Sermon: "If Jesus is Who Peter Says He Is," August 23, 2020

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Matthew 16:13-20
Sermon: “If Jesus is Who Peter Says He Is”
Preacher: Rev. Ryan Slifka

Today’s passage is one of the most divisive, troubling passages in the Bible. For modern, western, secular readers, anyway. And it’s divisive because it involves this exchange between Jesus and his disciples. His followers.

“Who do people say I am?” Jesus asks his disciples. “What’s the word on the street about me?”

“Some say John the Baptist,” they reply. “Others Elijah, some Jeremiah.” Basically people see Jesus as a prophet, as a messenger inspired by God. A member of a long-line of Prophets in his people’s history.

“Alright,” Jesus continues. “But what about you guys, you disciples? You’re close to me. Who do you, who do y’all say I am?”

And here’s where the divisive and troubling part comes in. And it passes the lips of Simon Peter, Jesus’ right hand man:

“You,” he says. “You’re the Messiah. You’re the Son of the Living God.” Peter says Jesus is the Messiah, the anointed One. The Son of the Living God.

The Messiah, the Son of God, meaning the one promised by God, sent by God to be enthroned as King of his people. The one sent to overthrow their oppression, to set all things right, and to usher in an age of eternal peace, harmony, and joy. Where others thought Jesus was only a prophet—just another human messenger for the divine—Peter names Jesus as the divine agent of the Creator. He ups the ante just a little bit, you could say.

And Jesus agrees. “Bingo,” Jesus says. “God herself has clearly shown this to you.”

Now, this statement is divisive for us because of the exclusive claims it makes about Jesus. If Jesus is the “Son of God,” as Peter says. And if both Jesus the Son, and God the Father confirms it as well, then it means that the core claims of Christianity are true. Which is troubling for us in so many ways.

Of course, we no longer live in a majority Christian country, but rather a multi-ethnic, multi-faith and no-faith society, and a globalized world. Our Muslim friends affirm Jesus as a prophet, but the Qu’ran says God has no Son. Our Jewish friends and neighbors can affirm Jesus as a great Rabbi and teacher, but they believe that the Messiah still has yet to come. Our Buddhist friends could see Jesus as a great spiritual practitioner, while our atheist friends may see a top-notch moral teacher. All of the above are right, of course. But they don’t quite get up there. They don’t quite ring that Messiah Son-of-God bell. It’s just not something we’re all going to agree on.

Not only that, but history is littered with examples of Christians using this against opponents who don’t share this believe. Muslims in the Crusades, witches and heretics in the middle ages. Indigenous peoples in the so-called New World, along with enslaved Africans. And Jews since pretty much the beginning, culminating in the Nazi Holocaust. It makes us nervous for perfectly good reasons. Because it’s often been used as excuse to exert our own power. And to help shed blood. Innocent or otherwise.

So it’s understandable that we’re weary about the absolute claim Peter makes for Jesus as the Messiah. It’s been a way for Christians to assert themselves over and against other people. It’s divisive. It’s dangerous. It’s been used and abused.

Now, while these fears are understandable, this use of the text is based on something of a misunderstanding. Of what it means for Jesus to be the Messiah, the Son of God. You see ancient hearers would have heard this differently than us. And they would have heard it differently on three levels.

The first level is the local one: Israel already had a King. A king named Herod. Herod, who was an idolater, a swindler, a murderer, and an appointee by the Romans, the occupying power. To call Jesus the Messiah/King figure would have been a threat to Herod’s kingship. Simply because there can’t be two kings. It was divisive because it was a threat to local power and authority over God’s people.

That’s the first level. The second level’s the global level. “Son of God” was the title given to Augustus Caesar, the Emperor of Rome, the world’s largest superpower. Caesar was thought of as blessed by the gods and elevated to the status of a god himself because of his power and position as conquerer. For Jesus to hold the title Son of God was divisive because it suggested that Caesar actually wasn’t in charge of the world. That the world’s gods were false. And that was, there is, a greater power and authority in the world than even the most well-armed human empires and nations.[i]

That’s the second level. The third and final level, though might be the most important. And we get a hint at this level in our text in what Jesus says next to Simon Peter.

“And I tell you,” Jesus says to Peter. “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.” On this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.

