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Date: Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost
Text: Matthew 16:13-20
www.kongsvingerchurch.org
Welcome to the teaching ministry of Kungsvinger Lutheran Church. Kungsvinger is a beacon for the gospel of Jesus Christ and is located on the plains of northwestern Minnesota. We proclaim Christ and Him crucified for our sins in salvation by grace through faith alone.
And now here's a message from Pastor Chris Roseberg. The Holy Gospel.
According to Saint Matthew, the 16th chapter. Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, who do people say the son of man is? And they said, well some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, 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 that 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.
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. This is the gospel of the Lord. In the name of Jesus. Amen. So Jesus is now with his disciples in the district of Caesarea Philippi, I mean really right planted firmly in the middle of pagan territory.
This is a wonderful religious tourist site to visit. They have the temple of Pan, they have the gates of Hades, they have, well in fact the city itself was founded by Philip II, and he named it after Caesar.
In fact they had a coin struck with Caesar's image on it, and of course the Jews were freaking out about that thing, saying that it was idolatrous to even use that coin. And they kind of had a point, because back in the day, well the worship of Caesar was part of your civic duty as a citizen of the Roman Empire, and so you were called to show your allegiance, your loyalty to Caesar through a religious ceremony where all you had to do was offer a pinch of incense and say Caesar is Lord.
And so here's Jesus, he's not in, well Judea, he's not in Israel, and he asks the question, who do people say the son of man is? It's a little bit of a vague question. I mean, are we talking son of man like Ezekiel, which seems to be a point, something pointing us to God in human flesh or God himself, or are we talking about son of man like talking about a mere mortal?
It's almost as if Jesus is saying, alright guys, have you checked the latest Gallup polls? What do they show? What are people saying about me? And the answers come back, the ones that come back, they're really weird.
Let me explain. So some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. That's a weird answer, by the way, and you can almost see Jesus stroking his beard going, since when did we start believing in reincarnation?
This is a weird answer. So rather than comment on the answers given, he looks at them and he said to them, but who do you say that I am? And you're going to note here, this is one of those times in scripture where the question jumps out of the text and kind of demands that we all answer that question as well.
Who do you say Jesus is? And that's kind of the point. And we'll note that throughout Christian history, there have been all kinds of interesting answers given. Now let me digress for just a minute. Have you all been following the latest kerfuffle in American politics?
Did the Democrats take out under God in the Pledge of Allegiance? Now, as civic creeds go, I mean, I remember saying the Pledge of Allegiance when I was a young lad. Every single time we had something at my school, we would say the Pledge of Allegiance.
Every time we got together as the Cub Scouts. Both as a Cub Scout, yes, I was a Cub Scout, but I quit before we got to the wee blows. I was a Cub Scout, but then later in life, I was a Cub Scout leader.
I was a PAC leader, and every time we would get together as Cub Scouts, there you have all your Cub Scouts in uniform, and we would say the Pledge of Allegiance. And so here's the question that's kind of before us right now as Americans.
Can we renegotiate what it means to be an American? Because it seems to be that there are people who are renegotiating that right now, and without any input from the rest of the country. This is why this is a discussion going on right now.
Now, whether you believe Trump was right or wrong, I do think the topic at hand is kind of fascinating. But you're going to note that in our day and age, and even before our day and age, the people have been trying to renegotiate what Jude calls the faith once delivered, or once and for all delivered to the saints.
Keep this in mind. Unlike the U .S. Constitution, Christianity was not something where some guys got together and said, you know, let's put together a better religion. One that gets rid of some of the crazy stuff that goes on in these other religions, and let's see if we concoct a religion that is more expansive, that has wide appeal.
We appeal to people all over the earth, and so maybe what we should do is we should talk about this fellow named Jesus, and we can make him be a miracle worker, we can make him God in human flesh, and everyone said, that sounds like a great idea, and then sat down and banged out maybe the Nicene Creed, and then they sent it out for ratification among all the different regions.
That's not how that worked, is it? No. You see, Christianity is a faith, a trust, a creed even, if you would, that has been delivered. Delivered by whom? Well, in our text it says here by God the Father.
So if you would, think of it this way, this text of ours today is kind of the first rough draft of maybe the Apostles' Creed, or the Nicene Creed, and in this confession of faith that Peter gives, in this confession of faith, he is saying the words that were given to him, that were delivered to him, the insight that was given to him by none other than God the Father.
Christianity is a faith once for all delivered to the saints. And so you'll note, in my lifetime I got to see, if you would, the changing of the guard, because if you've been on the planet long enough, y 'all remember those modernist liberals in the churches who were saying that miracles were not possible?
You remember those guys? They kind of culminated it. Their final act before they fell out of vogue was that thing called the Jesus Seminar, where John Dominic Cross and a bunch of liberal, and I'm going to say Bible scholars, got together and voted on which parts of the Gospels were historic and which parts were myth.
All the miracles, out. They voted them out. The Sermon on the Mount, stays. Anything moralistic. And all of this is really kind of the culmination of the work that was began by Albert Schweitzer in his attempt to demythologize Jesus and figure out who the historic Jesus is as opposed to the Jesus of faith, as if the two are different altogether.
