January 15, 2017
Matthew 16:13-23
- Matthew 16:13-23
- Rev. Dr. Jerry Deck
Next week we get back to our True North series, we kick off our winter session of home groups and Scott starts a Sunday school class where he discusses all the soap operas he watched when he was on his sabbatical. Just kidding! So, like last week, this Sunday I had the freedom to talk about whatever I wanted to. Last Sunday we used Luke 10 to talk about the importance of measuring ourselves at the beginning of the year for how we are doing when it comes to living into the identity of who Jesus says we are and what he says we are called to do. The challenge for us was to come up with at least one way in which you are going to practice being vulnerable because the practice of being vulnerable helps to shape us more like Jesus. When we are vulnerable we are reminded that we are not in control and that we are dependent upon him. So, whether it’s going through the Great Banquet or joining a home group or practicing hospitality or whatever other practice you’ve come up with, together we are committed to being vulnerable in such a way that we grow closer to Christ.
As I was thinking about this week I was reminded that the inauguration was going to be on Friday and that with it a fair amount of anxiety that continues to pervade our society. I’m always reminded, in times like these, of how critical it is to keep in mind something we talked about a fair amount last fall which is that Jesus is always the one who is in control. Whether you are republican or democrat or libertarian or a Tory or a Whig we fail when we get overly optimistic or pessimistic about who seems to be in charge in our world. What I love about the text today, and the reason I initially selected it, is that we are reminded that Jesus is the messiah, the savior, the son of the living God. Or, as this passage could be translated, he is the King.
It’s also been pointed out that it is not just happenstance that this particular scene occurred in Caesarea Philippi. Caserea Phillipi had recently been renamed in order to flatter Caesar Augustus the ruler of that time and it is in the moment when Jesus is in that city that he chooses to point out that actually he, not Caesar, is king. Can’t you just see him with a twinkle in his eye as he asks his questions, knowing exactly what he is doing even if no one else does. We are reminded then, that Jesus is the one in control and while God certainly can use human leaders and while we, as followers of Jesus are called to pray for our human leaders, we always do these things in the light that only Jesus is the messiah, the savior, the king.
Of course, our only temptation is not that we all too often forget who is in charge it is also that at times we wrestle with remembering exactly who Jesus is. In many ways that’s what we see in the initial answer to Jesus’ question of who people say Jesus is. None of the people mentioned, John the Baptist or Elijah or Jeremiah are bad people. Not at all. However, they are not enough. In other words, while they are wonderful people who pointed to God, to the savior, they are not God, they are not the Savior. The tendency that so many have is to look at Jesus only as a good person, a mentor, a teacher, someone to model their lives after. But the Jesus we see in the gospels is much more than that. He is the one who loves us, who calls us, who forgives, who saves us, who changes us and who asks us to follow him as Savior and as king. What that means you see, is that not only is God in control of the world, but when Jesus is more than just a teacher or mentor, but is savior and king it means that Jesus must be in control of our world.
Which brings me to something that I’m not sure I’ve really seen about this passage until this week. A part of the reason why I, and others, may have missed it is because of the fact that the Greek to English translation is not always as clear as it could be. In reality when we read the second question that Jesus asks one of the words should be italicized because of the way it reads in Greek. So, the question is not just, “But who do you say that I am?” Rather it is, “But who do you say that I am?” All of a sudden the question moves from a theoretical, interesting, philosophical, theological, inquiry to an incredibly intimate and personal one. Who do you say that I am?
I’ve had quite a few conversations with married couples over the years who have gotten married when they were in their early 20s or even late teens. Now 20 or 30 years later they have children who are in their early 20s and they remark how they can’t imagine their children getting married at that age and how it terrifies them. Now, Megan and I didn’t get married at a young age (at least I wasn’t young), but I do sometimes think about how quickly we told one another that we loved each other and then how quickly we began to talk about marriage after dating for only a few weeks and I pray to God that my daughters don’t follow in our footsteps. It makes me nervous just thinking about it and our oldest is only 7 years old.
Now, all that said, as Megan is quick to point out, while we talked about marriage a fair amount and from an early point in our relationship I was not overly quick in actually popping the question. You see, I had little problem thinking about how nice it would be to be married to her and I enjoyed talking about it with her, about what kind of house we’d live in, where we would live, how many children we would have, where we would vacation, all those sorts of things. That was great fun! But, to actually ask her the question, “Will you marry me,” was a whole different ballgame. I mean, that meant it was real, like things would actually change, like I would no longer be single, no longer be free. Life would be much different. It was going to cost me (and her) something. Quite honestly it was a lot more fun to talk about what it would be like to be married then it was to actually take the next step and do something about all of that talk. And so I waited month after month after month after month, talking about it, but not really doing anything to make it happen. In other words it was a great brain exercise, but there was little actual change. Until, that is, one year and one ultimatum later when I finally decided to make the jump from an exercise of the brain to an actual change in my life.
