OLBGrk;
Ver. 7,8. In these words he gives them power,
1. To preach the gospel.
2. To confirm the doctrine they preached to be of God by miraculous operations, healing the sick, cleansing lepers, raising the dead, casting out devils. He bids them go preach, Khrussete, Cry like heralds; something like Isaiah's commission, Isaiah 58:1, Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a trumpet. He teacheth them what should be the sum of their sermons, The kingdom of heaven is at hand; the same thing which John Baptist preached, Matthew 3:2, which Christ preached, Mark 1:15, and which he directed the seventy to preach, Luke 10:9: not that they were to use no other words, but that all the words they used were to have this tendency, to declare that the time was now come, when God had fulfilled his promise of the Messiah, who was setting up his kingdom in the world, and to whose laws they were to be obedient. This doctrine they were to confirm by miracles, which he gives them a charge they should work freely, without receiving any reward for them, that the miracles being used to their private profit, might not lose their end, which was the confirmation of their doctrine.