And in this way of thinking, the general idea goes something like this. The historic Jesus, well, you know, he was a pretty bold and courageous rabbi, itinerant preacher, you know, traipsing around Judea, and he had some things that he said and he challenged the authorities and wouldn't you know it, poor Jesus went and got himself killed.
But he serves as an example of what it means to stand up to the Caesar man, and so we hold him in high esteem. But the Jesus of faith, well, that's the concoction of the apostles. You know, because the historic Jesus didn't walk on water, the historic Jesus didn't rise from the dead, the historic Jesus didn't heal the sick and all that kind of stuff because that's miracles.
Those are miracles and those aren't even possible because they would be a breaking of the laws of nature. This is how they argue, right? And so, this Jesus of faith, this Jesus of faith is just a man-made invention, a legend if you would, like the legend of Paul Bunyan or something like that.
And these are people who were operating within the visible church. But here's the thing, that way of thinking, it's not really theologizing is it? It's philosophizing, if you would? Yeah, because theology, you need a biblical text.
You see, they deny what the biblical text says. This way of philosophizing has fallen out of vogue. What happened? What caused them to no longer have the best seats in the theological seminaries? The answer is this, a television show that you all may have seen goes back more than a decade, Ghost Hunters.
You guys remember Ghost Hunters? I think the world changed with Ghost Hunters and the reason why is because there on the Sci-Fi channel, there were guys in the dark with infrared cameras running around haunted houses and haunted places and using scientific equipment to prove the existence of the paranormal and the supernatural and all of a sudden the whole world changed.
Science has now proven the existence of the paranormal and now things are different. Everybody believes in miracles nowadays. Everybody believes in them, right? Except for the artifacts, like the 80-year-old guys who were trained the old way.
They're dinosaurs, they've fallen out of vogue. But here's the thing, don't think for a second that just because everybody believes that miracles are possible, that that means that they have a correct view of Jesus.
They don't. We'll talk about this in our Sunday school today. There's a whole bunch of people running around now in the Charismatic and Pentecostal churches who are overtly saying that Jesus did not come as God, he only came as man.
That is a quote. That Jesus did the things that he did as a man, not as God. And so they are downplaying the deity of Christ or even worse saying that Jesus laid aside his divinity altogether and as a result of that Jesus is now the ultimate example of what you can do, the miracles you can perform as a Christian indwelled by the Holy Spirit.
It's a big threat, big change that's happened in our lifetimes. But I digress. So coming back then to Peter's confession, remember Christ asked the question who do you say that I am? Peter replied, you are the Christ.
You can even say Messiah, because Christos and Mashiach are synonymous words. It means the anointed one. You are the anointed one. You are the son of the living God. And if you remember our text when Jesus was walking on the water and they were freaked out, he said, take heart, ego eimi, I am, do not be afraid.
And at the end of that text it says the disciples were worshiping Jesus. Jesus is God. He is the son of the living God. And Peter's confession of faith is, well, quite the confession. That Jesus is the son of the living God is to say that Jesus is God.
In the Gospel of John, you have Jesus calling God the father, his father, and by doing so the Jews got really upset because they accused him of making himself equal with God by that language. And so here this language of Peter, you are the son of the living God, is a confession that Jesus is the God of the Old Testament in human flesh.
He is the promised Messiah and that's the full stop. That's the kernel. That's the nugget. And you're going to note then that this confession of Peter's is the central foundational doctrine. The foundation stone itself of the Christian faith.
Not Peter, but this confession. So Jesus answered him, blessed are you Simon Bar-Jonah, and listen to the words, flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my father who is in heaven. Now it's absolutely true that here Jesus takes Cephas' name and changes it to Peter.
It's absolutely true. That's not a problem for us. And you'll note that, I think a good way to think about it, that when he says that you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church that we need to pay attention to the details.
But Simon Bar-Jonah, you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church. Simon Bar-Jonah, Jesus changes his name to Peter. And Bar-Jonah, I mean you can kind of translate that or transliterate that as son of John.
That would not be a bad way to say it. I had one pastor who I will never forget the point that he made at this point. He said Jesus changed Peter's name to Rocky Johnson. I think it's brilliant. It's great.
Rocky Johnson. Rocky the son of John. Now if we were to kind of do a 21st century version of that right now, rather than saying Jesus changed his name to Rocky Johnson, I think it would be better to say he changed his name to Stoney Johnson.
Doesn't that sound like a great name? Like on Apple Music if you saw a new artist who was being premiered and his name was Stoney Johnson. You can almost picture him with a name like that. He's got a really cool jazz vibe to him.
Anyway, just look for him on Apple Music. You'll find him. You guys look like you're in pain. But here's the text says, I tell you, you are Petras. You are Peter. And you are Peter. And on this Petra feminine, on this Petra I will build my church.
You see, Jesus here is not making Peter the first pope. That's not what's going on here. But what is happening is that we are seeing that the faith once delivered to the saints, the light bulb has gone on and in a way Jesus is making Peter kind of like the first prototypical apostle.
