Matt. 4 Matt. 4:1–11 Christ fasts forty days, is tempted of the devil, and ministered unto by angels. Matt. 4:12–16 He dwelleth in Capernaum, Matt. 4:17 begins to preach, Matt. 4:18–20 calleth Peter and Andrew, Matt. 4:21–22 James and John, Matt.

This is mentioned by two of the other evangelists, Mark 1:12, Luke 4:1 Luke saith that, being full of the Holy Ghost, he returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit, & c. Mark saith, immediately the Spirit drove him.

He was in the wilderness, a place of solitude, and so fitter for Satan’s purpose, and he was an hungred, which was another advantage Satan had. But he was not an hungred till he had fasted forty days and forty nights.

And when the tempter, viz. Satan, the devil, as he is called, came unto him, probably in some visible shape, he, forming an audible voice of the air, said, If thou be the Son of God, ( not that he doubted it, which showed his horrible impudence), command that these stones, (this stone, saith Luke,…

So also Luke 4:4. There is no better answering the tempter than by opposing the precepts of holy writ to his motions to sin. The word is called the sword of the Spirit, Eph. 6:17. The papists, therefore, denying people the use of the word, disarm them as to the spiritual combat. It is written Deut.

By the holy city is meant Jerusalem, once a holy city, Dan. 9:24; now, though a most impure and filthy city upon many accounts, yet, upon other accounts still a holy city, being the only city in the world which had then in it the true worship of the true God, and in which God doubtless, who in…

Before the devil had tempted our Lord to diffidence or distrust in God’s providence, and the use of means not allowed by God to supply himself; here he tempts him to an unwarrantable presumption, and confidence of and concerning the Divine protection.

This is written Deut. 6:16. To make an undue and unwarrantable trial of God, is to tempt God, whether the trial respecteth his power or his goodness; thus the word is used, Num. 14:22, Ps. 78:18, Isa. 7:12, Matt. 16:1.

This is the third temptation by which the tempter solicits our Saviour to sin, and of all other the most impudent. For what can be more impudent than for the creature to expect a homage to him from him who was his Creator.

As this was of all the three the most impudent temptation, so our Lord receiveth it with the highest detestation, saying, Get thee hence, Satan by which words he doth not only show his detestation of this temptation, but also chides him off from any further tempting him.

Resist the devil, saith James, James 4:7, and he shall flee from you. Thus he did from the Head, thus he shall do from the members: but as he did not flee from Christ till commanded away, so neither till commanded off by God doth he leave the people of God; but upon our resistance God will command…

John was some time after this cast into prison, for his free reproving Herod Antipas, the tetrarch of Galilee, for taking Herodias his brother Philip’s wife, and other evils, Matt. 14:3–4, Mark 6:17, Luke 3:19–20. Jesus heard of this accident, and departed into Galilee.

By this (as was said before) it should seem that our Lord first went into the Nether Galilee, where Nazareth was, which after a time he left, and went to Capernaum; which Capernaum was a city near the sea, in the borders of Zebulun and Naphtali, whose lots in the land of Canaan were contiguous, and…

The text in Isa. 9:1–2, where the words are, Nevertheless the dimness shall not be such as was in her vexation, when at the first he lightly afflicted the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, and afterward did more grievously afflict her by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, in Galilee of the…

From the time of Christ’s baptism, or from the time that he heard that John was committed to prison, he, who before had preached and taught privately, and more rarely, began to preach more ordinarily and publicly, and the sum of his doctrine was the same with that of John the Baptist, confirming…

Whether by the sea he here meant the lake of Gennesaret, or the ocean, is not worth the arguing, for the Jews called all great collections of waters the seas, according to Gen. 1:10.

Here was their call to the office of apostles. It is observable that God’s calls of men to places of dignity and honour, and his appearances of favour to them, have ordinarily been when they have been busied in the honest employments of their callings.

When Christ calls, men shall obey; when he calls, he draweth. It is not of indispensable necessity that men who exercise the ministry should have nothing else to do, Paul’s hands ministered to his necessities; but nothing but a providing for ourselves and households can excuse ministers in…

There was another James, Matt. 10:3, the son of Alpheus, called James the less, brother of Joses and Salome, Mark 15:40. This was James the son of Zebedee, and John, who is thought to be the evangelist.

Jesus Christ having now called four disciples, did not judge it sufficient to send them about, but himself went about all the places of that dark country of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues; the word signifieth both the congregation convened and the place. Here it signifieth both.

Syria is said to be bounded on the north by Cilicia, by Egypt on the south, on the west with the sea, and on the east with Euphrates, and to comprehend within it all Judea, Bethany, Galilee, Decapolis, Samaria, Idumea, Palestina, Syrophoenicia, Syria of Damascus, and Syria of Antioch.

They followed for the loaves, for the benefit of the bodily cures, or out of curiosity, though some (probably) followed him out of love, and to learn of him. Decapolis hath its name from ten cities comprehended in it.