The keyword here is Hades. Now, some translations say Hell. Which isn’t incorrect. But Jesus specifically refers here to Hades, the Greek word for the underworld, the realm of Death. Because in the worldview of the Bible there’s more than what we can just see. And this is the third level. What we’d call the cosmic level. In the Bible Death isn’t just dying, or even a place to go when you do. Death is a power in the world that imprisons, corrupts, and enslaves human beings.[ii] It’s one of the powers, the Adversary opposed to God’s good purposes for all Creation. Whether personal—lies, deceit, corruption, hatred. Or social—oppression, injustice, greed. It’s the undergirding, ultimate source of Sin. It’s why the world is ultimately the way it is.

And this level—this cosmic level is where the inspiration of the early Christians came from. Because starting with Peter—Jesus’s building a community, he’s building a people. A people who’ll not only be able to withstand the destructive onslaught of the power of death. Like a solid rock. But also as Messiah, as the Son of God, he will bust down its gates and overthrow Hades—the power of death—forever. “Death of death and Hell’s destruction.” As the classic hymn goes.

So in the end, Peter’s claiming Jesus as Messiah and divine Son is a threatening and divisive statement, for sure. But not because Jesus is arguing for this or that world religion, or giving his followers the license to rule like Caesar. No. It’s divisive because it’s a claim as to who’s truly in charge of the universe and its destiny. Neither kings nor princes, nor tyrants, nor corporate moguls, nor abusers, nor anything in heaven above nor earth below. Not even death itself. But it’s the One who came as a poor peasant, feeding the hungry, healing the sick and the outcast. The One who came loving his enemies, blessing his persecutors, and pronouncing forgiveness on even the ones who murdered him. The One whose answer to the world’s violence is not more violence, but grace—the self-giving Love of the Father poured out on a cross for the sake of the world. It’s divisive because it means that—in the end— it’s not Death who rules the day... but “Love [who] commands both heaven and earth.”

Now I’ll admit that this can all sound abstract. Like, what does this big cosmic, ancient, cosmic narrative have to do with us, down here on the ground, here and now? Quite simply, if Jesus is who Peter says he is, then we ultimately have nothing to fear. In this world of ours that that seems like it’s slipping out from under us. If Jesus is who Peter says he is, then no matter what the world throws at us. No matter what the world has in store for us in the coming days, the coming months, the coming years. As followers of Jesus, as the church, as Christ’s own body, we know that God holds the future.[iii]

We’re probably going to have to start doing church differently as this pandemic continues to unfold. The world’s going to continue to change. But no matter what, we have a solid rock to stand on, our souls are planted firmly in solid ground. Which means we can not only endure trials and tribulations, but we can face them. We can resist them. We can love one another, we can love God and our neighbors. We can give up on our own petty sins, fears and hatreds and instead fight for justice, giving ourselves away generously. We can storm the gates of Hades now, knowing that by the power of the cross one day those gates’ll give way to mercy, justice and peace forever. “Ever singing, march we onward/victors in the midst of strife.” We have a hope that will never be crushed, will never fade, and never be destroyed.

So, brothers and sisters. Let not this ancient text be a stumbling block to you. But may it be a living Source of hope. This is the faith that the church is sustained by.

Who do you say Jesus is? A Prophet? A teacher? A wise sage or philosopher? Maybe he’s all of those things. But if he’s more... if he is who Peter says he is, if he is who the church says he is, if Jesus is who he says he is… Then we have a rock we can cling to from here to eternity. And the gates of Hades don’t have a snowball’s chance in Hell.

And man, is that Good News.

AMEN.

[i] “[Matthew] brings the scene of Jesus’ confession as the Jewish Messiah into the shadow of a Caesarean temple, where the Roman destroyers of Jerusalem celebrated their victory.” See M. Eugene Boring, “Matthew,” in the New Interpreters Study Bible, vol. 8 (Nashville: Abingdon, 1997), 343.

[ii] “[Hades is] the realm of the dead, which no human being can conquer, is never the less not stronger than the church founded on the rock, and the church will always endure to the end of history accompanied by its Lord.” Ibid., 346.

[iii] “The rock is the truth that God will prevail, that God is faithful, that God can be trusted, that God will outlast all the posturing of the world. Peter had answered with this gospel certitude, and Jesus confirms he had it right.” See Walter Brueggemann, “Trusting Two Rocks,” in The Collected Sermons of Walter Brueggemann (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011),327-8.