Matthew 28 - The Final Chapter . . . NOT

The 28^th Chapter wraps up Matthew's account of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. Although not disagreeing with the other gospels, his penchant for brevity means that details recorded elsewhere are left out here and only essentials are included.

The primary essential to all the gospel writers, of course, is that Jesus' death was not the end, but a transition.

In Matthew, we have the account of Mary Magdalene and the other Mary visiting the tomb and encountering angels who announce that the grave has given up Jesus' body and that he is now alive. Matthew's defense of the miraculous resurrection is one that might stand up in the court of public opinion, but doesn't pass the test of logic. “The Jews,” in Matthew, spread rumours and bribes to propagate the story that the disciples had spirited Jesus' body away, supposedly to make his disappearance seem a miraculous resurrection.

To cause them to do this, two possibilities at least exist: either they believed a miraculous resurrection had taken place, the news of which would be politically damaging to them, or the disciples actually did conspire to set up the appearance of a bodily resurrection, in which case these would not be rumours they were spreading, but news. In any case, citing “the Jews'” announcement that the resurrection was faked doesn't prove that it wasn't; the bribing—if that part of Matthew's retelling is accurate—would point toward conspiracy to hide truth, but doesn't prove it.

Other gospels add more positive proofs, including the conversations, the showing of the wounds to Thomas, etc. but at the core of all the accounts of Jesus' resurrection is the need to erase doubts among early Christians that the crucifixion spelled the end.

And that's the key. Whether a bodily resurrection and ascension can be believed as literal fact or not, the movement to reconcile the world to the God who created it is central; vigorous demands that the literal, bodily resurrection must be believed in order to grasp the essence of the story seems to be the gospel writers' stance generally, though. We who live in an age replete with scientific knowledge are far more likely to understand resurrection in the Pentecostal sense, the ignition of a fire that spreads far beyond what Jesus—the person—was able to achieve during his short lifetime.

Matthew ends with the great commission: “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth! Go to the people of all nations and make them my disciples. Baptize them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and teach them to do everything I have told you. I will be with you always, even until the end of the world.”

Looking at our world through the lens of the Passion story ought to be enlightening . . . if not easy. In the great commission as Matthew records it, the task set out by Jesus seems clear: make disciples of all people on earth, baptize them and teach them the gospel. People cannot, however, be made to be disciples, cannot be baptized without consent, cannot be taught what they have no interest in learning. Turns out, it is not and never has been a world on which Christian order can be imposed. But as Christians, we have accepted a role in whatever age or generation we find ourselves, and that is to be salt and light in a world as crass, as violent, as indifferent to its collective future as it was in Jesus' time.

The possibility is suggested that the most difficult judgement day test might be: “Don't tell me what you believed; just tell me what you did.”

The spirit lives on, entrusted to the hands and feet of us who share the resurrection news.