Matthew was not just writing to convey information; he wanted his readers to know that Jesus is the king of Israel. By the titles he used, we know that Matthew did not just think of Jesus as a historical figure. He was the Christ, the promised Messiah, the one sent to save his people from their sins (Matt 1:21).

The names we call others provide a snapshot of our relationship. It is drastically different, for example, to hear a child refer to an adult as “Mr. Smith,” “Officer Thomas,” or “Daddy.”
Names and titles matter throughout the Scriptures, and I’ve recently started a project examining the use of titles and names for Jesus in the Gospels. My first article laid out my methodology and looked at the top 10 titles of Jesus in the Gospels.
In this article we’ll consider the titles used for Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew.
Top 5 Titles
By my accounting, there are 131 titles used for Jesus in Matthew. There are 443 in all four Gospels, so the titles in Matthew account for about 29.6% of the all titles. (Matthew contains about 28% of the verses in the Gospels.)
Here are the top 5 titles in Matthew.

Son of Man (30 times)
Lord (23 times)
Christ (13 times)
teacher (10 times)
the child (9 times)

The next few entries on the list are also interesting: Son of David (8 times), Son of God (8 times), and Son (6 times). The top four titles used in Matthew are the same as the top four titles used in all the Gospels, just in a slightly different order.
Perhaps also of interest: the title “Lord” comes from Peter five times, and five of the 13 uses of “Christ” are by Matthew himself.
Titles Used by Matthew
Most of the titles used in the Gospels are put in the mouth of someone else by the Gospel author. But there are times when the author himself refers to a name or title of Jesus.
There are ten such occasions in Matthew. He refers to Jesus as “Christ” five times, as “the child” four times, and as the “Son of David” once. Nine of these occasions are found within the first two chapters of the Gospel; the other one (“the Christ”) is found in Matthew 11:2.
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If Augustine was not the first to bring Christianity to England, he was the first to be sent on an official mission by a Roman pope and the first to be appointed as archbishop of Canterbury. He was also the first to adopt Gregory’s method of “recycling” pagan places and rites for Christian purposes. This was not a wholly new practice (Roman buildings, names, and rites had been recycled before), but Gregory’s imprimatur and Augustine’s example contributed to its diffusion.

Augustine of Canterbury, often known as “the apostle of the English,” would have never made it across the Channel if it hadn’t been for the insistent prompting of Pope Gregory I.
The eighth century historian Bede tells us in fact that Augustine and his companions were “seized with a sudden fear” after hearing tales about the “barbarous, fierce, and unbelieving nation to whose language they were strangers.” In unanimous agreement, they sent Augustine back to Rome to beg Gregory to spare them from “so dangerous, toilsome, and uncertain a journey.”[1]
Gregory and Augustine had known each other for some time, since Augustine had served as prior at Gregory’s family monastery of St. Andrew’s in Rome. Gregory held Augustine in great esteem, but was not about to let him off so easily. He sent him back to his companions, but sent letters to bishops and kings in France asking them to supply the missionaries with whatever they needed. He also made sure Augustine could able to find some interpreters who spoke the language of the Anglo-Saxons.
Augustine and his team of about forty monks landed in the Isle of Thanet (a peninsula in the east of Kent, southern England) in the spring of 597.
Augustine and Ethelbert
Augustine told Ethelbert, king of Kent, that they had come to bring “a joyful message, which most undoubtedly assured to all that took advantage of it everlasting joys in heaven and a kingdom that would never end with the living and true God.”
Ethelbert received the missionaries warmly, although he kept them outdoors. Bede tells us the king was afraid that, inside a building, they could cast some magical spells. This is unlikely, since, as Bede himself confirms, he had learned about Christianity by his Frankish wife of 15 years, Bertha. In fact, Bertha’s parents gave her to Ethelbert on condition that she could continue to practice her religion with the assistance of her confessor, Bishop Luidhard. Ethelbert gave her an older church building, St. Martin’s, for her worship.
In any case, Ethelbert was cautious. “Your words and promises are very fair,” he said, “but as they are new to us, and of uncertain import, I cannot approve of them so far as to forsake that which I have so long followed with the whole English nation.”[2]
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Future pastor, local churches need unwavering leaders who fear the Lord. They don’t need you to meet their expectations, but they do need to see your hand tremble when you hold up your Bible. They need to know that you would rather have the whole room turn on you than utter one word that displeases the Spirit.

When I began pastoral ministry, I didn’t realize it would be my job to disappoint people. I had to tell a young man he wasn’t ready for ministry. I had to counsel a couple that they shouldn’t get married. I had to inform the church that Sunday’s text means exactly what they don’t want it to mean. Pastoral ministry is full of no-win decisions. Because of this, ministry is a miserable place for a pastor who needs everyone’s approval.
If we knew that before 2020, we know it even more now.
Fear of Man & Pastoral Ministry
This sinful desire for the approval of others is often called “the fear of man.” We were made to desire loving relationships, acceptance into a community, and the favor of those in authority over us. But the fear of man multiplies and warps these desires into an insatiable hunger for applause, honor, and status.
In pastoral leadership, this wrongly placed fear surfaces in many ways. It makes a pastor perform in the pulpit, but never quite preach from it. It makes him hide in his study with the light off, afraid the bully member might swing by. It fixates him on what would make his favorite professor proud, so much that he forgets to ask what his people need. It addicts him to fame or internet attention. It makes him easily manipulated by those who know how to hand out honor, shame, and pressure.
Every pastor struggles against this in different ways, but their hearts all say the same thing: “I need approval to be happy.” Young pastor, learn to overcome the fear of man now.
That’s easy to say. But how?
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