Matthew Section 8: The Great Commission

In our overview of Matthew, some scholars see a final section of Matthew in 28:11-20. Personally, I believe this should actually be part of the seventh section for several reason. First, I think being a good Jew, Matthew may have made seven sections for his gospel, much like there are seven days to the week. This would be interesting in that the last day of the week was the Sabbath, the rest, and Matthew's seventh section is about the true Sabbath, the rest which comes through Jesus (Heb. 4:8-10).

The second reason I believe this section should be included in the previous section is that every section in his gospel has a major section of Jesus speaking (see the posts regarding the first six sections). However, in the post for section seven, you can see there is no discourse. However, if section 8 was part of section 7, then the Great Commission would be the discourse for the final section of Matthew (I am not sure that all made sense).

The final reason I think this section 8 should be part of section 7 is because if this is a separate section, it seems much too short. It is only 10 verses long. It does not seem like 10 verse constitute a section compared to the other sections Matthew has contructed.

That all being said, I posted this as section 8 just so you all could make your own decision. Here is the visual aide for this section (click picture for large image):


This is either one or two sermons, depending on how much time you want to spend on the Great Commission.

This is the overview of Matthew. I will be posting the individual sermons I am developing for this series. Hopefully, I will be doing so a bit more regularly than I have with the overview. I would love to hear any comments you have on this overview and if the visual aides have been helpful.