The Promise of the Church - The Dearest Place

Introduction

Living in Denver

Church plant was meeting on one night

We were a part of another church where we got married

played bass, not by choice.

Being fresh out of bible college I thought, they are missing out on my worship leading skills

In the midst of this my friend was trying to get me to move to Missouri

Start making plans — Call Rob

Commit to a local church first then let’s talk

Decide to stay in Denver but let’s leave our church and join this church plant.

Your job is to wash the feet of the people with the towel Jesus hands you, right now that is the bass.

I don’t want a guy to come to my church who doesn’t love to play bass for Jesus.

the need in any church is an open hand to serve people.

Recap

Purpose of the Church To Glorify God

Power of the Church is the love of Christ.

Practice of the Church is to be a people who love one another.

Presence of the Church is a faithful, peaceful, and fruitful one.

Persistence of The church is built on our shared confidence in Christ.

Segway

MPT: The foundation of the church is the fact that Jesus is the Christ.

MPS: The Church will not fail because Jesus made it.

Point 1 | The Great question 13-15

[13] Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” [14] And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” [15] He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”

The context of our passage is helpful as we make some initial observations. Just before this exchange, Matthew records Jesus ministering in Galilee, Healing many and performing miracles. He feeds a 4,000 plus people. He is then cornered by the religious leaders who ask Him for a sign…

So here we are now away from that hustle and bustle in the pagan territory of Caesarea Philippi. It may seem odd for Jesus to bring His disciples here but it would make sense to go to a place where He would not have been quickly recognized, so that he could have time with the 12.

This helps us understand why Jesus would ask this question. He is living in the midst of people, performing miracles left and right and just does not seem to be clicking with anyone. Just a couple quick observations on this — First, Jesus cares about our context and our culture and so should we. We are not to be some insular group that never faces outward. We should know our culture, we should know what they believe. Jesus knew there was a lot of confusion about who He was during that time, and the same is true today. There is so much confusion.

Here is the reality of our context here in the south. There are many who have been brought up in a sort of Christianized culture — There are polite folks, there is southern branded hospitality, It has some marks of Christianity but if you dig deep, you might not find Jesus in a lot of it —This Christianized culture; they are just as confused about who Jesus is, as those they would deem unreachable. Perhaps, some of you are confused about who Jesus is. You have spent years in the church, playing the game, saying the right sorts of things, yet you find yourself alone with your thoughts and the hope that you have heard talked about; the peace that surpasses understanding — is foreign to you. Maybe you have heard about Him and know about Him but you don’t know Him.

That is the second observation. It matters what we believe. It matters who we say Jesus is.

See in verse fifteen He changes who the question is geared toward. He says ‘Who do you say that I am?’

It matters who we think Jesus is. It matters who we say He is. It matters who we say He is with our words. It matters who we say He is with our actions. So what is our answer? Well for starters it should line up with what Jesus said about who He is.

He is God the Son

Mark 14:61–62 [61] But he remained silent and made no answer. Again the high priest asked him, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” [62] And Jesus said, “I am, and you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of Power, and coming with the clouds of heaven.” (ESV)

John 10:37–38 [37] If I am not doing the works of my Father, then do not believe me; [38] but if I do them, even though you do not believe me, believe the works, that you may know and understand that the Father is in me and I am in the Father.” (ESV)

So He is God, the Son. You cannot have God the Father without Jesus and you cannot have Jesus, the son, without God the Father. He says in John 10:30 just a few verses before that,

John 10:30 [30] I and the Father are one.” (ESV)

Jesus was not a standalone character in the Bible that you can admire and call yourself a Christian. He is either God or a liar. You cannot love Jesus and not love God the Father.

Next He is the way the truth and the life

John 14:6–7 [6] Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. [7] If you had known me, you would have known my Father also. From now on you do know him and have seen him.” (ESV)

Secondly, in a post truth world Jesus stands in defiance as the only way to the Father. If you want a relationship with God, there is no other path than Jesus. If you want someone to know God, point them to Jesus. The world says, you can’t know truth, we say, yes you can — His name is Jesus Christ.

