Thoughts on preaching Matthew’s Gospel over five years

It took nearly five years, 7 different series and over 50 sermons. Yet in God’s kindness, yesterday our English congregation at PCBC completed an expository preaching journey through the gospel of Matthew. Out of the dozen or so sermon series we’ve completed at PCBC English, this one has been the most meaningful to me personally – my first sermon as pastor was from Matthew 1 (in the midst of the COVID pandemic, no less!), while diving into Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount firstly in 2020 and more recently at this year’s Equip Conference continues to convict and challenge my own walk with the Lord.

Alongside our senior pastor Albert, it was a privilege to share the pulpit for this Gospel with a number of fellow pastors including Sam Cutforth, John Tucker, “John the Baptist” (😉), Michael Drake, Dave Giesbers, Nathan Cutforth and Peter Anderson (an unforgettable message on the resurrection!). We also took the opportunity to train some of our own members to preach from this eyewitness account, and even had the joy of two students from a visiting college mission team preach from the crucifixion accounts earlier this month. For our children and alternative learners, we also paired the main sermons with worksheets and resources, graciously prepared each week by Eva and Cheryl from our English congregation.

For those preparing their own preaching series through Matthew’s gospel, I personally found the following commentaries most helpful:

Matthew (EGGNT) by Charles Quarles – a clear and convenient first stop for original language and syntax-related questions. Anytime I stumbled in translating the Greek text, this volume offered well-informed translation options and helpful preaching suggestions based on the text.
Teaching Matthew by David Jackman and William Philip – at times I felt like the authors flew too high above the text (e.g. summarising multiple chapters in one sermon), but in general this book gave some concrete and practical ways to keep my sermons focused on explaining Matthew’s gospel in the context of God’s Old Covenant promises fulfilled in Jesus Christ.
JC Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on Matthew were particularly helpful in connecting the truths of this gospel to the thoughts and concerns of the average congregation member. It was a delight to listen over his shoulder, in a sense, to think how the gospel should shape the various concerns of our daily life.
For Matthew 5-7 specifically, Jonathan Pennington’s The Sermon the Mount and Human Flourishing: A Theological Commentary was paradigm-shifting in a good way, as was Jonathan Dodson’s Our Good Crisis on the beatitudes specifically (I also shared a few exegetical thoughts on this part of Matthew’s gospel when we encountered it together in 2020).
Tim Patrick and Andrew Reid’s “The Whole Counsel of God” gave me permission to think long-term when it came to preaching through this gospel, and offered a practical framework to schedule and plan to preach through the book in a setting where it wasn’t always possible to preach seriatim for more than a few weeks at a time (unlike other series, this book didn’t align with our Cantonese congregations’ preaching schedules).

I also learned a lot from other churches that journeyed through Matthew’s gospel at the same time or beforehand. In particular, I’m especially grateful for Tim Bradford’s input during our time at Petersham Baptist in Sydney when we went through Matthew’s gospel from 2017-18, and for Nathan Cutforth at Papakura Baptist who helped me wrestle with some of the harder parts of Jesus’s discourses (e.g. the end of the age stuff in Matthew 24).

Looking back at older sermons you’ve preached over the years is also a good way to grow in humility! When I scan the sermon archives I’m reminded of rookie mistakes, bad preaching habits, the sermons that felt woefully unprepared in the midst of a busy ministry life, and the attempts to be clever that thankfully nobody will remember once Jesus returns! My hope and prayer each week was simply that sinners were convicted to turn to Christ, and saints were built up to abide in Christ. It’s been a privilege to let Matthew’s Gospel tell the gospel at PCBC English, and to preach the Word in season and out of season.

A few more reflections in no particular order:

Five years is probably a bit too long for a sermon series in Matthew – barring our family and a couple of others, most of the people who heard Matthew 1 have since moved on from PCBC English, while others have joined without ever hearing the start. Nevertheless, in the context of a 20 / 25-year preaching ministry, it was worth the time and effort to let the Word set the agenda for us time and time again.
There’s a lot of time and energy spent putting into words the vision, mission and values of any organisation (our church included). But there is no better summary of God’s vision for His church than what the resurrected Christ declares to his disciples at the end of Matthew’s gospel: “As you go, make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit… and I am with you always to the end of the age.” If we ever wonder the purpose and vision for any church, Matthew’s gospel makes it clear – to be disciples who make disciples because of the good news about the risen Lord Jesus!
The more I’ve read and thought about Matthew’s gospel within a cross-cultural setting, the more I’m convinced that this is the one that came first (i.e. Matthean priority). There are lots of academic debates about this, but it’s interesting to me that for much of church history it was held that Matthew was the first gospel to have been written (followed by Mark, Luke and John, as per our present-day book order). Other well-known authors (e.g. Augustine) have explained this, but I personally see a coherent logic where Matthew was written as a comprehensive account for the first generation of mostly Jewish background believers, while Mark subsequently summarised and rearranged Matthew’s content for a church becoming more multi-ethnic, cross-cultural and less conversant in Old Testament prophecies and typologies.
Matthew chapter 1’s long list of names seems to be a rather unexciting way to begin sharing good news. However, there is something particularly resonant in a non-Western church to begin with a genealogy – just as Māori customs begin a serious conversation with a pepeha (introducing one’s place and people), Matthew introduces Jesus’s place and people to a hurting world longing for God to be truly present with us (Immanuel). Preaching through Matthew raised for me how our society’s incessant focus on the individual is not necessarily a worldview that is shared by much of the world.
Team preaching carries with it a number of benefits and challenges. It takes more planning and coordination to make sure the gospel is consistently preached and explained season by season. But there is something wonderful in letting people see that it is the gospel (proclaimed through fallible preachers) that speaks, that their pastor also sits under the preacher’s authority, and that it is the Scriptures that serve as our supreme authority on matters of life and faith. It’s also wonderful to look back and see how many different partnerships in the gospel began and continue today through the simple ministry of opening God’s Word section by section, week after week, year after year.

If you’re interested, you can listen in to each sermon series here:

Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore as you go, make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you [Immanuel!] always, to the very end of the age.”

Matthew 28:18-20

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