You see, the question that Jesus asks his disciples, “Who do you say that I am?” is combatting a temptation which many of us struggle with. And that is, as Peter Marty points out, moving from talking about Jesus to actually trusting your life to Jesus. That danger that so many of us wrestle with, especially as Presbyterians who like to think about and talk about higher ideas, is that we do the same thing when it comes to Jesus. There is a certain amount of safety that happens when you talk about Jesus, almost like an object, and don’t ever get to the point of asking more intimate questions like who is Jesus for me? Who do I really believe Jesus is and what difference does that make in my life? Honestly, I have discovered this to be a real temptation for pastors because we talk about Jesus with other people all the time. And if you’re not careful you can begin to talk about him so much that you fool yourself into believing that you’re taking the time to continually ask, “Who is Jesus to me and how is that changing me?”
Before I came here as your pastor I served as an interim pastor at a church in western Pennsylvania and one of the great things about being an interim pastor is that you can say whatever you want and get away with it because you know, and they know, that you’ll be gone soon. It’s a great freedom and you can be as provocative as you want and no one will say much because they’re like, “Well, he’s leaving in a few months anyway.” One of the things I told them, in fact I repeated it at a community Lenten lunch as well and got a bit of grief from some of the pastors, is that I was afraid the church might have too many Bible studies. (Actually, since I was an interim what I truly said was, “We have too many Bible studies in the church.”) Since I am not an interim here let me explain clearly what I meant by that (lest I become an interim here!). What I meant was that I was concerned that we had too many people who wanted to talk about the Bible and about Jesus because it gave them the feeling that they were actually doing something spiritually when in reality all they were doing was a brain exercise. There was a false sense of security in other words.
Now hear me, learning about the Bible and talking about Jesus is critically important, but if that’s where it remains then we are in trouble because Jesus wants much more than to simply be in our brains and on our tongues. Jesus wants to be our savior, our messiah, our Lord and that is so much more than just something interesting to talk about. When I mentioned home groups last week one of the things I talked about is that the questions in home group might make us vulnerable because they are trying to get us to ask not just what scripture or Jesus said, but how that actually makes a difference not just theoretically or in his life or her life, but in my life. Yes, that can be a bit touchy-feely sometimes, but when Jesus looks at us he wants to know, “Who do you say I am” and how is that changing who you are and how you live. It’s one thing to talk about marriage, but it’s another thing to actually be committed to it. It’s one thing to talk about Jesus, but it’s an entirely different thing to be committed to following him as Savior and Lord.
But that move, from talking about Jesus to actually following him, make no mistake, is not without cost. This, I think, is the reason behind Jesus’ strange request for his disciples to not yet tell anyone that he is the messiah. It’s a strange request, isn’t it? The reason though, why Jesus says this to them is because the disciples still don’t yet have a full understanding of who Jesus is nor a full understanding of what it means to follow him. We see this in this great little story at the end of our passage.
In the days after Peter answers Jesus correctly, he begins to tell the disciples that as the messiah, as the savior, he is going to have to suffer, to be killed and then he will be raised from the dead. And I love what happens next, because it’s this completely awkward scene. Peter, trying to be discreet it seems, pulls Jesus aside and says, “No, no, no, that’s not the way this is going down. That’s not going to happen.” To which Jesus loudly and embarrassingly says back, “Get thee behind me Satan!” Can’t you see Peter kind of nervously laughing and saying to those whose attention now is focused upon them, “Oh Jesus, you jokester…”
What Jesus is doing is making it very clear that the way of the savior and king is not with pomp and circumstance, not glitzy and glamorous, separated from the pain of people or from the everyday world, but that it will involve suffering and blood spilt. That loving those in the world will be costly to Jesus. This was not, of course, what Peter expected nor, my guess is, what he had hoped for. All of a sudden Peter began to see that being the rock upon which Jesus was going to build his church on did not mean getting to go to all the nicest balls or being introduced to famous people, but would mean being the first ones to get on their knees and serve and sacrifice out of love for the world. It wasn’t a call to power, but a call to servanthood. Until the disciples understood that Jesus was not just the savior but the crucified savior they wouldn’t understand fully who they were called to be. Jesus knew it would take time for them to grasp this because it was so counter to the world in which they lived and in which we live. It is a costly decision to move from talking about Jesus to genuinely following him.
The good, if not sobering news, that we receive in this passage is that this discipleship journey to understanding what it means that Jesus is our crucified savior and that we are called to a journey of sacrifice is a really, really long one. That just like with Peter, the one upon whom Jesus has built his church, there will be days when we genuinely believe that God is in control of the world and days when we struggle with believing that. There will be days when we follow Jesus and days when we’d prefer to simply talk about Jesus. There will be days when we are willing to sacrifice and days when we are looking for the smooth and painless road. What gives us hope, what gives me hope, is that Jesus does not give up on us. Yes, he calls Peter “Satan” but then he continues to love him and teach him and grow the church through him.
And at the end of the day, that’s really our call church. To get behind Jesus and to follow him. Not to give up when it seems the world is winning, but to follow him. Not just to talk about him, but to follow him. Not to veer off the path when things get rough, but to follow him. Why? Because he is the savior, the messiah, the king. Who do you say he is? Then follow him. Hallelujah. Amen.