If I handed you a hundred dollar bill it would make you pretty happy (you could get a whole gallon of gas with that). You might feel really loved by me if I gave you a hundred dollar bill. You go about your week imagining how you will spend the 100 dollars.

Now imagine you get to the store to pay for your item (your gallon of gas) and as you go to hand the bill you look down and see George Washington’s face on it. Everything else about the bill looks legit. It even has the weird hologram stripe on it. How did you not notice it? It is so close to the real thing and yet it is utterly worthless.

It might seem loving to give a softened Jesus — a Jesus who doesn’t say deny yourself, a Jesus who doesn’t say come and die that you may live, a comfortable Jesus who doesn’t sanctify — as an option but friends that is a false Gospel and therefore is the most unloving thing you can do. Don’t let anyone miss out on the real thing by giving them something that may be close but misses the mark. Christ alone is the door to salvation.

Lastly, He is the builder of the church.

Matthew 16:18 [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. (ESV)

The church is His. In fact, in Mark 2:19 Jesus refers to Himself as the bridegroom. The church we see in the New Testament as His bride. So, you cannot claim to love Jesus but hate His bride the church.

You come to me, tell me how great I am, tell me you want to do life with me, let’s partner in ministry, let’s start a business together, let’s be best friends — but then you tell me or worse I find out from someone else, you can’t stand my wife. Donzo. We will part ways.

How much more the King of the ages who laid down His own life for His bride, the church. Jesus loves His church, and so should we if we are to follow him. We will spend a good bit of time unpacking the significance of that today — it is the promise of the Church; the name of our final sermon in this series. It’s gonna be awesome.

Who do we say, in all the ways we could say it, who Jesus is? Well let’s look at how Peter answers the question.

Point 2 | The Great Answer 16-17

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

Peter has got to be one of my favorites. He is the bold mistake maker of scripture. Only this time as his mouth opens, the most profound eternal truth of the ages comes out. Peter is so convinced that this teacher he has been doing life with is from God. John Calvin points out that Peter attributes “living God” lest there be any confusion. Jesus is from THE God. Not the dead idols of the time.

We know from the rest of the Gospel accounts that Peter likely does not fully understand this declaration. We see his mouth seem to jump in front of his mind quite a bit actually. Nonetheless He recognizes that Jesus is no ordinary man. He has come from above. That is what the name Christ means — anointed one, messiah. Peter knows Jesus is the Savior, even if he doesn’t yet understand what that entails.

How does Peter know? Is he just smarter than the other disciples? Well probably not but it almost seems as if Peter has solved it. He looked at all the evidence and came to a conclusion. But that isn’t the case either.

Jesus tells us in verse 17. God revealed it to Him. See none of us who believe have any stake in the game. We have no claim of mental ascent — no right to stand above anyone and say “I figured it out”. If you believe in Jesus it is because you have been rescued out of darkness by the Father of lights in whom there is no shadow due to change.

You may think that apart from being saved, you looked at evidence, you discerned right from wrong and made a decision to follow Jesus because it’s the right thing to do and you are a moral person. That’s not what the scriptures say though. Scripture says you were dead in your trespasses and God made you alive. You were by nature a child of wrath. You who were far off have been brought near by the blood of Jesus.

Jesus says in John 6:44

John 6:44 [44] No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day. (ESV)

You might hear this and say “Well why evangelize then?” This is not how Christians think though. See we evangelize for lot’s of reasons, namely that Jesus commanded us to.

What a miracle and a scandal all wrapped up in that God would choose us to be His instruments of redemption! God is at work in the lives of people all over and He will use us in their lives. Ultimately we will tell others about Jesus because we love Him.

