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The disciples were never at their lowest. Yet our friend, Peter, was never at his finest.
As you will hear in this PODCAST, Peter made a declaration the reverberations of which have echoed down through the two thousand years of church history. This was HUGE.
What Peter said and where he said it are mind-blowing in their impact upon our world and in our lives.
This might just be my very favorite passage in all of the Gospels. Perhaps after hearing this, it will be yours too.
Let’s set the stage by reading Matthew 15:39–16:1
39 And He sent away the multitude, got into the boat, and came to the region of Magdala.
1Then the Pharisees and Sadducees came, and testing Him asked that He would show them a sign from heaven.
Now, back in chapter five of Matthew, at the beginning of Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said:
For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled. (Matthew 5:18)
“Jot” refers to the smallest of Hebrew letters and “tittle” refers to a small part of a Hebrew letter, like the dotting of an “i” or crossing of a “t”. So, in this singular, broad, sweeping statement, Jesus is saying that in our doctrine of inspiration, God’s Word, scribed by human authors, but with God’s divine supervision so that it was written without error, even down to the very part of each letter within each word of each and every sentence.
Now, with this in mind, the level of “fulfillment of every tittle” was incredible as Jesus got off the boat at Magdala and was immediately tested by the religious leaders… just after miraculously feeding thousands and mere days after raising a boy from the dead.
Apparently they needed more tests… more fulfillment. Well, Jesus had had enough of their hypocritical unbelief.
A wicked and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign shall be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah.” And He left them and departed. (Matthew 16:4)
And Jesus and His disciples got back in the boat, abruptly left Magdala and sailed for Bethsaida, where the people there introduced him to a blind man:
22 Then He came to Bethsaida; and they brought a blind man to Him, and begged Him to touch him. 23 So He took the blind man by the hand and led him out of the town. And when He had spit on his eyes and put His hands on him, He asked him if he saw anything.
24 And he looked up and said, “I see men like trees, walking.”
25 Then He put His hands on his eyes again and made him look up. And he was restored and saw everyone clearly. 26 Then He sent him away to his house, saying, “Neither go into the town, nor tell anyone in the town.” (Mark 8:22-26)
All this set the stage for Jesus and His disciples going to Caesarea Philippi, which was once called Panius, before Roman rule, and today is called Banias, which rests at the foot of Mt. Hermon – the highest mountain in all of the Middle East – whose rivers feed the Jordan River. Because of this unending water source, this region became the center for “fertility cults”, complete with a giant pagan temple at its center. This was the hotbed for sexual orgies and child sacrifices, all in the name of pagan worship to every false, dead god.
And, in walked Jesus.
13 When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, saying, “Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”
14 So they said, “Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”
15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?”
16 Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” (Matthew 16:13-16)
This was a HUGE contrast to the unbelieving religious leaders who needed more proof than raising someone from the dead and miraculously feeding thousands. Peter not only connected the dots that Jesus is the promised Messiah, but the Son of the LIVING God (contrasted to the dead gods they were surrounded by at Caesarea Philippi). This was an absolute formal declaration of the very fundamental question of who Jesus is!
17 Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 18 And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church,
Now, this is something that I very much want to address. For centuries, people have believed that when Jesus said this, He meant that the Church would be built upon His disciple Peter. The history of the Vatican proves this out. However, getting back to Jesus’ mentioning of jots and tittles in Matthew 5, we need to look at the actual words that Jesus used here in Matthew 16:18.
Jesus didn’t just use the name “Peter”, He used the word “Petros”, which meant “stone” or at most “boulder”. Typically, it was a rock small enough to pick up. I can envision Jesus, Who so often spoke using analogies of things around Him, picking up an actual rock and encouraging Simon Peter.
And here’s the kicker: Jesus used “Petros” when He changed Simon’s name. THEN He used the word “Petra” when He talked about what His church would be built upon. A “petra” is an unshakable, unmovable, “Rock of Gibraltar” kind of rock.
In other words, Jesus said that as truthful and accurate as Peter was, he was just a pebble in comparison to the stone mountain of truth that he just spoke regarding Jesus being the Messiah! And on THAT petra – the truth that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God – on that rock will Jesus build His church!
Peter isn’t the foundation of the Church, Jesus is.
And right there, in the middle of “Sin City”, at the foot of the pagan worshipping great “rock” of Mt. Hermon, Jesus declared Himself the Rock of Eternity!
He was also encouraging His disciples that although it may have seemed in recent days that they were losing the spiritual war – scrutinized by religious leaders in Magdala, having to lay low in Bethsaida, and now surrounded by sexual sin, false worship and child sacrifices in Caesarea Philippi – with Christ as the Rock, God and everyone who decides to side with Him, will be victorious!
Even in terms of the small group that surrounded Jesus that day, He was telling them that in time, this tiny band of a dozen disciples would turn into a ginormous community of Christ-followers, spanning the globe, numbering in the millions!
Jesus continued…
…and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.
Jesus said this as they stood at the figurative gates of Hades where people had orgies in honor of their dead, false gods and sacrificed their own children.
Today, Caesarea Philippi is nothing more than a pile of rocks. Nothing more than an archeological dig. 2,000 years ago, the disciples wouldn’t be able to believe this. The temple is gone, and due to a severe earthquake, the water doesn’t even flow down as it did back then. Just a bunch of “petroses”.
But the Petra still stands!
Likewise, here in the 21st century, we may find ourselves surrounded by a culture that glorifies sexual sin. Our legislators have made it permissible to consume drugs and sell them in the open marketplace. Our courts have redefined marriage so it is completely different than what God has ordained. Our neighbors take to twitter to celebrate the killing of their children with the #shoutyourabortion trend.
It’s easy to feel like the war is over and we’ve lost.
But the truth is that we have already won!
I’ve read the end of the Book, and just as Jesus declared in Caesarea Philippi, He will endure forever and just like Caesarea Philippi, even today’s culture will one day be just an archeological dig, while Christ remains!