Great Confession (Part 1)

Thanks for tuning in to No Compromise Radio with pastor and author, Dr. Mike Avendroff. Today on No Compromise Radio, we'll be hearing Pastor Mike open the Word of God in a recent message he preached at Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston, Massachusetts.

Now let's join Pastor Mike in progress as he preaches through the scriptures verse by verse with no compromise.

Matthew 16 and the Demand for a Sign

Matthew chapter 16 for this morning. I think I can get through all 28 verses. I know you're probably going to want to take a wager on that and not sure if I could do it all. After I finish 1 Corinthians, we're going to do some chapter by chapter studies, probably the book of Ruth, probably the gospel of Paul according to Romans, the apostle of Romans according to Paul, the epistle of Romans, just kind of chapter by chapter because as much as I like to dig in and take two verses at a shot or two words at a shot, sometimes it's good to get a little bit big picture.

And so this summer while I was studying, I was studying the gospel of Matthew, specifically Matthew 16, and I was just captured by who this King Jesus was and who he is. I try not to do a lot of intense studying, but I did study this chapter and I just was very impressed as the fame of Jesus started to increase in Mark chapter 1.

When you read this, you'll say to yourself, there's nobody like Jesus. I'm glad Jesus is my King. There's no one like this Savior. He's the only Savior. I can't believe how He talks to false teachers.

I can't believe how He talks to His own people. This is an amazing person. This is an amazing God. And so that's my focus today is to look at Matthew chapter 16, maybe one of the most important chapters of the Bible.

Every preacher says that on his particular chapter that he's preaching or verse, but James Boyce says something fascinating. Every chapter of the Bible is important, but you know what they say about all persons being born equal.

Some are equaler than others. So also with the Bible, some chapters are more important than others, though all are important. Matthew 16 is one of these more important chapters. It is the central or critical chapter in Matthew's account of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

Or to put it another way, James Boyce says, it is the high point in the teaching and the disciples' growth in spiritual understanding. And so I want you to see who Jesus is today, and I want to do it in such a way that when you get caught up into the text, you're going to forget about all the issues you have in your life because your focus is going to be on our Lord.

That is my goal. So we're going to look at Matthew chapter 16. It breaks up into four sections, but it just flows along so quickly and so full of information and details about Jesus that you don't even really need an outline.

Lots of times pastors give an outline. Why? So you can see progress. So you can say 30 minutes into the sermon, if it's a 40-minute sermon, he should be on point seven of point 10 now because we don't have much time left.

And you can just feel yourself getting pulled through. He says he has three points. It's a 60-minute sermon. How many minutes for each point? And you can feel yourself work through it. But this passage is so great, you don't need any points because it'll just drive you through.

You don't need to say, well, are we there yet? Are we halfway through it yet? And so Matthew chapter 16 is one of those high points in the scriptures. And here's the thing, you already know what's in the chapter, but I think you'll be encouraged as we revisit it.

Let's take a look at chapter 16, verse 1. And the Pharisees and the Sadducees came and to test him, they asked him to show them a sign from heaven. So now you've got the Pharisees, and they were the group, the separated ones, pretty good theology, conservative people.

Not right leaders in the eyes of God, they had torqued things, but they at least had the right doctrinal statement, if you will. And then you've got the Sadducees, and they were the liberals. They were the modernists.

Pharisees believe in supernatural things, the Sadducees didn't. They didn't believe in a resurrection, eat, drink, and you know, for tomorrow we die. But they got together because they had a common enemy.

So you've got these theological thugs getting together. They don't like each other, but they hate Jesus more than they hate each other, so they get together. And under one definite article, the Pharisees and the Sadducees came, and they came to test him.

Now they're going to try to test him. They've got bad motives. We're told of the motives right here. They're not good motives. We want to be confirmed in our own heart that in fact you are the Messiah.

No, they want to test him so that he fails. But do something from heaven so that it can't be done, and we'll realize that you're a fraud, and so will everybody else. Same language here that Matthew uses for Satan coming to test Jesus in the wilderness.

So now Satan has his emissaries, they happen to be the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They ask him to show them a sign from heaven. Forget earlier in Matthew chapter 1 to 15, healing the sick, casting out demons, raising people from the dead, feeding the 5 ,000 men, feeding the 4 ,000 men.

We'd like another sign, and can I say right now, of course I can't because I'm the pastor, but that's just a way that you say things nicely. Can I say unbelief is never satisfied with a sign. If they look at that sign, then they'll just want another sign, and another sign, and another sign.

