Untitled Sermon

Matthew 16:13-20; Mark 8:27-30; Luke 9:18-21 ESV

Mark 8:27 And Jesus went on with his disciples to the villages

Matthew 16:13 into the district of Caesarea Philippi. And on the way,

Luke 9:18as he was praying alone, the disciples were with him. And he asked them,

Matthew 16:13"Who do people say that the Son of Man is?"

Mark 8:27"Who do people say that I am?"

Luke 9:18 "Who do the crowds say that I am?"

“The Son of Man”

Jesus reveals Himself as the prophetic fulfillment of the Old Testament “Son of Man”

Typically OT “son of man” speaks of the FRAILTY, TEMPORALITY, and plain HUMANITY of being a “son of man.”

In all cases but one it refers to being human.

Ezekiel was called “Son of man” - almost seemingly to differentiate him from the awesome angelic beings he was surrounded by and spoken to by in his intense visions!

However, one use expressly speaks of a Messiah under whom God would place all things.

Daniel 7:9-14

In the New Testament, Jesus identifies himself as the Son of Man, speaking of His complete humanity.

As a human He experienced life and He experienced death.

The Church, through its history has tried to separate Christ the spirit from Christ the human…

Luke 9:19 And they answered, "John the Baptist.

But others say, Elijah, and others,

that one of the prophets of old has risen."

Notice two things:

People are wrong.

What they weren’t saying:

He’s a fake

A new prophet (canon of scripture/prophets closed)

A lunatic

A demoniac

A great teacher

The Messiah/Christ of God

“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.”

― C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

Matthew 16:15 He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?"

The answer to this question is the difference between:

eternal life and eternal death

Heaven and hell

This is the crux of the gospel.

Matthew 16:16 Simon Peter replied,

"You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."

Luke 9:20"The Christ of God."

SON OF MAN & SON OF GOD

All God. All man.

Matthew 16:17 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.

Once again, Spiritual things are spiritually discerned, especially the revelation of Jesus Christ!

God is inconceivable (not capable of being imagined or grasped mentally;)

and incomprehensible (not able to be understood; not intelligible.)

He must reveal Himself to us. We cannot even come up with the idea of Him

He must impart an ability or capacity to understand or fathom what He reveals for our natural minds cannot contain!

Matthew 16:18 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.

“On this rock” - sounds like Jesus is talking about Peter (since Petros and Petra are so similar), but it’s a word play. Many scholars and commentators agree that Jesus was most likely referring to the truth that Peter exclaimed.

Petros mean pebble or little rock, Petra means a large rock

The cliffs where they were had little rocks that had broken off of it.

Those who are named in the Bible are named after greater things.

Some feel that Jesus was referring back to Himself.

Build my church

Jesus builds His church through us.

Gates of Hell

Some Jews held (Book of Enoch) that Mt Hermon was where the “sons of God” descended to mate with the daughters of men and gave birth to Nephilim

Mt Hermon was also known as Mt Baal - a center of Baal worship

Philippi Caesarea, at the foot of Mt Hermon was designated a shrine for the evil god pan by Alexander the Great

To this day, it is known as Banias (p pronounced b)

In Jesus day, this place was called “the gates of hell”

Perhaps this is the basis whereby many people preach on this passage as the gates of hell being all evil.

I read it as the gates of hell with not withstand the saints as it cannot contain them. We will rise!

In fact, death and hades will be thrown into the lake of fire.

Mat 7:24 ESV - 24 "Everyone then who hears these words of mine and does them will be like a wise man who built his house on the rock.”

1Co 3:11 ESV - 11 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.

Matthew 16:19 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."

Matthew 16:20 Then he strictly charged Luke 9:2and commanded the disciples

to tell no one that he was the Christ.

KEYS OF THE KINGDOM

The announcement (Acts 2: Pentecost) of the kingdom was the key to it.

God used Peter to announce who Jesus is, thereby opening the Kingdom of Heaven to all who would believe.

Rom 1:16 ASV - 16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

The preaching/sharing/announcing of the Gospel is a key that unlocks the door of eternal life in the heart of the hearer.

Whomever responds in belief are bound together as the body of Christ

Whomever rejects are loosed from the body of Christ

and whatever you bind on earth shall [have been] bound in heaven,

and whatever you loose on earth shall [have been] loosed in heaven

God calls the shots.

We follow or not!

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