{"id":525,"date":"2015-01-05T12:00:47","date_gmt":"2015-01-05T12:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?p=525"},"modified":"2014-12-12T23:24:35","modified_gmt":"2014-12-12T23:24:35","slug":"matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html","title":{"rendered":"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus\u2019 encounter with would-be disciples (Matthew 8:18-22) is the first time that Matthew records Christ calling himself the \u201cSon of Man.\u201d In all, Matthew will document 32 times that Jesus used this culturally-charged title for himself.<\/p>\n<p>The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d was not unique to Jesus. In the Old Testament it generally referred simply to one who was part of the human race (i.e., Numbers 23:19, Job 25:6, Psalm 8:4, Isaiah 51:12 and so on). Most notably, God called the prophet Ezekiel \u201cSon of Man\u201d as a proper name, addressing him this way early and often (Ezekiel 2:1 and throughout the book of Ezekiel).<\/p>\n<p>However, most scholars agree that when Jesus called himself \u201cSon of Man\u201d he was identifying himself with a well-known Messianic prophesy from Daniel 7:13-14, which says in part, \u201cThere before me was one like a son of man, coming with the clouds of heaven\u2026He was given authority, glory, and sovereign power; all peoples, nations, and men of every language worshiped him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That had to have been a confusing, ironic moment for the first would-be follower of Jesus. Matthew reveals this man to be a \u201cteacher of the law\u201d\u2014someone who would\u2019ve been well versed in Messianic prophesies like Daniel 7:13-14. The \u201cSon of Man\u201d reference would\u2019ve been immediately recognizable as a claim by Jesus of \u201csovereign power\u201d and even Messianic worship. Then, immediately after making that divine claim, Jesus gave a promise of degradation to any who would follow him: \u201cThe Son of Man has no place to lay his head.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The all-powerful Messiah is homeless and destitute? What?<\/p>\n<p>We\u2019re not told how this teacher of the law responded to that mixed messaging of Jesus. Perhaps he walked away confused and disappointed. Or maybe he took up the challenge, even though he didn\u2019t understand it all. Perhaps he became one of the many, unnamed, dedicated followers of Christ throughout his time on earth. And maybe Matthew deliberately left out the conclusion of this man\u2019s encounter in order to prompt people like you and me to ask the question:<\/p>\n<p>How will I respond to the Son of Man?<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/workscited.html\">Works Cited<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>[DBI, 447]<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u2126\u2126\u2126<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Bible Study Nerds\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-for-bible-study-nerds.html\">About: For Bible Study Nerds\u2122<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a title=\"About: Mike Nappa\" href=\"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/about-mike-nappa.html\">About: Mike Nappa<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Copyright \u00a9 2014 to present by\u00a0<a title=\"Nappaland Communications Inc. official website\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nappaland.com\/\" target=\"_blank\">Nappaland Communications Inc<\/a>. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jesus\u2019 encounter with would-be disciples (Matthew 8:18-22) is the first time that Matthew records Christ calling himself the \u201cSon of Man.\u201d In all, Matthew will document 32 times that Jesus used this culturally-charged title for himself. The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d was not unique to Jesus. In the Old Testament it generally referred simply to&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":571,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,2],"tags":[224,16,225],"class_list":["post-525","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cross-referencecomparisons","category-matthew","tag-discipleship","tag-jesus","tag-son-of-man"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons) - For Bible Study Nerds<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons) - For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Jesus\u2019 encounter with would-be disciples (Matthew 8:18-22) is the first time that Matthew records Christ calling himself the \u201cSon of Man.\u201d In all, Matthew will document 32 times that Jesus used this culturally-charged title for himself. The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d was not unique to Jesus. In the Old Testament it generally referred simply to&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"For Bible Study Nerds\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-01-05T12:00:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2014-12-12T23:24:35+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Mike Nappa\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons) - For Bible Study Nerds","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons) - For Bible Study Nerds","og_description":"Jesus\u2019 encounter with would-be disciples (Matthew 8:18-22) is the first time that Matthew records Christ calling himself the \u201cSon of Man.\u201d In all, Matthew will document 32 times that Jesus used this culturally-charged title for himself. The phrase \u201cSon of Man\u201d was not unique to Jesus. In the Old Testament it generally referred simply to&hellip;","og_url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html","og_site_name":"For Bible Study Nerds","article_published_time":"2015-01-05T12:00:47+00:00","article_modified_time":"2014-12-12T23:24:35+00:00","author":"Mike Nappa","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html","name":"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons) - For Bible Study Nerds","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website"},"datePublished":"2015-01-05T12:00:47+00:00","dateModified":"2014-12-12T23:24:35+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575"},"breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/2015\/01\/matthew-818-22-the-cost-of-following-jesus-cross-reference-comparisons.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Matthew 8:18-22; The Cost of Following Jesus (Cross-Reference Comparisons)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/","name":"For Bible Study Nerds","description":"Beliefnet Voices - Mike Nappa","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/#\/schema\/person\/a0ce37903172885871b0c504c6694575","name":"Mike Nappa","description":"Mike Nappa is an entertainment journalist at FamilyFans.com, a bestselling author\u2014and a notorious Bible Study Nerd. He's a former youth pastor who shepherded kids on staff at Chuck Swindoll's church in Southern California\u2014and he's a bestselling and award-winning author with more than a million copies of his books sold worldwide. Plus, he holds a degree in Christian Education with an emphasis in Bible Theology. So, you know, he\u2019s got that going for him. Mike is also a pop culture dork who watches too much TV, reads too many comic books, utters too many bad words, laughs at all the wrong jokes, and often gets in trouble because he says whatever he happens to be thinking at the moment\u2014like quoting an R-rated movie in the middle of a sermon. Yeah, he\u2019s a mess (just like you!), but he kind of likes it that way. Most of all, Mike Nappa loves Jesus, and he figures that covers over a multitude of sins. Learn more at nappaland.com\/mikenappa.","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.biblestudynerds.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/author\/mnappa"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/571"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=525"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":528,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/525\/revisions\/528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=525"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=525"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/forbiblestudynerds\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=525"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}