D .A. Carson said the reason they want more signs is they weren't satisfied with the first sign. Unbelief is never satisfied. Jesus had done plenty in their midst, and now they said we want a sign from heaven.

Look at that at the end of the verse. What's that mean, from heaven? Now remember, Jews didn't like to say the word God very often, so they could have said from God. This is written to Jewish people to show that he's the king, but I think it's more than just we want a sign from God.

We want a sign from God from the heavens. It's spectacular. We want something that's going to blow our minds from the heavens. They used to say back in those days, not biblical, but just tradition, demons could do things on earth, but only God could do something from heaven.

Show us who you are, and remember why signs are done. They're attesting miracles to confirm both the messenger and the message. Show us that you're the Messiah by doing one of these things. Show us a sign from heaven.

Of course, for these unbelievers, seeing is not always believing. They want more miraculous proof. After all, Jesus, Elijah had fire come down from heaven. After all, Jesus, Joshua, he stopped the sun and the moon.

After all, Jesus, Moses had manna come down out of heaven. After all, Samuel made it thunder on the Philistines. You're next. Do something. Impress us. They weren't even messiahs. You are a messiah. You should do something extraordinary.

Of course, those things weren't done by Moses, who was God behind the scenes, of course. Authenticate yourself, Jesus. This is one of their famous tricks to try to get Jesus to fail. Would Jesus really pay taxes?

Whose husband is this, ladies? And then Jesus answered them, verse 2 and 3. He answered them. The rest of the verses 2 and 3 after he answered them are in some good manuscripts, not in other good manuscripts.

So we're not sure if this is in the best manuscripts or not. You could just jump right down to verse 4 if you don't think they're in the good manuscripts and everything would still work out, but let's just assume they are in the best manuscripts and I'll read them as such.

He answered them, when it is evening, you say it will be fair weather for the sky is red, and in the morning it will be stormy today for the sky is red and threatening. Now, here's what he's saying. You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of the times.

Do we have some similar slogans today? Red sky at morning, sailors take warning. Red sky at night, sailors delight. Jesus is saying to these men, we've already given, I've already given you so many signs and you're the theological seminary professors and you can't figure out theological signs.

You can look at the weather and figure that out, but you should know better. You should know what the Old Testament teaches about who the Messiah is. You can't get it right. Can you imagine what they must have been thinking?

This is like going to Fuller Seminary or Union Seminary or Princeton Seminary saying, you would be better off being weathermen than theologians. Sweet kind loving Jesus. And again, we see Jesus when people are perverting the gospel and making other people take their eyes off of Jesus, he whacks them.

When people know that they have no righteousness and that they're sinful, he's kind to them. He eats with them. He loves sinners. When people begin to pervert the gospel of grace and who he is, he is after them.

They're culpable of disbelief because he's shown them. Remember back in chapter nine, you can turn there if you like, you don't have to turn there. But in chapter nine that we saw several weeks ago, Jesus heals the paralytic that you may know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins.

He then said to the paralytic, Matthew 9, 6, rise, pick up your bed and go home. When the crowd saw it, they were afraid and glorified God. How many miracles and signs does someone need before they say Jesus is in fact God?

They took folk meteorology without question, but then they see Jesus and theologically corrupt what he is doing. Mark 8 says, Jesus sighed deeply in his spirit. We'll look at verse 4 of Mark, excuse me, of Matthew 16.

This is the theological jab for all sign seekers. An evil and adulterous generation seeks for a sign, but no sign will be given to it except the sign of Jonah. And then the worst judgment of all, chastisement is one thing, discipline is one thing, but the worst judgment of all is the judgment of divine abandonment.

So he left them and departed. They're suppressing the truth and unrighteousness, Romans chapter one would say. Verse five, when the disciples reached the other side, they had forgotten to bring any bread.

This is tied right into what's going on in verses one, two, three, and four. They go to the other side, we don't have any bread, they're hungry. And Jesus says, watch, look out, if you see a vision of some person, you'd say, look out, watch out, and beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

Now they're in their own little world and when they hear leaven, we didn't bring any bread and now he mentions leaven, what do they begin thinking about, right? So if I were to talk to you right now about a nice, juicy red steak for lunchtime out on the grill, and then you were thinking about that, but then I said, you know what we need around this church is the meat of the word.

But you forget the word part because you're stuck on tenderloin, you're stuck on that filet and everything I say now theologically, you've got that word in your mind, meat. So Jesus says, beware of the corrupting influence of the Pharisees.

He just talked about them in chapter, he just discussed things with them in chapter 16. Go back to chapter 15, it's the same thing. He's already battling with these Pharisees, Pharisees chapter 15, verse 1, scribes came to Jesus from Jerusalem and said, why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders for they do not wash their hands when they eat?

