What Does Matthew 18:19 Mean?
Again, I say to you, that if two of you sound together on the earth concerning anything they ask for, it will come to be for them from my Father who is in the heavens.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven.THE KEY
Before the request comes into being, two voices are already being called to sound together.
THE MEANING
When two come into accord on earth, this verse places their shared request before the Father and promises that it will come to be for them. The Greek word for “agree” carries the image of voices sounding together, while “shall be done” can also be heard as “will come to be.” The asking is shared, and the promised response is active in the reader’s life now.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It challenges the assumption that prayer here is only a private transaction between one person and God: shared accord is part of the asking.
THE ROOT
συμφωνήσωσιν
symphōnēsōsin
GROWS FROM
φων- (phōn-, sound or voice; in συμφωνέω (symphōneō), σύν (syn, together) joins φωνή (phōnē, sound or voice))
Sound or voice; joined with “together,” it forms the sense of sounding together.
“sound together” in this verse is symphōnēsōsin. The word translated “agree” carries an image of distinct voices finding a shared sound. The verse places that shared sound before the asking, so agreement is part of the request’s shape, not just a tally of people who want the same thing.
ALSO GROWS
phōnē: Voice; sound
φωνή
It makes the shared quality of agreement audible: the voices remain distinct, yet sound together.
symphōnia: Harmony; concord
συμφωνία
Its image of harmony opens agreement as coordinated voices, bringing the verse’s “two” into a common asking.
γενήσεται
genēsetai
GROWS FROM
γιν- (gin-, from γίνομαι (ginomai, become or come to be))
Become; come into being or happen.
The verb translated “shall be done” can also carry the sense “will come to be.” The request is pictured not only as something completed, but as something that comes into being through the Father’s response.
ALSO GROWS
genesis: Origin; birth
γένεσις
It shares the sense of coming into being, opening an emergence beneath the verse’s promise that the request will be done.
genos: Kind; lineage
γένος
It carries the same family of becoming and origin, echoing the movement from a shared request toward what comes to be.
THE PATTERN
When people come into accord, their shared direction and voice take shape before action follows.
Do two walk together, unless they have met?And when they heard this, they lifted up their voice to God with one passion and said, "Master, you are God, who made the heaven and the earth and the sea and all that is in them."That they all may be one; as you, Father, are in me, and I in you, that they also may be one in us; that the world may lean its full weight on the fact that you sent me.THE THREAD
For where two or three are gathered together in my nature, there I am in the midst of them.The next verse gives shared asking a setting: two or three gather in his name, ὄνομα (ónoma, name as nature), and his presence is in their midst. Together, the verses join the shared request to a shared relation to his nature.
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