Now You Get It!

Psalm of the Day: Psalm 141

Psalm 141 ESV

A Psalm of David. O Lord, I call upon you; hasten to me! Give ear to my voice when I call to you! Let my prayer be counted as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice! Set a guard, O Lord, over my mouth; keep watch over the door of my lips! Do not let my heart incline to any evil, to busy myself with wicked deeds in company with men who work iniquity, and let me not eat of their delicacies! Let a righteous man strike me—it is a kindness; let him rebuke me—it is oil for my head; let my head not refuse it. Yet my prayer is continually against their evil deeds. When their judges are thrown over the cliff, then they shall hear my words, for they are pleasant. As when one plows and breaks up the earth, so shall our bones be scattered at the mouth of Sheol. But my eyes are toward you, O God, my Lord; in you I seek refuge; leave me not defenseless! Keep me from the trap that they have laid for me and from the snares of evildoers! Let the wicked fall into their own nets, while I pass by safely.

Scripture Reading: Exodus 3:13-15

Exodus 3:13–15 ESV

Then Moses said to God, “If I come to the people of Israel and say to them, ‘The God of your fathers has sent me to you,’ and they ask me, ‘What is his name?’ what shall I say to them?” God said to Moses, “I am who I am.” And he said, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘I am has sent me to you.’ ” God also said to Moses, “Say this to the people of Israel: ‘The Lord, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you.’ This is my name forever, and thus I am to be remembered throughout all generations.

Sermon

Good Morning Church! I was glad when they said to me let us go and worship in the house of the Lord!

Interestingly enough, for those of you who are counting, this is our 50th sermon in our series through the Gospel of Matthew. Ad It turns out on a nice round number like 50 we find ourselves landing on what is, form many points of view THE most important passage in the book of Matthew. You might be thinking about the crucifixion or the resurrection which are still to come, and theologically those are surely the most important, but from a literary view, it gets not much bigger than this one. If you read the whole gospel of Matthew and start to understand how this whole Gospel is structured you will find this to be true. The same is actually true of all three synoptic Gospels, the gospels of Matthew Mark and Luke. There is a point in the middle that becomes in some sense the focus point, and that event is peters Confession of who Jesus is.

Thus far Matthew has been telling us washout telling us a lot of who Jesus is, giving us hints and showing us through narrative and teaching, through hints and clues. So while these truths were told to us, we had to pay careful attention. He forgave sins and walked on water and spoke with a heavenly authority. We could piece together the genealogy and read betwen the lines at the baptism, it has been here for those that looked, but it has been possible, i guess to overlook the truth. So while the truth of who jesus is has been sort of pointed to ere, in Matthew 16 verse 13-20 The words that have been implied, and the thoughts that have been motivated are put into action and spoken clearly and plainly. So that is part of why it is important, but understanding the scope of how the whole book unfolds we see this as well.

It is as if the story has been building to this point to Peters Confession of the Christ and then from here to the end we have a march towards the cross ad Resurrection. This then becomes in many ways the start of the end of the book of Matthew. It serves as what I like to call the hinge from the building action of introducing the Messiah to the meat of the action, the death of the Messiah. Literarily the march towards the cross starts here. This will be seen clearly next week for sure as we see what comes immediately after. but today we will be focusing in on the confession of Peter of Jesus as the Christ, the son of the Living God.

As Mentioned our Passage for today is Matthew 16:13-20

Matthew 16:13–20 ESV

Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.

These are the words of the Lord for us this morning. Lets begin with a word of prayer.

PRAY

If we look on this passage as the middle of Matthew, we should note here that the center has in it’s middle yet another center. And while that sounds a little, well, DUH, in this case it bears saying. That middle of the middle if you will is that finally someone gets is. Finally someone realizes that Jesus is not JUST a miracle worker. Not JUST another rabbi or teacher. He is NOT JUST someone who can get people what they need or want. not JUST in the eyes of the P and S an enemy or usurper, one seeking to take away all their fame or clout. Even those who kinda got it (John the B) it is not boldly stated, and it is asked in a question. no, here finally someone gets who Jesus is. And the one who finally gets who, who finally vocalizes this precious truth is Peter. Called here Simon peter and Simon Bar-Jonah. Theologically speaking there is a whole whole lot here, but today I would like to be a little more practical.