And then the scud from Jesus, and why do you break the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition? He's battling the Pharisees, the scribes and the Sadducees, and he says, watch out, like leaven pervades, false doctrine pervades, like leaven corrupts everything, it corrupts everything, these false teachers.

But they're stuck in la-la land, they're stuck in weather land, they're stuck in bread land. Now, by the way, chapter 15, Jesus fed thousands with bread, chapter 14, Jesus fed thousands with bread, probably up to 10 ,000 people both times, and so now you've got, let's see, how many loaves for the 5 ,000, how many loaves for the 4 ,000, we got one loaf for the 12.

Mark said there's one loaf in the bread, one loaf in the bread, one loaf in the boat, one loaf in the bread basket. They're thinking about food, we forgot to bring bread. Beware the leaven of the Pharisees and the leaven of Herod, Mark says.

Verse 7, they began discussing among themselves, saying, we brought no bread, totally occupied and preoccupied with, not spiritual issues, but temporary issues, ignoring Jesus' reference to the Pharisees and their reasoning, it's an imperfect tense, over and over and over and over and over.

Verse 8, but Jesus, aware of this, said, O ye, or O you of little faith, why are you discussing among yourselves the fact that you have no bread? Faith is the key, not intellectual, not an understanding, not what they know knowledge-wise.

The God of the universe is in their boat, food shouldn't be a problem. See chapter 15, see chapter 14. See, He can make bread for their needs, so He chastens them, He disciplines them for not having faith.

Verse 9, do you not yet perceive, do you not remember the five loaves for the five thousands and how many baskets you gathered? Are the seven loaves for the four thousands and how many baskets you gathered?

Look at God's faithful provision for everything they need, when, disciples, will you recognize that I'm the Messiah? When are you going to get it? When will you recognize that only God, Yahweh, on earth can do what I do?

When are you going to get it? How is it, verse 11, that you fail to understand that I do not speak about bread? Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees. Then they understood that He did not tell them to beware of the leaven of bread, but of the teaching of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

When will the disciples get it that Jesus is Messiah? Answer? The next passage, verse 13, it's tied right together. Sometimes I love to just take a pencil or a pen, not usually very often in pen because that's sacrilegious to mark in any book with pen or especially it's even, it's a venial sin if you use some kind of highlighter.

Only pencil, let's make sure we get this straight, but sometimes I'll take my pencil and I'll make a little mark from the end of verse 12 to the beginning of verse 13. These things are linked. When will they recognize that He's the Messiah?

Okay, they're going to recognize it right here. The confession. Now before we read verses 13 through 20, what I'd like you to do is not focus on all the academic discussions, but I want you to focus on the character who's central and that is Christ Jesus.

In other words, people go to this passage and say, who's the rock that the church is built on? They'll say, what are the gates of hell? They'll say, what's binding and loosing? And people write book after book after book after book, who are these things?

What are these people? What are these issues? And they forget that the main issue is spotlight is on Jesus. We'll answer some of those questions, but stay focused on the big issue. Verse 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?

Who's been to Caesarea Philippi, anyone? If you've been, you won't soon forget it. It's beautiful, it's right, it's close to the base of Mount Hermon. Mount Hermon's 9 ,200 feet up. It's about 20 miles north of the Sea of Galilee.

And it was this spectacular place that was beautiful, water. And they worshiped the false god Pan there, P-A-N, i .e. Peter, okay. But they did worship Pan there, the false god. Augustus in 20 BC gave this to Herod the Great.

Herod died, and it became part of the Tectarchy of Philip. Caesarea's at the beach, Caesarea Philippi, name it after yourself and make it different than the one by the beach, hence Caesarea Philippi. Now, Jesus is going to ask this question, who do people say that the Son of Man is?

With the backdrop of this huge worship center. That's like me taking all of you and saying, I've got some theological training for you. Follow me, we're going to go to Salt Lake City to the Mormon Tabernacle.

Or we'll go down to the one by the alewife deal on Route 2. We're going to all stand... You stand there on the sidewalk, we don't want to trespass, and I'm going to talk to you about who Jesus is. That's the backdrop.

Or that's like taking all of you, and you could go with me to the Vatican. We're going to go to St. Peter's Square, and we're going to have a theological discussion about who Jesus is. Regarding all these religious issues, right in the backdrop.

It's a fascinating place to teach someone something. Now, notice what Jesus says in verse 13, who do people say that the Son of Man is? Jesus loved to call himself the Son of Man. Son of Man, think like a Jew, who's the Son of Man?