And you'll note that with his confession of faith, which by the way, because he says you are Petras and on this Petra I will build my church on this rock, the rock was not Peter. The rock was his confession that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God.
This is the rock that the church is built on and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And so then he goes on to say, I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven.
Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. And don't miss this part. That what happens is that with this confession of faith, with the foundation of the very church itself, it's not good news in and of itself to say that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God.
That's not good news in and of itself because to say that Jesus is the son of the living God, for some that revelation is something that will result in their judgment, not their salvation. And so to the church then, Christ gives the keys of the kingdom of heaven so that sins may be forgiven.
It is wrong for the Roman church to take the keys here that are given and turn it into the logo for the papacy. That's trademark infringement. The keys in John chapter 20 are given to the entire church.
And so you'll note here that with this proclamation that Jesus is the Christ, the thing that is important is that there is the forgiveness of sins for all who repent and all who believe. And whoever persists in sin and unbelief, well, their sins are bound to them.
But those who believe their sins are forgiven. And so that is a good way to look at this text. Now since we've talked about different ways in which people are trying to renegotiate Christianity, the modernist liberals of the past who've fallen out of vogue, the charismatics today who are denying the deity of Christ, keep in mind that it is never a safe idea to merely talk about the different popular ways in which it is to deny Christ.
To confess is to say the same thing as scripture. And to confess then here that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God, also requires us to consider the ways in which we as individuals, even if we never bought into the modernist liberal notions that miracles were not possible, or even if we're not modern day charismatics denying that Jesus had access to his divine nature.
There are ways in which we deny Christ in our thoughts, our words, our deeds. So we deny that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God. Every time we try to justify ourselves by our own good works, by our own piety, all the ways in which we want to negotiate with God.
So when we do that, what we end up doing is we become a Christ for ourselves. We become our Savior. We become our Messiah. And by doing so we are denying that Christ is the Messiah. We also do this in all the different ways in which we live, where we basically act as if God doesn't matter, and as if other people have not mattered.
In fact, worse, all the ways in which we think that we matter the most, we deny that Jesus is the son of God. Because when we think that we are the ones who matter the most, we are confessing with our actions that we think that we are the son of God, that we have the preeminence, that we're the foundation.
We deny Christ when we seek to atone for our sins with our own blood. And this is kind of an interesting way of thinking about it. And by our own blood we can even talk about being a living sacrifice, kind of a twisting of our epistle text.
But in our day and age, there's an alarmingly large number of teenage girls who engage in cutting themselves. It's a fascinating phenomenon. And with that there is oftentimes a feeling in the girls that do this, that by doing so they are well, making themselves to suffer for their wrong doing.
They're letting their own blood out for the purpose of atoning for whatever standard they have not achieved. But we cannot atone for our own blood. And so I would kindly remind those who are tempted along those lines that Jesus was cut for us so that we would not have to cut ourselves.
Because we cannot atone for our own sins with our own blood. The other ways we deny Christ is when we try to bargain with God. You ever done that? It's like, God, if you just get me out of this circumstance, I will pray at least once a day.
Or okay, once a week. Right? We try to bargain with God. You can't do that. You're denying that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. And that there is forgiveness offered through Him when you try to bargain in these ways.
We deny Christ when we refuse to sing His praise. When we refuse to confess His name. When we do not pray. We do not praise. We do not give thanks for what He has won for us. When we sit in stony silence and we refuse to confess, and yet claiming to believe as though heart and mouth can somehow be disconnected.
We deny Christ when we make His word to be nothing but a human opinion. We deny Christ when we turn His sacraments into nothing more than a religious ceremony. We deny His presence among us in the word and in the bread and the cup.
When we do that, we are denying the very word of Christ that is intended to bring us life and salvation. So you'll note, this confession of Peter's is the confession. And it is wise for us to consider all of the ways in which we deny this confession.
Where our own lives, our own worship fall so far short that it's clear that our sinful nature is very, very active in denying this confession of Peter's. But I would remind you that in John 20, the keys, the sins you forgive, y 'all forgive are forgiven.
The sins you retain are already retained. Jesus gave the keys to the whole church, to all of His apostles, to everybody who believes. And so you'll note then here today, you heard that your sins were forgiven.
And indeed they were. Because the same Jesus is going to go to the cross. In fact, next week if you're tempted to really think that Peter got it right, you're going to note that in the sentences that immediately follow this, Jesus is going to turn right around and tell Peter that he's from Satan.
That he is acting as the devil. And the reason why is because from this time forward, Jesus will begin to tell His disciples that He has to go to Jerusalem, that He's going to suffer at the hands of the scribes and the religious leaders, and that He will die, and that He will rise again.
And so this same Jesus, the one who is the Christ, the Son of the living God, He goes to the cross and He bleeds for all of the ways in which you have denied Him to be what Peter confessed Him to be. All the ways in which you have exalted yourself and made yourself the Son of God and made yourself the Christ, made yourself your own Savior.
Christ has even bled and died for all of that idolatry. And so today you again heard that your sins were forgiven. So I would say this. Jesus said to Peter, Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you.
And so blessed are you, dear saints. Blessed are you, because you believe this and your sins are forgiven like His. In the name of Jesus.
Amen.
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