Hello Joseph, it’s good to hear from you.

You said:

“Hi Kyle, thanks for the article and your thinking. I just have a few comments for consideration.
For starters, Jesus never said to worship me.”

He did, actually.

But again, everything He did is to be understood in terms of the first-century Jewish world.

Jesus presented Himself as God in the flesh. The natural, expected result of such a claim is worship.

This is why Jesus never refuses worship.

Jesus expects people to worship Him when they realize He is God. Throughout His adult life, no matter who worships Him, He receives it. He often praises the person who worships Him and grants their requests.

If Jesus didn’t want to be worshiped, He would have behaved entirely differently.

If Jesus didn’t want to be worshiped, He would stop people as soon as they tried. Angels do this constantly, forbidding people from worshiping them. If Jesus didn’t want worship, He would rebuke those who worshiped Him, and refuse their requests, because they wouldn’t be understanding things rightly.

Instead, Jesus always, always receives worship.

Again, it’s the natural, expected result of claiming to be God. When you see God for who He is, you worship Him. God is to be worshiped.

Claiming to be God is expecting to be worshiped.

You said:

“Secondly, the disciples, including Matthew were confused and uncertain about Jesus's origin/divinity throughout his ministry. Hence, what he wrote about ~40 years later around 70 AD just might have been influenced and evolved over this time.”

Matthew 28 presents them worshiping Jesus. They all worship Him in the boat after He quiets the storm. The disciples certainly worshiped Jesus during His ministry!

They were confused primarily after the Crucifixion, before the Resurrection. Once they saw the risen Jesus, they were set on fire. They willingly sacrificed anything and everything to spread the word and tell the whole world about Jesus. There was no doubt or confusion anymore. Acts records this boldness in force.

You said:

“Maybe your argument is reasonable and he eventually concluded Jesus was God but even his opinion developed over time because as it says in scripture, he was huddled in fear with the other disciples after the crucifixion.”

Matthew worshiped Jesus before the Crucifxion, in the boat.

Matthew worshiped Jesus after the Resurrection, along with the rest.

As Acts 1 records, the disciples were filled with boldness once they saw the risen Jesus, to the point where Jesus had to command them NOT to go and do anything until the Holy Spirit came upon them.