So today I would like to focus on how this passage flows. Because what I will argue and what I will maintain is that the way this whole narrative pans out with Peter making a confession of who Jesus is becomes for us a microcosm of what everyone in their life will have to make a decision on. Peter as he is given the keys to the kingdom of heaven as he is promised that the church will be built on him and on his confession, as Peter receives this blessing of knowing and this blessing of empowerment and authority given to him, and by extension therefore the church, what is fascinating to see and witness is how this all pans out. And the whole section begins with A QUESTION.

A QUESTION

Actually it starts with two, and this is very telling. Jesus comes to his disciples. Geographically they come to Cesarea Phillipi, they are travelling from if we remember a couple of weeks ago they are moving on from sort of Gentile land and now we begin the journey towards Jerusalem. So thinking culturally we are moving FROM Gentile land to what is the city of God and the most quintessentially Jewish city, Jerusalem. and as he makes his way from one to the other w find ourselves here and Jesus asks peter the first question. “You know, people are talking, the gentiles are bringing me their sick for healing, this gentile woman is coming up to me and bothering you, what is she saying. Everyone is coming after me. TH pharisees are talking the Sadducee are talking The P and S are talking to each other, the people are talking. But what are they saying. Maybe they are not talking to Me, jesus says, so Peter what are they saying. As you are out there telling people the truth, saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Peter what are people saying. Who are people saying that I am?

And Peter gives us all the usual suspects, and maybe a few new ones. John the Baptist. Which again is weird, John Baptized Jesus, how could Jesus BE john, doesn't fully make sense but we have already read that Herod had this thought. Others say he is Elijah, the greatest prophet to ever live. Elijah, who God took him up in chariots of faire, maybe he came back down and here he is, He is this Jesus guy, he is really Elijah. Maybe he is Jeremiah, the weeping Prophet the one who foretold of the desperate and painful exile, but also spoke of hope. Maybe he is Jeremiah the prophet come to give us hope after bringing such bad news before. Maybe he is some other prophet. Hosea, Jonah, Nathan, Pick your favorite one, maybe Jesus is one of those dudes. Whoever he is he is a man of God, one who speaks God’s words. Which is only about half true.

But Jesus does not correct him. He doesn't say well we all know that's wrong. He doest explain how he cant be John the Baptist or how he is more important than Elijah or all these other prophets, he doest hit us with a before these people were I AM sort of statement, because those that would be true, that's not the point here. No, he hits peter with the real question. Because ultimately it does not matter what everyone else says. It doesn't matter what OTHER PEOPLE think. It does not matter to PETER and PETERS soul what everyone else around him thinks. Here is the real question verse 15: WHO DO YOU SAY THAT I AM? This is THE question. This is the question that every soul must face and wrestle with. This is the question that will impact every soul for eternity. Here is Jesus. WHO DO YOU SAY THAT HE IS? And while Modern people we don’t usually pull out the same sorts of answers as the people of Peter’s day, John the Baptist, some Prophet, we still don’t give the right answer. GO out into the world and ask, ask some random person on the street, who do you say that Jesus is? Well he was a good teacher. Oh, he was one who taught us how to be good people. He was a great moral man. Maybe you will hear that he was some sort of prophet, a man who spoke from God. But ho many people will say the truth.

Though he is not the originator of the thought, CS Lewis made famous the argument that when confronted with Jesus, who he was and what he taught you have but three options. Here is a man who claimed to be God. WE have seen multiple times even here Jesus will not correct Peter when he confesses it. So here in Jesus is a man who claims to be God what are you going to do with that, Jesus says he is that but again, who do YOU say that Jesus is. And the argument goes you really have only two options. Noting he taught us moral things, and he was a moral teacher that is not all he taught so confronted with a man claiming deity you have three options. Option one: He is a LIAR. He knows he is really not but he wants the fame and notoriety that comes with this claim. But if he knows he is not and claims to be God then he is simply put a Liar. But maybe hes not a liar, maybe he is just crazy. SO he could be a Liar or he could be a Lunatic. Maybe he really thinks this, but it cant be true. If anyone came up to you on the street and claimed to eb God you would probably jump to this one, that is a crazy person, but in the case of Jesus there is the third option. Maybe he is telling the truth. Maybe he is LORD.

