And [Jesus] went round the whole [of] Galilee, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the glad tidings of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every bodily weakness among the people.
Matthew sums up the first days of Jesus' public work in one sentence: where He went, what He said, and what He did. Three things stand together here — teaching, preaching, healing. They raise two questions. What did "the gospel of the kingdom" announce, and why did healing belong to it?
The verse names three activities. Each had its own setting and its own audience:
The work was threefold. Teaching, which He did only in their synagogues, and that meant explaining the scriptures, the law and the prophets... Preaching the good news of the Kingdom, which He may have done mostly to the large crowds who flocked around Him in public places, in the streets and on the mountainsides. Tied closely to the preaching of the gospel of the Kingdom was the healing of every disease — not spiritual, but every bodily disease and weakness.
The verse says their synagogues, not the synagogues. A synagogue was the local meeting place where Jews gathered to hear the scriptures read. Mark uses the same phrase, and one writer notes what that small word admits:
"And He went throughout all Galilee, preaching in their synagogues"; there His ministry began. This drew Him into conflict with Satan, and His power showed in casting out demons. Notice that it is always "their synagogues." He went among a people He was separate from, and that was their state. He was a Servant, but among them in His own power.
This message is not the message Christians carry today. The kingdom the prophets promised came to Israel in the person of the King Himself:
His message was "the gospel of the kingdom." We must not confuse it with "the gospel of the grace of God," which is preached today. That gospel has the death and resurrection of Christ as its great theme, and announces forgiveness as the fruit of the expiation He made. His was the good news that the kingdom the prophets predicted was now brought to them in Him. If they would submit to the divine authority He held, the power of the kingdom would work on their behalf.
The cures were not an add-on to the preaching. They belonged to the announcement itself — and another writer adds a warning for anyone who would claim such signs today:
The heavenly rule of the Messiah over the earth was therefore announced with accompanying power, suited to the promises made to Israel. On the other hand the physical condition of the people was a proof of their sins and disobedience... So the forgiveness of sins and the healing of bodily disease were bound together. No intelligent preacher of the gospel could openly claim that link now: it would confuse times and things that differ, and ignore the absence of the King.
Hole reads the healings in a further direction: every bodily disease removed was "the pledge that He could heal every spiritual ill."
Behind the work stands the question of who was doing it. The One walking these roads was not just a gifted teacher:
The general testimony is in chapter 4:23... or, as Peter put it (Acts 10), He went about doing good, and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him. Matthew's testimony is to the Lord as Emmanuel and as Jesus, that is, Jehovah the Saviour. For He will save His people from their sins.
The verse leaves no one out — all Galilee, every disease, every affliction:
He was within reach of people of every class. As Messiah He met the need of the children of Israel, and healed, as we read, every disease and every affliction among the people... The Samaritan leper, a foreigner in the eyes of the law of Moses, was healed along with the other nine... All alike were healed, though only one, that stranger, gave glory to God by confessing it to the Lord.
This kingdom message has a future as well as a past:
Notice that it is "this Gospel of the kingdom" which must be fully preached before the end comes; that is, the Gospel which the Lord Himself had preached — see Matt. 4:23; Matt. 9:35 — announcing the kingdom as at their doors. The Gospel we preach today — see 1 Corinthians 15:1-14 — could not possibly be declared before Christ had died.
- He went — through all Galilee, from place to place, rather than waiting for people to come to Him.
- He taught — in their synagogues, opening the law and the prophets among a people He was separate from, yet served in power.
- He preached — the gospel of the kingdom, announcing that the promised reign had arrived in Him. This differs from the gospel preached now, which rests on His death and resurrection.
- He healed — every disease removed showed the power of the kingdom and pledged healing for every spiritual ill. Commentators warn against claiming those same signs now, with the King absent.
- He will be announced again — this same gospel of the kingdom must be fully preached before the end comes.
And his fame went out into the whole [of] Syria, and they brought to him all that were ill, suffering under various diseases and pains, and those possessed by demons, and lunatics, and paralytics; and he healed them.
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And great crowds followed him from Galilee, and Decapolis, and Jerusalem, and Judaea, and beyond the Jordan.
The closing verses of Matthew 4 show the whole land in motion. Crowds came to Jesus from every direction. What did that vast reach prove — and what did it not?
These verses are not a single day's event. They gather up a long stretch of the Lord's work into one wide view.
Matthew opens out here into a large general view of His public ministry, and the attention it drew. Then he gives a full summary of all the principles of the kingdom He was preaching, and what characters had a place in it. The report went abroad, and multitudes followed Him from all sides. This, of course, covers a considerable time, and gives on purpose a general view of the work and its effects — a picture, in a few verses, of the results of His ministry.
Matthew groups these regions together for a reason.
To give greater weight to His teaching, the Spirit of God, in my opinion, chose first to sketch the deeds of miraculous power that drew everyone's attention. The report went everywhere. So unbelief had no ground of excuse. It could not argue that there was too little publicity — that God had not sounded the trumpet loud enough for the tribes of Israel to hear.
Decapolis is the one name here a reader is likely to stumble over.
A district containing ten cities, as its name implies. After the Romans conquered Palestine they rebuilt these cities and partly settled them, giving them special privileges. All were east of the Jordan except Scythopolis. But the name Decapolis appears to have covered a district west of the Jordan as well as east.
The names cover very different kinds of people. One writer turns that mixture into a question.
In fact great multitudes flocked after Him from all the country round: from Galilee itself; from Decapolis, Rome's ten colonial cities; from Jerusalem too, which prized privileges it had misused, privileges that were bringing ruin on all connected with it. These were different ranks of one common humanity, alike in the sad inheritance of the fall, which had yet so strangely divided them. Could they now find in one Saviour-King their restorer to one another and to themselves? So it surely seemed as if it would be.
The cures that drew the crowds pointed beyond themselves.
The good news was that the kingdom the prophets had predicted was now brought to them in Him. If they would submit to the divine authority given to Him, the power of the kingdom would work on their behalf. As proof of this He showed the power of the kingdom by healing men's bodies. He removed every kind of bodily sickness and disease — the pledge that He could heal every spiritual ill.
Another writer looks from these cures forward, to the age when Christ reigns over the world.
It is a precious testimony to His mercy, the fullness of grace in Him, that He healed them all. These were samples of what He will do in the millennium. What He did here, He can and will do for the whole world.
The size of the gathering said nothing certain about its heart.
There was a large following at first. All Galilee had Him teaching and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and His fame went throughout all Syria. Great multitudes followed "from Galilee and the Decapolis, and from Jerusalem and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan." But these crowds were astonished at the teaching of the kingdom. Not authority and dominion as yet for the heirs, but contempt and persecution — joined to a blessedness which no prosperity in the world could give. It lets us into the secret: for all their eagerness in answering John the Baptist's call, they were not ready, and that unreadiness ripened into personal dislike and hatred of the Lord Jesus. The multitudes dwindle away.
- Fame — These verses press a long stretch of ministry into one wide picture of the work and its effects.
- Reach — Galilee, the ten cities, Jerusalem, Judea and the land beyond Jordan all sent crowds. Ranks of people long divided came to one Saviour-King.
- Proof — The report spread everywhere. Unbelief could never plead too little publicity; the trumpet had sounded for all the tribes.
- Pledge — Healed bodies proved He could heal every spiritual ill. They sample what His reign will do for the whole world.
- Test — The crowd was vast and eager. But when the King set out the character of His kingdom, the multitudes thinned. A following is not yet faith.