Every follower of Jesus has a command to evangelize. dAnd this understanding — God is the one who draws people to the Son who saves us and gives us His Spirit — that understanding should unleash the most powerful boldness in us to get out and talk about the one we love because He first loved us. The pressure is not on us to change hearts, our job is to show up as a witness and testify to the life, death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ; then we step back and watch what God will do. There may be a place and time for defending the truth, but our main call as believers to point to the hope we have in Jesus. Our main call is to pray for people more than we argue with them.

Look at verse 17 one more time.

[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.

If you believe in Jesus, you are blessed. You are a walking talking miracle. And I should add, this is for anyone who would believe. If you are searching for the truth, if you are searching for what this life is even supposed to be about, if you are weary and need rest, if you are wondering if the Father is drawing you, friend He is. How do I know that? Because if you are hearing these words, if you are here it is because He has brought you to this place and perhaps it’s time to get off the fence and meet Jesus Christ. Perhaps this is the day that God brings you out of Darkness into His light. I pray even now that your heart would be softened. You don’t have to have it all figured out. You don’t have to clean yourself up. Peter declared this revelation well before fully understanding it.

Life does not get easier — I don’t really know a great way to articulate this but my best effort is that all of the current suffering you experience, the certain torments, or even the monotony of every day life; its not as if all of those suddenly change for the better when you follow Jesus, but there is this strange shadow of beauty that falls on all of it that no human can really explain. Suffering, Anxiety, Depression, they don’t suddenly disappear, but they do start to appear less powerful. And over time they may lose power altogether because One day He will wipe every tear away. And the monotony, the mundane, the ordinary — they take on indescribable beauty as the rhythms of grace play out from the Spirit of God at work in our every day lives.

You begin to see glimpses of glory and when you read passages like Romans 8:18 your heart is warmed with comfort no earthly vice could dream of matching.

Romans 8:18 [18] For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. (ESV)

If you have not met Jesus, delay no longer. Come talk to us. We will pray with you.

Ok so perhaps you are here and you hear about Jesus, you hear about who he is and we are closing off this series called “The Dearest Place” about the Church that Jesus would build and you think to yourself, “I have experienced anything but the dearest place when it comes to church”.

So is the church a failure? Has the truth of the Gospel been lost because of the failure of God’s supposed followers?

Well, in short, no. This brings us to our final point this morning. The Great Promise.

Now for the sake of time and of our series we will spend most of our remaining time on verse 18. Perhaps we will cover verses 19 and 20 at some point going through the Gospel’s but today we just don’t have time unless everyone wants to skip lunch.

Point 3 | The Great Promise

[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. [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.” [20] Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ. (ESV)

Now this is one of the most heavily debated pieces of scripture. The Roman Catholic church interprets it to mean that Peter is the first pope. As I already said, we don’t have time to unpack all of this but in brief we can deal with it because it is a question. Just what is the rock upon which Jesus will build His church?

In short Peter is not the rock. No really, it just doesn’t add up. Like we said Peter likely didn’t fully understand this. We know must of these things didn’t click for the apostles until the resurrection. But more than that, just 5 verses later Jesus calls him Satan.

Bryan Robinson, lead pastor of Steadfast Church gave us this sermon series and this outline, for that we are very grateful. While I have made most of the content my own I had to use this phrase, He said:

Peter goes from leader to Lucifer in 5 verses.

So what is the rock? We can see it is the confession Peter makes. “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” And we see that more from the following verses and the things Jesus says and does than just the quirkiness of our bold mistake maker.

Jesus goes on to explain how being this fulfiller of prophecy, being this messiah, the Christ, means He will suffer and be killed. Cue Peter saying no to that to which Jesus responds “Get behind me Satan”. And everything Jesus said was going to happen did!

Jesus would go on performing miracles — Healing the sick, giving sight to the blind, raising the dead — all the while still not convincing the religious leaders. He would be falsely accused. Judas would betray Him. Peter would deny three times even knowing Him. Every single one of His followers would scatter and flee. He, nonetheless, would remain faithful and steadfast, making his way to calvary to be murdered. He was first mocked, beaten beyond recognition, stripped of his clothes — they placed a crown of thorns on His head, nailed him to the tree and the darkest day in the history of the universe ends with His dead body being laid in the tomb.