But here the ultimate question that is laid before all of us is this: WHO DO YOU SAY THAT JESUS IS? In our story we have the only correct right and true answer. in PETERS CONFESSION

THE CONFESSION

Matthew 16:16 - the central action point of the book of MATTHEW

Matthew 16:16 ESV

Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

You are the messiah, you are the one we have been waiting for. you are the Son of the living God,. the only begotten son of God, you are everything YOU say you are and more. the confession here YOU ARE THE ONE WHO CAME TO SAVE. the only one who can save. that is what is encapsulated in saying you are the christ. We often look at the phrase christ as sort of Jesus last name but it is a title meaning Messiah And he is the son of the living God. Beautifully just like we had two feedings we have this confession twice too, we will get to it at the END of our series but a roman centurion confessed this too, Matthew 27:54 Truly this man was God.

Matthew 27:54 ESV

When the centurion and those who were with him, keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were filled with awe and said, “Truly this was the Son of God!”

But ultimately, though over the years of church history our confession has become a bit more precise, and we have things like the apostles creed: I believe in God the Father almighty and in Jesus Christ his only son our LORD” though or confession is a little more polished, and robust as we have had truths revealed to us, with that being said, THIS HERE is the foundation of everything that we believe. This here, this confession, YOU ARE THE CHRIST THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD, are the most powerful and important words ever spoken. This becomes the hings and the thing that holds all of Christianity together. This confession right here.

Given by Peter, the first recorded person to have these words leave his mouth becomes our example. We often (maybe rightfully) rag on the disciples. Here Peter nails is. He knew that ultimately it does not matter how everyone around us answers this question. When the question is placed before YOU what WILL YOU say? who is this Jesus you proclaim. You say you are a Christian, who is this Person who’s name you claim to bear? He is our savior, our messiah the christ, the son of the living God. He is our Lord. He is the beginning and the end. The author and perfecter and fisher of our faith. He is the second person of the trinity, Gd became man. He is our everything. In him, Paul would write, we live and move and have our being. For from him and through him and To him are ALL things. These are what we confess. This is what we must do and say when faced with the question.

But I want to note one more thing about this confession. It doesn’t come from Peter. Peter is empowered to say these profound and powerful words. But it is not because he sat down and thought about it and it just made sense t him, because on some level frankly it does not make sense. And it is not because Peter, of all 12 disciples gathered round is the MOST smart and MOST insightful and the MOST eloquent. It is none of those things. Peter makes this confession: YOU ARE THE CHRIST THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD and jesus answers him: Matthew 16:17

Matthew 16:17 ESV

And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

You are blessed, Peter. We will get into other blessing, but note here, Why are you blessed? Because God has revealed this precious truth to you and to your heart.

I don’t want to get bogged down r weighted down in sort of the weighty theological debates surrounding this, instead I would like to let this linger with Joy in our hearts. Because as Jesus says: you are blessed just to have this truth revealed. We often think of blessing as all coming AFTER this confession, but Jesus says the very fact that you MAKE THIS CONFESSION is the blessing. For that is a gift from God.

For those of us who confess this truth: YOU ARE THE CHRIST THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD, for those who have this truth resound i your hearts and minds know that THAT was a precious gift from God. He loved you so much. We talk about John 3:16: For God so loved the world that he sent his only son, and that is true, but when you compound that thought with this verse it is even more rich. For God so loved us that he sent his son for us and THEN saw fit to sow us and teach us in our hearts and in our souls who the son he sent IS. He didn’t just bring before us his son and hope we get it. The beauty of this, the splendor of this is that he brings for his son and then he opes our eyes, causes our dead hearts to beat and he shows us clearly the truth: JESUS IS LORD. You don’t come to this confession in your ow strength and might. And praise God for that, because left to my ow sinful devices I would never get HERE. So we come to this confession because God saves us.

Then we get THE PROMISE.

THE PROMISE

The promise becomes, and we will deal with this particular question a bit on Thursday at Grace Group, but here is the long and short of t, the promise becomes that those who make this confession are built into a living vibrant active life giving community called the church.

What unites us is NOT, this is the beauty of the church. what unites us is not our socio-economic status, what unites us in NOT our political beliefs, what unites us is NOT just the fact that we get along and like each other, though that does help. What unites us is NOT JUST similar interests, what unites us is not even just the fact that we all just happen to live here in Las cruces, because what unites US is the same thing that unites ALL BELIEVER existing at all times and all places. It is what unites ME to the believer halfway across the world in the smallest most remote village in the most obscure corner of the world. What unites us is this confession.

