Recently I was given a copy of the centenary edition of the Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrases. It gives this definition of “to look up”: “To seek information in books; to visit an acquaintance; to pay a call. Things or persons are said to ‘look up’ when they are improving” (p. 683). I couldn’t have said […]
As we have considered the seven parables grouped together in Matthew 13, we will now consider a further series of seven parables scattered throughout chapters 18 to 25: The two debtors (Mt. 18:23-35) The hired servants (Mt. 20:1-16) The two sons (Mt. 21:28-32) The wicked husbandmen (Mt. 21:33-43) The wedding feast (Mt. 22:1-14) The foolish […]
The special characteristics of the kingdom in mystery are these: 1. It is the realm of the rejected King. It extends over the period of Christ’s rejection, and ends with His return to establish the earthly kingdom; as the words twice repeated show-“So shall it be in the end of the world (or age)” (vv. […]
It is generally stated that there are seven parables in Matthew 13. This is true so far as the most familiar parables are concerned; but just as there are only seven notes in the scale, and yet an eighth is required to make the octave, repeating the first note in another key, so after the […]
Is there any difference between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of heaven? The fact that some parables in Matthew are called parables of the kingdom of heaven and the same parables are designated parables of the kingdom of God in Mark and Luke, seems to indicate that the terms are interchangeable. Without being […]
Here the Lord directs our minds to the essential feature of the kingdom of heaven, namely, the intermingling of good and evil. “The kingdom of heaven is like unto a net, that was cast into the sea, and gathered of every kind.” If we consider how many formalists; there are who put the means of […]
Many of the great commentators have come to the conclusion concerning the parable of the woman and the leaven in Matthew 13 that the woman is the Church, the leaven is the gospel, and the three measures of meal represents humanity. Therefore, hiding the leaven (the gospel) in the meal (humanity) means that the gospel […]
The treasure and the pearl have been accepted by many, down the years, as pictures of the Lord Jesus Christ; and the sinner, discovering the beauty and worth of the Saviour, willingly gives up all to obtain Him. The idea found its way into our hymnology, and we sometimes sing, I’ve found the Pearl of […]
Scores of remarkable missionary stories in this century have been full of drama. We wonder, while so many have laid down their lives in China, Russia, the Congo and elsewhere, how is it that the muffled footsteps by that stretch of sand on the Curaray River still reverberate around us. It happened on the eastern […]