Three days later though, He would get up and walk out of that tomb. He appeared to many and ascended to the right hand, just as He said He would.

So rewind back to this moment in these verses. Jesus knows what they are about to go through. He is lovingly preparing their hearts. He is saying “Hey, I am building something that can’t be stopped by death — the world is going to try and cut the head off this thing by killing me and killing you ultimately but I am the resurrection and the life — I am the defeater of death! What I build cannot and will not be destroyed!”

I love imagining what the disciples must have gone through emotionally. The night Jesus was crucified had to be the darkest moment. All they had seen and learned. All they had experienced coming to an end or so it would seem. You have to wonder if like us they wouldn’t be wrestling internally and maybe even arguing with one another “Remember what He said about rising?” Perhaps they had a glimmer of hope…imagine that. Now hear this — Jesus rose from the dead, He is walking with disciples, He unpacks the scriptures, and then joins them for a meal —

Luke 24:30–34 [30] When he was at table with them, he took the bread and blessed and broke it and gave it to them. [31] And their eyes were opened, and they recognized him. And he vanished from their sight. [32] They said to each other, “Did not our hearts burn within us while he talked to us on the road, while he opened to us the Scriptures?” [33] And they rose that same hour and returned to Jerusalem. And they found the eleven and those who were with them gathered together, [34] saying, “The Lord has risen indeed, and has appeared to Simon!” (ESV)

He is alive! It’s all true! It clicked for them.

And here we are. Let this truth sink in. Oh that our hearts would burn within us! Do you see how significant it is that we walk through these doors?! I cannot stress enough that Billy and I don’t preach Gospel community because we want buts in seats, or because we want to hang out — We are participating in something so cosmic and glorious that the gates of hell will not prevail against! Remember our big idea? The Church will not fail because Jesus made it.

What if laws change? What if there is a huge moral shift in society? What if the Christianity becomes utterly hated and viewed as harmful? I mean, look around we are in it. The Church will not fail. What about us?

Hebrews 10:36–39 [36] For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. [37] For, “Yet a little while, and the coming one will come and will not delay; [38] but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” [39] But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls. (ESV)

Let us not be those who shrink back! We need not fear, governmental change, we need not stress over election cycles and what freedoms we might lose — maybe freedoms for far too long we have taken for granted. We need not fear persecution, but rather should expect it; even so we need not fear death because Jesus made a promise and He keeps His promises.

He gets in by dying. He gets out by resurrection. And now the gates are his. Revelation 1:18, “I died, and behold I am alive forevermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades.” The keys were kept on the inside. That is why he went in. And when he came out he brought the keys with him. Now he will build his church. Death will take none and keep none that he finally wills to have. John Piper,

Conclusion

So has the church failed? This same question appeared on a Q&A poll on Instagram from an artist I follow. His answer was stellar so I will share it - This is what he wrote:

“No. Jesus set it up and not even the gates of hell will prevail. Be as committed to the church as Jesus in the way Jesus was committed to her — even the laying down of your life. Our culture wants to abandon what’s broken — but Jesus is devoted to redeeming what’s broken.

God is doing incredible things in the life of our church. The church will not fail. Will we be a part of that? Because of this promise, the only way we could fail is by losing the confession we are commanded to hold fast to. Let’s hold fast. Jesus made the church, It will not fail. Let’s join in. I don’t want to miss out on being a part of what God will do in Burke County, I hope you don’t want to miss out either.

Application Questions

1. Do I really know the Jesus of the Bible? 2. Who do I say Jesus is with my life, my words, my thoughts etc… 3. How have I abandoned brokenness in the past? What would it take for me to be “all in” here? 4. What ways does God want me to serve the bride, His church, that I have delayed or ignored?