The promise is that the church will be built. The promise is that upon this confession of who Jesus is and our profession of this man, who was God and our savior, Christ will build his church. and it will grow and it will flourish. It will be a light to the world a beacon of hope and salvation.

The church is then given the keys of the kingdom. That which we bind and loose on earth will be bound and loosed in heaven. We are given authority to speak the truth and life and light and salvation into peoples lives and hearts and minds. We are given the authority that Christ has been given. This is Matthew 28 given to us 12 chapters early. Chrsit has been given authority and then he empowers his disciple through this confession to go out into the world. And so the promise that we have been given is a promise is that Christ will build his church - and he does so in the beauty of the already and not yet in his church.

And so on one hand we say that we long for and wait for the day and we anticipate and hope for the day when he will gloriously return. When he will come back and establish in real and tangible ways his kingdom here. When the new heavens and new earth are ushered in and when every knee will bow and every tongue confess, when he will rule with a rod of iron and the nations will bow before him. Yes, we look forward to that. But know this: his kingdom is here on earth. built upon what is our confession first uttered by Simon peter now proclaimed by every beleiver.

A long time ago, when I was working at another church I got a phone call. I was sitting in my office working on, that churches version of the grace point, we called is the Refresco, means refreshing, that's not super relevant to the story, but I thought i would share. But I was typing or reading away, writing a bible study, and I get a page from the office that a guy wants to talk to a pastor, Pastor Ruben not in right now can you take it - sure. And I answer the phone and the guy says: are you a pastor? and I said yeah, and he said OK, how can I be saved. I was taken a little bit back, people don’t usually just jump to this point in the conversation, so I asked some follow up questions. Ca I know little about you, what is your heart, why are you here. I wanted to see, his background. Did this person grow up in church and they need assurance, did some friend tell them, you need to call a pastor and be saved? What is their background and heart? So i asked like one or two questions trying to understand the situation and he didn’t answer any of them just said well that's disappointing, you fail.

I said well, that's really interesting I didn’t realize that this was a test. It turns out that this guy took upon himself to call every church in the nation to make a list, and it turns out that ours made it on his list of synagogues of satan because I didn’t answer his question by quoting Acts 16:30-31

Acts 16:30–31 ESV

Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household.”

And i am proud of myself, I bit my tongue, I didn’t respond in the flesh with a how dare you, who are you to judge. You wretch who seeks to place himself in a position to judge every church with the same measure you will be judged. Sure acts 16 says that, but what if I had said: If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is lord ad believe in you heart that Jesus raised him form the dead you will be saved. How about this, maybe the Holy spirit gave me the discernment to know that your question was not sincere and so just like Jesus would not perform miracles in his hometown because of their hard heart so too I will not cast pearls before swine. No, I bit my tongue. I said I am sorry to hear that and he said you better be and he hung up on me. and while I do not give much credence to that particular gentleman, I will always remember that whole encounter. But I bring it up because he asks a good question, approprate to our discussion today.

Scripture says a lot on how we can be saved. I mentioned a few already. Believe in the Lord Jesus and you will be saved. Acts 16:31.

Romans 10:9 ESV

because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

1 John gives us tests like loving and forgiving

In acts 2 after Pentecost Peter, the one who said this says:

Acts 2:38 ESV

And Peter said to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Theologically speaking though, the heart of it is here. in Matthew 16. This ultimately is for us the promise. When confronted with the question, in our heart, by the world around us, however or whenever we are confronted with this question what will you say when asked: WHO DO YOU SAY THAT JESUS IS.

If we confess He is the Christ, the son of the living God, we are on the right page.

I am a man who prides myself, and I really don’t think in a sinful way, i think it is good and right, but I pride myself on my theology. I enjoy sitting back and pondering theological points. As a philosophy major, right, I like the debate, and I like diving deep into those sorts of things. But we should note that there is a real danger that we elevate our theology to the point where the peripheral things matter more than the central thing. This is 10000% the issue with the Pharisees. We just read it. the elevate the traditions of man over the commands f God.. they have s emphasized their thoughts that Gods doctrines fall by the wayside. But i would say that the way that we can guard ourselves or protect ourselves is by remembering the simple beauty of this confession. Remembering that this is what unites believers.

YOU ARE THE CHRIST, THE SON OF THE LIVING GOD.

Lets Pray.