \\Thou hast said.\\ In other words, "Thou art the traitor."
 John says that Jesus then said to Judas, "What thou doest, do
 quickly" and that he "immediately went out, and it was night."
 # Joh 13:27,30
 Judas, therefore, left before the Lord's Supper was instituted.
 (PNT 143-144)
00936
 # Mt 26:26
    \\As they were eating.\\ Before they had arisen from the
 paschal feast.
    \\Jesus took bread.\\ That is, one of the unleavened cakes
 that had been placed before him as the celebrant or proclaimer
 of the feast.
    \\And blessed.\\ As was the custom. Luke and Paul say, "gave
 thanks," which is the same thing.
 # Lu 22:19 1Co 11:24
    \\This is my body.\\ Not literally, as the Catholics and
 Luther contend, but "represents my body." We interpret it as we
 do his other sayings: "The seed is the word," "The field is the
 world," "The reapers are the angels," "The harvest is the end of
 the world," "I am the door," "I am the vine." So, too, at this
 very feast, the Jews was wont to say of the paschal lamb, "This
 IS the body of the lamb which our fathers ate in Egypt." Not the
 SAME, but this is meant to represent and commemorate that. He
 could not have meant that the bread was his real body, because
 his body was present at the table breaking the loaf, and he was
 speaking and acting in person among them. The doctrine of the
 "Real Presence" is every way unreasonable.
 (PNT 144)
00937
 # Mt 26:27
    \\He took the cup, and gave thanks.\\ The cup was provided
 for the celebration of the paschal feast, and was at hand as
 well as the bread.
    \\Drink ye all of it.\\ Observe that he simply said of the
 bread, "Take, eat"; but of the wine, "Drink ye all," as if he
 intended to uproot the Catholic innovation of denying the cup to
 the laity.
 (PNT 144)
00938
 # Mt 26:28
    \\This is my blood.\\ A sign or emblem of my blood.
    \\New testament.\\ Covenant is the preferable sense here, as
 in most passages where the word occurs in the NT; the new
 covenant is contrasted with "the covenant which God made with
 our fathers."
 # Ac 3:25
    \\Shed for many.\\ Shed, in one sense, for all, for the
 benefits of the blood are offered to all; but "many" accept it
 and are saved.
 (PNT 144)
00939
 # Mt 26:29
    \\I will not drink henceforth of this fruit of the vine.\\ He
 is done with earthly rites, and at this sad moment points them
 to a future reunion at the marriage supper of the Lamb. "Do this
 in remembrance of me" points to a permanent institution, to be
 observed until the Lord comes the second time.
 # Lu 22:19
 The command is therefore binding on all who believe in
 Christ; and disobedience to it is sin, for the unbelief that
 keeps men away is one of the worst of sins. The subsequent
 practice of the apostles,
 # Ac 2:42,46 20:7
 and still more the fact that directions for the Lord's Supper
 were made a matter of special revelation to Paul,
 # 1Co 11:23
 seem to make it clear that Christ intended the ordinance for a
 perpetual one, and that his apostles so understood it.
 (PNT 144)
00940
 # Mt 26:30
    \\When they had sung a hymn.\\ It was customary to conclude
 the passover by singing the Psalms from 115th or 118th.
    \\To the mount of Olives.\\ To the garden of Gethsemane,
 which was on the slope of the mount. This journey over the
 Kedron to Gethsemane was made in the darkness of the night. The
 Lord's Supper, a memorial of his death, has a still more tender
 interest, from the fact that it was established only two or
 three hours before he was betrayed and seized.
 (PNT 144)
00941
 # Mt 26:31
    \\Shall be offended.\\ Compare
 # Mr 14:26-31 Lu 22:31-34 Joh 13:37-38
    \\It is written.\\ See
 # Zec 13:7
    \\The shepherd.\\ Christ.
    \\The sheep.\\ His disciples.
 (PNT 144)
00942
 # Mt 26:32
    \\I will go before you into Galilee.\\ The first announcement
 of the great Galilean meeting of the risen Lord with his
 disciples. See
 # 28:16 Joh 21:1-25 1Co 15:6
 (PNT 144)
00943
 # Mt 26:33
    \\Peter answered.\\ With his usual rashness.
 (PNT 145)
00944
 # Mt 26:34-35
    \\Thou shalt deny me thrice.\\ The first cock crow was about
 twelve at night. The second about three o'clock. Before this
 the three-fold denial would occur. Peter and the disciples were
 sincere, but knew not their own weakness.
 (PNT 145)
00946
 # Mt 26:36
    \\Gethsemane.\\ The word means "oil-press," and would
 indicate that a press for making oil out of the olives, which
 grew in abundance on the mountain, stood there. It was on the
 western slope of the Mount of Olives.
    \\Sit ye here.\\ He speaks to the eight who were to remain.
 These eight would form, as it were, a watch against premature
 surprise.
    \\While I go yonder, and pray.\\ The great crisis was at
 hand, and it was casting its dark shadow before on the spirit of
 our Lord. In this hour of the power of darkness he felt that he
 must throw himself upon his Father's bosom.
 (PNT 145)
00947
 # Mt 26:37
    \\And he took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee.\\
 The eight were left at the entrance of the garden, while the
 three who had always been a kind of inner circle, who had been
 witnesses of his transfiguration, and of one of his greatest
 miracles were taken within.
 # Mr 5:37
    \\Began to be sorrowful and deeply distressed.\\ The shadow
 of the cross had fallen upon him. It was not fear of the agony,
 or fear of death, for he bore all, when the moment came, so
 sublimely that a heathen officer exclaimed, "Surely he must be
 the son of a god." I doubt whether it is possible for a mortal
 to comprehend the mystery of his suffering, but I think the key
 is found in the declaration, "He was made sin for us."
 # 2Co 5:21
 (PNT 145)
00948
 # Mt 26:38
    \\My soul is exceedingly sorrowful, even to death.\\ The
 weight of woe was literally crushing out the Saviour's life.
    \\Tarry ye here, and watch with me.\\ He had wished his
 chosen disciples to be near him in his woe; and yet, as it
 advanced, he felt that he must retire even from them, and be
 alone with himself and his Father.
 (PNT 145)
00949
 # Mt 26:39
    \\And he went a little further.\\ About a stone's cast.
 # Lu 22:41
    \\If it is possible.\\ If it were possible to save men, and
 carry out the divine work of redeeming them.
    \\Let this cup pass from me.\\ "This cup" is the betrayal,
 the trial, the mocking, the scourging, the cross, and all
 besides which our thoughts cannot reach.
    \\But as thou [wilt].\\ This is an example of perfect faith--
 the faith by which alone answers to prayer can be obtained. He
 that insists on his will, when it is contrary to the will of
 God, fails in faith.
 (PNT 146)