Throughout Jesus' ministry all that he did and said made astounding claims. Within the book of Matthew, the writer seeks to make one claim clear above all ... Jesus' claim as King of Kings.

We see the claim from the first chapters: His Royal human lineage (Matt 1), His amazing nativity (Matt 2) and His heavenly attestation (Matt 3). And then, within his ministry we see His incredible teaching (Matt 5-7) Matt 7:28-29 "He taught as one who had authority".

And then we come to the focus of this series: Matthew 8-9. In these chapters we read of Jesus' amazing miracles - three groups of 3 miracles, each with teaching following to elaborate the message of the miracles. These miracles were carefully chosen from all that Jesus did, carefully laid out with one reason: so that we would see who Jesus is ... King of Kings, God come amongst us to reign.

And it is so important that we understand this. In John 14 we find that Philip, one of Jesus' disciples, still didn't get it, even after all he had seen. Jesus' verdict was that Philip should have understood: "Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the miracles themselves." (John 14:11). Worse than that, we find that so many of those who also witnessed all these things concluded that Jesus was actually 'a devil' (Matt 12:24). Later, when they realised how foolish their assessment had been, they begged that Jesus do more miracles; Jesus refused – they already had been shown all the evidence they needed, but their hearts were too hard.

In this series, I long that we would see Jesus - see Him as He is, see the King of Glory in all His splendour! But more than that, I long that we should see this so we respond by falling on our knees, bowing to Him in faith as our King, our Saviour and our God. Like Thomas, that we see, and rather than harden our hearts, we worship him "My Lord and my God".