Daniel 7, the Messiah is called the Son of Man. It's not like Jesus is fully human. Hi, I'm the son of a man, I must be fully human. That is true, but Son of Man is a name. This is nomenclature for the Messiah, Daniel chapter 7.

The Ancient of Days and the Son of Man. When you say Son of Man, you're saying to yourself, I am Messiah. He wants them to know, who do people say that I, the Messiah, am? He doesn't want information from them, he wants them to talk.

In the middle of this Roman God of the fields, the Roman God of nature, Pan, what is the consensus out there? Verse 14, four responses here in Matthew, and all of them, by the way, are good. None of these are, he's full of demons like the Pharisees say, he's some kind of kook, he's just a good teacher.

These are good views, but still inadequate. Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others, Jeremiah, are one of the prophets. John the Baptist, why would they call him John the Baptist? Matthew chapter 14, 1 and 2, John the Baptist is murdered.

And what happens in Matthew chapter 14, verse 2, and Herod said to his servants, this is John the Baptist, speaking of Jesus. He's been raised from the dead, that is why these miraculous powers are at work in him.

Who is this Jesus? I think he might be John the Baptist coming back. That's one option. Second option, the text says Elijah. Malachi says, long after Elijah has been dead. Malachi says, behold, I'm going to send you Elijah, the prophet, before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord.

The day of the Lord's here. Jesus is doing all these miracles on the earth. It's coming fast, the end is coming, and we know, Malachi says, at the end there's gonna be somebody like Elijah. How about Jeremiah?

What about Jeremiah? What was Jeremiah known for? Why would they associate Jesus with Jeremiah? You know what Jeremiah preached? Judgment, repentance, and the nations hated him. Jesus comes along and preaches what?

Judgment, repentance, and nations are hating him. Maybe he's Jeremiah reincarnated somehow, or one of the prophets, just somebody else. Now this isn't as bad as the Jesus seminar on modern scholars. Who do you think Jesus is?

What would they say today if I went to Harvard, Princeton, Yale, or Baylor? Maybe Baylor would give us some better answers. Well, he's a good teacher. Sermon on the Mount's really good, a good way to live.

He's a really good teacher if he helps you. Well, verse 15, he said to them, but who do you say that I am? Now we're gonna get Peter as the spokesperson on behalf of the disciples. And Peter replied, by the way, this is the best answer he could ever give.

A plus, this is the answer, this is it. He couldn't give a more glowing report. You are the Christ, the son of the living God. You, emphatically in the Greek, you are God. You are not the son of the dead God, you're the son of the living God.

And four definite articles, the, four thes in there for specific things. Why are definite articles in passages? To show you how definite things are, right? Here's how it reads in four different definite articles.

You are the Christ, the son of the God, the living one. You are the Christ, the son of the God, the living one. Jesus is the Christ. By the way, that is the eternal question for you. It's not just enough that I believe it, but you have to believe that Jesus is God.

You have no other way to bear your sins. You have to bear them yourselves, or the Messiah has to bear them for you. You need a representative who's fully human to stand in your place, and you need a representative who's fully divine so he can suffer all the judgment.

Do you on him and still have enough righteousness to bestow to everyone who would believe you've got to have a Messiah for a Savior? How did Peter come up with this? How does anybody understand that Jesus is God?

Divine Revelation and Peter's Confession

Verse 17, Jesus answered him and said, blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, because you opened up your heart to God, and now Jesus, the gentleman, is able to come in. You know, Jesus is a nice gentleman.

He's not going to bash down the door of your heart. You have to open it first with your own free will, and you have to take the first step, and then after you take the first step, then Jesus can come in.

How about that? Since Simon and since all of us, except Christ, have been affected by the fall, we're corrupt, we're not able spiritually to respond, our minds are futile, we suppress truth and unrighteousness, we love darkness, and then out of nowhere, we're just going to go, oh, yeah, Jesus is God.

When we first get saved, somehow we think that way practically because we go to our friends, I know I did it, and I just wanted to stack up all the evidences. I'd go get that book, evidences demand a what?

Verdict. They do? The Pharisees saw with their own eyes what was going on, and it didn't demand any verdict for them because here, the way you recognize that God is working is God puts out his scepter via the Holy Spirit and opens your mind, and then you respond like Lydia to the things of God.

The Church, the Kingdom, and the Authority of Christ

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 8 .30 and 11 a .m. and Sunday evenings at 6 p .m. We're right on Route 110 in West Boylston, Massachusetts. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

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