What manner of man is this!

Matthew chapter 5 began with the Lord going up into the mountain; chapter 8 begins with His descent from the mountain. In between those two points, in the Sermon on the Mount, the King has revealed the principles by which He will govern. In chapters 8 and 9 the focus now is not upon His teaching but upon His miracles, and His power to implement the manifesto of His kingdom. Five times in today’s passage, and for the first time in Matthew’s Gospel, He is directly addressed as ‘Lord’, vv. 2, 6, 8, 21, 25. For the first time the Lord refers to Himself by the title ‘Son of man’, v. 20.

One effective way of answering the query, ‘What manner of man is this?’ is to consider what the miracles recorded in these verses reveal about the Saviour. Firstly, in a miracle in the countryside, a leper was cleansed by His touch and word, vv. 1-4. In the second, a miracle accomplished in the town, a centurion’s servant was healed by His word from a distance, the servant not seeing the One who healed him, vv. 5-13. Thirdly, in a miracle in the home, with no word, only a touch, Peter’s mother-in-law was enabled immediately to rise from bed and minister unto them, vv. 14, 15. In the stilling of the storm we see Christ’s power in the realm of nature, vv. 23-26. Here was a ‘man’ who was master of every situation, able to meet the need of all who came to Him, v. 16. But is He only a man? The king of Israel confronted with Naaman the leper cried, ‘Am I God . . . to recover a man of his leprosy’, 2 Kgs. 5. 7? Equally, what man could rebuke the ‘winds and sea’ and from ‘a great tempest’ produce ‘a great calm’? Of the Lord God of hosts Ethan wrote,‘Thou rulest the raging of the sea: when the waves thereof arise, thou stillest them’, Ps. 89. 9. Here are things which are the prerogative of God alone, these miracles bearing testimony to the essential deity of the Lord Jesus.

Having thought of the greatness of the power of the Lord Jesus, and the glory of His Person, the quotation of the words of Isaiah, ‘himself took our infirmities’, reminds us of His grace, Matt. 8. 17. With reverent and grateful hearts we must surely exclaim with the disciples, ‘What manner of man is 26 this?’