Our FALL term will start on TUESDAY, OCTOBER 4th 2022 at 7pm! Anyone wishing to participate in the Fall Term may email us at: biblestudy@all-saints.ca
This year (2022-2023) we will meet in person in the Church Wing, but we will continue to have a shared Online meeting through Cisco Webex - video conferencing application.
Our All Saints Bible Study and Discussion Group typically meets on Tuesdays from 7 to 9 pm.
Leo Lazaris leads our group and Fr. Haridimos oversees and offers spiritual guidance. We read and discuss the scriptures in an easy-going way, host topical and multimedia presentations, and welcome lessons on the history and tradition of our faith. Overall, we enjoy time together and plan social gatherings and potluck parties as regulations allow.
This year, we will start with the Gospel of Saint Matthew and also include units of Church Catechism.
The Gospel of Saint Matthew
Before Christ called him to become one of the 12 apostles and an evangelist, Matthew was known by the name Levi, and he was a much-reviled tax collector. Yet Matthew displayed one of the most radically changed lives in the Bible in response Christ’s invitation. He left his old life of wealth and security behind.
Furthermore, Matthew was unique and gifted. He was an accurate record keeper and a keen observer of people. He captured the smallest details. Those qualities served him well when he wrote his Gospel some 30 or so years later.
He was an eyewitness to Christ’s preaching and deeds; suffering, death, and Resurrection; and of His glorious Ascension into Heaven.
While still in Antioch, Syria, Saint Matthew wrote his Gospel with the aim of showing the Jewish Christians that Jesus is the incarnate Son of God, the Messiah, the Anointed One, the Christ, Who fulfills the Law and the Prophets of the Old Testament (chapter 5 verse 17).
The prophecy in Genesis 12:1-3 about God’s blessing being spread to all the nations was fulfilled in Christ—He being the One Who connects all men and women, every tribe, and every nation, into the family of God—for Christ is the bearer of God’s Kingdom to all peoples.
In keeping with Saint Matthew’s aim, his Gospel abounds with references to the Old Testament. It starts with the genealogy of Jesus from Abraham and the story of Christ’s birth from the Virgin in Bethlehem. Next it depicts the baptism of Jesus and the temptations in the wilderness, continuing with the calling of the disciples, and His preaching and marvelous works.
The Gospel of Saint Matthew contains the longest and most detailed record of the Sermon on the Mount (chapters 5–7). Generally, the text of the Gospel of Matthew is the one most consistently used in the Orthodox Church for liturgical worship. For example, though Saints Mark and Luke have versions of the Lord’s prayer, it is Matthew’s version that is the fullest and which we use liturgically. Also, only his Gospel contains the “Great Commission” of our resurrected Lord to His apostles: “Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (chapter 28 verse 19).