Chapter 26 begins the narrative of Jesus' passion. Keener gives a brief and helpful overview of the evidence for the historicity of the account. Matthew begins the account with Jesus' announcement of what is about to happen, highlighting his obedience to His mission. He then sandwiches the great devotion of the woman who anoints Him between the plots of the Jewish leadership, who reject Him because they love power, and Judas, who rejects Jesus because he is not getting anything (money) out of it. The rest of 26 describes the Last Supper, the betrayals of Jesus by all those closest to Him, His arrest and trial before the Jewish Sanhedrin. Jesus redefines the Passover as a new exodus, a new covenant, in which the cross will usher in God's kingdom come to earth. At His trial, he acknowledges that He is the Messiah, but not in the way the Jewish leaders understood that term. He is the Son of Man, the sacrifice who rules now and will return as judge. He is sentenced as a blasphemer, but subsequent events will show that Jesus was right.
Because the story of our Lord’s death provides the historical record of our once-for-all redemption, it reveals to us in intimate detail the concrete expression of God’s love for us, as well as the awfulness of sin. At the same time, because Jesus’ sacrifice becomes the model for that of his disciples (16:24), it invites us to count the cost of discipleship in a world hostile to the purposes and agendas of a God of justice, holiness and compassion. Matthew 26
Salvation is free to us, but it was never cheap; nothing in all human history has ever been so costly...The Last Supper was a symbolic act, like the triumphal entry and “cleansing” of the temple. Interpreting the elements of the Passover feast was a standard part of Passover tradition, but instead of using standard explanations Jesus interprets two elements (those representative of food and drink in blessings at Jewish meals) in a strikingly new way. Matthew 26:17-30
Loving God does not always mean that we want to face what God calls us to face; it does mean that we choose to face it anyway. Thus when the test arrives, Jesus summons all his disciples to rise to face it—ready or not (26:45). Matthew 26:31-46
Protecting Jesus seemed the greatest of life-and-death issues, yet Jesus did not want his disciples to protect him. He came to conquer by way of the cross, not by way of the sword. We disciples are sometimes ready to fight for our cause, but rarely willing simply to be martyred for it without resistance; and once Jesus’ disciples realized that martyrdom without resistance was the price of following Jesus, they fled (v. 56). Matthew 26:47-56
The next section 26:57-27:26 sandwiches the outcomes of the denial of Peter and the betrayal of Judas between Jesus' Jewish and Roman trials. Peter is contrasted with Judas. Peter's remorse leads to repentance and productive life, while Judas' guilt leads to despair and death. Matthew makes the point that all the parties-Judas, the Jewish leadership, the Jewish crowd, and Pilate share in the guilt of Jesus' "innocent blood. None of them would escape the resulting judgment.
By including the denial account, Matthew warns disciples against apostasy in the face of persecution. By placing two responses to betrayal side by side, Matthew also points out how disciples should respond to failures of their discipleship. Peter wept with remorse (v. 75); Judas killed himself (27:5). Only the former was able to return to Jesus. Matthew 26:69-75
The Christian view of sin is not that only the individual or only the society is responsible: all guilty parties are responsible. By framing Judas’s end with the account of Jesus’ being brought before Pilate, Matthew contrasts Judas not only with Peter but also with the courageous Lord he had betrayed. The theme of shedding innocent blood connects Judas, Pilate, the high-priestly authorities and the people. Matthew 27:1-10
Though Pilate knows the unjust motivation of the charges (v. 18) and receives a divine warning (v. 19), political expediency takes precedence over justice. We are guilty of the same crime whenever we side with views because they are popular in our society or political party even though we know that someone is suffering unjustly (whether the poor, the unborn, racial minorities, abused wives or children, crime victims, prisoners of war, refugees or others). Matthew 27:11-26
The rest of chapter 27 tells the story of Jesus' crucifixion and death. Jesus faces the worst that evil can dish out and takes on all the consequences of human sin: ridicule, pain, rejection, dishonor, and ultimately death. He faces ridicule and rejection from his own society from top (religious leaders) to bottom (thieves crucified with Him). Those that should have stood by Him-His disciples- desert Him, and those one would not have expected to stand by Him-women, Joseph, a Roman centurion- acknowledge and serve Him. Matthew inserts the paragraph about resurrection of the saints to show that Jesus was about to fix all the evils that sin had caused.
Genuinely following Jesus to the cross means we follow a road that may quite well cost us our lives physically (16:24); it also means sacrificing our own honor for Christ’s along the way. Ridicule was often the social backdrop of public executions, especially naked crucifixion, which constituted the ultimate form of shame. Those of us who value our dignity too much to live with unjust criticisms and the world’s hatred must seek a different messiah to follow. Matthew 27:27-44
That Jesus utters the complaint of the righteous sufferer (Ps 22:1) suggests that he participated in our ultimate alienation from God in experiencing the pain of death. Yet he would also know that the psalm goes on to declare the psalmist’s triumph (Ps 22:22–24), and the phrase my God indicates continuing trust. Matthew 27:45-54
Matthew’s message to his Jewish Christian audience is clear: regardless of the response of the Jewish religious leaders, you must evangelize the Gentiles. His message to us today is no less clear: although church people often live in disobedience to the gospel and take Christ for granted, we must take him beyond the walls of our churches to a waiting world. Matthew 27:54
The final chapter of Matthew records three reports of the resurrection. Two are true and one is false. The first is the report of the women; the first witnesses of the resurrection and the first to be sent out as witnesses of it. The faithful women make their report to the 11 disciples (Jesus still calls them "brothers") who had been unfaithful to Jesus. The second report was the false report, suggested by the Jewish leadership and told by the Roman guard, that Jesus' body was stolen by the disciples. Even as it gives a false report, it testifies to the bodily resurrection of Jesus. The final report is the church's report of the resurrected Jesus giving His great commission and promise to be with them throughout the present age. The church's mission is to make new disciples of Jesus from every people group in the world.
The men’s initial dependence on the testimony of the women reflects the gospel’s power to transcend gender restrictions. When the women met Jesus, they worshiped (Mt 28:9)—finally responding as the wise Gentiles had (2:2, 11), yet—again with an ironic touch—before the male disciples (28:17). Nevertheless, Jesus does not cast off the male disciples here; he identifies the disciples to whom he is sending them as his brothers (v. 10; 12:50; 25:40; Jn 20:17). Matthew 28:1-10
As long as unreached peoples exist, we disobey the Great Commission by refusing to cross those boundaries. Given the explicitness of Jesus’ command, perhaps many use the lack of “call” to missions as an excuse; yet it may be that the Lord of the harvest has been calling us through the need of the world but we are not willing to hear. If Christ has already called his disciples to go, is it not possible that it is those of us who stay who need an explicit message from God? Matthew 28:16-20
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