Matthew 16:28

28. Verily I say The accomplishment of the enterprise for which they toil and earn a martyr’s reward is now stated. Son of man coming Is parallel with Matthew 10:23; both are fulfilled at Christ’s resurrection. As the Son of man would be come before the apostles had gone over the cities of Israel, so these same apostles standing here should see the Son of man coming. Some standing here would refer to the eleven apostles, excluding Judas, who did not behold Christ in his resurrection power.

These eleven were only some, not all, of those standing here; for it appears by Mark 8:34, that Jesus had called the people to be present at this discourse with his disciples. The declaration that they should see the Son of man at that time is too plainly literal for any fulfilment at the destruction of Jerusalem.

Instead of the phrase “Son of man coming in his kingdom,” Saint Mark has, (Matthew 9:1:) “Until they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.” Luke has: “Until they see the kingdom of God.” We may fairly suppose that our Lord used the expressions given both by Matthew and Mark, which include that of Luke. It would then be that some there standing should not taste of death until they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom; and the kingdom itself come with power. These two phrases express the commencing and continuative points of the same thing. The coming in his kingdom was at his resurrection; the coming of the kingdom of God with power was the consequent miraculous establishment of Christianity on earth. The latest surviving apostles saw both of these before their death. Our Lord’s “coming in his kingdom,” was when he came from Paradise to resume his body, now glorified, and was invested, as prophetically seen by Daniel, (Daniel 7:13-14,) with “a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages should serve him.” He then declared that “ALL POWER” was given into his hands, and commissioned his disciples to go and disciple all nations. The keys of the kingdom of heaven were put into their hands, and they were to open the doors to the believers of all peoples. Compare on Matthew 28:18.

It has been objected that the “phrase shall not taste of death until,” implies a considerable distance of time. This objection is correct, and it refutes the application of the passage, which some commentators have made, to the transfiguration, and even its exclusive application to the resurrection of the Lord. But of the whole then present, including the people, none but the eleven disciples saw the resurrection, which was the Son of man coming in his kingdom; and some of these same eleven lived until they saw the kingdom of God come with power by the complete miraculous establishment of Christianity in the earth, as well as the disappearance of the old dispensation before it. To this interpretation, therefore, of both phrases taken together, the implied length of time is no objection.