Life-Study of Matthew

Life-Study of the Bible #16

by Witness Lee

The Gospel of Matthew reveals that Christ is God incarnated to be the king-savior who came to establish the kingdom of the heavens by saving his people from sin through his death and resurrection. Christ, as the son of David according to the flesh, came as the proper heir to the throne of David; as God incarnate, he came as the first God-man. God named him Jesus, yet he was called Emmanuel ("God with us") by men. As the new king, Christ was recommended by John, anointed by the spirit, and tested by the devil. Having defeated the devil, he began his ministry to establish the kingdom of the heavens. Matthew presents the kingdom of the heavens in three aspects, the reality of the kingdom of the heavens (5:1—7:29), the outward appearance of the kingdom of the heavens (13:1-52), and the manifestation of the kingdom of the heavens (24:1—25:46).

Author Witness Lee reveals that the reality of the kingdom is simply the king himself, sown into humanity as the seed of the kingdom. This kingdom seed, containing the kingdom life and nature, will grow and develop in the believers, constituting them the reality of the kingdom, until it is brought to full maturity as the manifestation of the kingdom. In particular, it explains the crucial difference between the kingdom of the heavens and the kingdom of God, and presents a clear understanding of the Lord’s prophecies concerning Israel, the church, and the nations at the consummation of the age.

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In the Lord’s recovery during the past five hundred years the church’s knowledge of the Lord and His truth has been continually progressing. This monumental and classical work by Brother Witness Lee builds upon and is a further development of all that the Lord has revealed to His church in the past centuries. It is filled with the revelation concerning the processed Triune God, the living Christ, the life-giving Spirit, the experience of life, and the definition and practice of the church.

In this set Brother Lee has kept three basic principles that should rule and govern every believer in their interpretation, development, and expounding of the truths contained in the Scriptures. The first principle is that of the Triune God dispensing Himself into His chosen and redeemed people; the second principle is that we should interpret, develop, and expound the truths contained in the Bible with Christ for the church; and the third governing principle is Christ, the Spirit, life, and the church. No other study or exposition of the New Testament conveys the life nourishment or ushers the reader into the divine revelation of God’s holy Word according to His New Testament economy as this one does.

831 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1986

About the author

Witness Lee (李常受, pinyin Lǐ Chángshòu) was a Chinese Christian preacher associated with the Local Churches movement and the founder of Living Stream Ministry. He was born in the city of Yantai, Shandong Province, China, in 1905, to a Southern Baptist family. He became a Christian in 1925 after hearing the preaching of Peace Wang and later became a close coworker of Watchman Nee. Witness Lee moved to Taiwan in 1949 as the Communists were advancing in mainland China. During the 1950s, his ministry extended throughout Southeast Asia and in 1962 Lee moved to the United States, relocating the base of his ministry to Southern California. He gave his last public conference in February 1997 at the age of 91. Many of Lee's spoken messages have been published in over 400 books and translated into more than fourteen different languages. Lee's major work is Life-study of the Bible, comprising over 25,000 pages of commentary on every book of the Bible from the perspective of the believers' enjoyment and experience of God's divine life in Christ through the Holy Spirit. Lee was also the chief editor of a new translation of the Bible entitled the Recovery Version.

Reviews

[Reese Walling · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredible commentary on the first book of the New Testament, Witness Lee’s Life-Study of Matthew opens up this gospel to the reader in a way I’d never seen done before. Right at the start, this Life-Study unveils the riches hidden in the genealogy of Christ! If that alone doesn’t want to make you read it, then you continue on to an incredible overview of the gospel in light of Matthew’s unique usage of the term "kingdom of the heavens." Beginning from the kingdom's "constitution" with the Sermon on the Mount, it becomes clear that a new and higher kingdom is to be established under Jesus our King, where it's no longer an eye for an eye but a love for your enemy. The kingdom of the heavens in it's reality is described in chapters 5-7, revealing the inadequacy of the human, sinful life in fulfilling it or living up to it. This is why one must first be poor in spirit (5:3) and pure in heart (v.8), for the only life that can live under this kingdom constitution is the life of Jesus the Son. By His life, we become sons (v.9), and by the life of the Son, we "shall be perfect" as our "Heavenly Father is perfect" (v.48). The kingdom is not just an outward ruling, rather it is likened to a seed sown in the hearts of the believers, growing to produce much fruit (chapter 13). So there is a hidden reality of the kingdom of the heavens which exists in the hearts of believers. So we must learn to live in this hidden reality which in this age of grace. There is also a coming kingdom which will be the manifestation of the hidden reality of the kingdom of the heavens on the earth, with a literal kingdom established on earth for 1,000 years as revealed in Revelation 20. Finally, there is an outward appearance of the kingdom which exists alongside the hidden reality described by the mustard seed growing into a tree and the woman adding leaven to the meal (13:31-35). This is a false kingdom or the kingdom of Satan which only has the appearance of the kingdom, lacking all life and reality. The mustard seed should grow into a mustard plant, a small annual herb that is good for food. This seed, however, grows contrary to its nature ordained by God in Genesis 1 ("each according to its kind"), and the evil birds (signifying demons in the earlier verses - 13:4, 19) come to lodge in it. Leaven in the Bible always signifies evil things (1 Cor. 5:6-8; Gal. 5:9; Lev. 2:5, 11; Matt. 16:6). How evil and abhorred must this false kingdom be in the eyes of God! Man desires the outward appearance and glory of an earthly kingdom, so he usurps God's headship and distorts God's kingdom, making a shame of His holy name to the world. Surely this is what the Catholic Church and her many lingering influences in the Protestant denominations have done: creating an outward show of religion and power when God desires a seemingly insignificant herb that will produce fruit and satisfy His hunger. This Life-Study opened up the book of Matthew to me in a way that I can't even begin to describe in such a limited review. I haven't even mentioned the exposition of chapter 24-25 on Israel, the Church, and the nation; the parable of the pearl and the treasure; the dispensational significances in particular miracles; and so much more. Everyone needs to read this.

[Eric · Rating 5 out of 5]

Praise the Lord! The more I have experience with the Lord, the more I started treasuring the book of Matthew. I truly appreciate that the ministry helped me see that Matthew, as a book of doctrine, can be so experienceable in my daily life through the Spirit. Recently, I was again amazed by Matthew 19, where Jesus, after having the conversation with a young man regarding how to enter into the eternal life, declared in verse 26 that with man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible. How wonderful that today we're no longer under the law but stand in grace, which is God doing everything through us to fulfill His righteous requirements. The more I read Matthew, the more I see how we as men are absolutely incapable to fulfill the law, especially the perfect law announced by Jesus Christ in Matthew. This is why He has to go through the process of not just dying, resurrecting, and ascending, but became the life-giving spirit! Praise the Lord that today we're born from the Spirit and we have the Spirit of God, which is God Himself operating in us to accomplish His good pleasure (Philippians 2:13)! Praise the Lord that we're under Your grace!