Father, we thank You for Your goodness and that, Lord, wherever we are, whatever’s happening, we can know that, Father, Your Son is a rock for us.

He’s a rock for all ages and for all times.

There’s never a time where we can’t look at Your Son, Jesus, and find the love and find the forgiveness and find the help that we need there.

Father, Your love and Your goodness runs so much deeper than we can even

begin to grasp. Like the very scratch of the surface of a whole planet or a whole galaxy or the whole universe, we can’t even begin to get how big Your love is in Christ for us. So we just say thank You for that. May we ever live to explore it more and know it more.

Lord, we thank You for, Lord, Lord, all the ways You take care of us and You meet our needs. And we pray, Lord, we would live with open hands to give back to You and You would bless, Lord, our service to You, our tithe, our offering, Lord, that You would multiply it for Your kingdom. We just pray You would open our ears now that we would together as Your church grow up in Christ more as Your Word penetrates deep. And I just pray all that in Jesus’ name. Amen.

Well, good morning. It’s really good to see you. It’s good to be with you. We’re going to be in Matthew 16 this morning.

Matthew 16, verses 13-20.

Thank you to Chase and Jessica and Rebecca and all the hard work they do to prepare those worship sets for us and to do that.

I just wanted to say thanks. I was just thinking about it.

13-20. It says, Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, He asked His disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, Some say John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others say Jeremiah or one of the prophets. And 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, 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 and 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. You probably heard the term agnostic. Agnosticism. That’s a very trendy, popular thing for folks to say. Oh, I’m an agnostic. I’m an agnostic. If there is a God, we can’t quite know who He is. I’m in science. I’m a man of science. People say things like that. A man named T.H. Huxley, he lived from 1825 to 1895, he coined that phrase. Agnosticism. He was the first agnostic. He was also, a well-known biologist of the time. And there was a weekend when he was at a house party with some men on Sunday morning while most of the men were getting ready to go to church. Huxley said to one of the men who was a well-known Christian with good Christian character, hey, why don’t you stay home and not go to church? Stay here with me and you talk to me about Christianity. And the man knew he didn’t have the wits to compete with an argument with Huxley, so he said no, but he said, no, look, I don’t want to argue with you. I just want you to tell me simply what Christianity means to you. So the man agreed to do it and when he finished, Huxley was in tears as he said, I would give my right hand if only I could believe that.

See, it’s one thing, isn’t it, to know things. I’m sure that man had many facts about the Christian life, or about who this man Jesus was. It’s quite another thing to hear Christ from someone who believes Him to be true. Someone who confesses Christ as their own personal Savior. Two very different things. And as long as we’ve been in Matthew, we’re coming to a hedge here, and Jesus puts that question really to His disciples.

Peter makes a good confession. A good confession. What is your confession this morning about Jesus Christ?

Back in 13 it says, Now Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi and He asked the disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? And they said, Well, some say John the Baptist and others say Elijah and others Jeremiah, one of the prophets. He said to them, But who do you say that I am? And Simon Peter replied, You are the Christ, the Son of God, the Son of the living God. Jesus answered him, Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

So the last time we looked at Matthew, Jesus, remember He was out in Tyre and Sidon. He was in really these Gentile areas and He had that conversation with the Canaanite woman. And since then, He’s been doing a lot more of the same stuff. He’s been healing people again and He’s teaching and He’s having these, you know, word jousts with the Pharisees that He always wins. And it’s happening and it’s happening and it’s happening. It’s not going to go on forever. Jesus’ ministry wasn’t going to go on forever like this. Maybe despite what the disciples thought that, well, this is just going to, you know, we’re just going to keep going on like this.

But they come into Caesarea Philippi and Jesus poses a heart to heart. A question to His disciples. He says, well, who do people say that I am? Who do y’all say? And Jesus knows. He’s not genuinely interested. He’s asking this to get to something bigger. One of them says, well, some people say you’re John the Baptist. And wouldn’t that be an amazing thing if He was John the Baptist? Remember, King Herod thought Jesus was Herod the Baptist come back from the dead because He had cut His head off and He’s afraid and He thinks He’s John the Baptist. And that would be great. Wouldn’t it? Because remember John the Baptist? And we’ve studied John the Baptist a lot. He was a beacon of truth. He was a real burning lamp for what it meant to live a pious life to God. He was a great preacher. And another disciple said, well, Jesus, some people say that you’re Elijah. And wouldn’t that be amazing? Elijah was really, you know, an army and a horse sort of a man. He called fire down from heaven. He stopped up the rains for years to cause a drought because of the people’s sin. And the wicked king, he gave a jar of oil to the widow with unlimited oil to keep her and her son alive during the famine. And then when that son dies, Elijah brings the boy back to life. And then at the end of Elijah’s life, he doesn’t die. Elijah uniquely is taken up to heaven in a chariot of fire. And Elijah sees him swooped up to heaven in this chariot of fire. What an amazing thing if Elijah was there among them.

And so when that’s said, well, maybe, you know, the people think, well, they say Jeremiah. Jeremiah was a great prophet. He was the weeping prophet coming to tell the people your sins. They’re great. But he also spoke of the coming day when God would make a new covenant with the people. So all these are very interesting theories, but they’re that, you know, like conspiracy theories. They’re real interesting and you love to read them, but at the end of the day, there’s no real grit to them, is there?

These are the many. Remember, we kind of use that crowd disciple comparison earlier in Matthew. And for all that Christ has said and done, the masses are non-convinced that Jesus is any more special than anyone else that God has ever sent before. Is He unique? Yeah, He’s unique. Is He powerful? Yeah, He’s powerful. But any more than that,

they do not see, what they cannot see. But here’s the thing, though. It’s quite irrelevant for the disciples, actually. And really, it’s quite irrelevant for you what other people say about who Jesus Christ is. So, He puts the question to them and I believe the Spirit of God puts it to us this morning. He says, Who do you say that I am? Draws out a strong contrast there. What about you? If I could be as so bold as to rework that vernacular, to modern English, who do you say that I am? Who am I to you, really? Who am I to you, really? That’s what Jesus is asking them. And I think when you hear that and I hear that, you’re tempted to riff off a good, faithful Bible answer. You know, one you’ve got memorized like the alphabet from childhood or maybe you know what I’m fishing for because we’ve been in Matthew’s Gospel for so long. You can give me the textbook answer. But to hear the voice of Christ is not real. It’s really just looking for the right answer. He’s looking for the right answer that proceeds from a heart. He’s looking for the right answer to come from a place of conviction.

Conviction. You know, your head can be full of all kinds of good doctrine. It can be full of great doctrine. Doctrine that rivals the greatest minds of church history. But it would be to no advantage. If you and I cannot make the good confession.

You know, oftentimes I think Christians, their confession, it has everything to do with their upbringing. Well, I was raised Christian and so yeah, I’m a Christian and so that’s what I believe. But friends, that’s not a good confession if your confession of Christ is really just tied up with the heritage in which you were raised and it’s no more coming from your heart.

Sometimes we make confessions on Sunday mornings. When we’re wearing our better clothes and we have a fake smile on our face under which we can hide our real self and our real feelings. But the question is, who is Jesus when you get in your car? The question is, who is Jesus at home today and at work tomorrow and in the mess of life? Who is Jesus really?

Peter says, well, you’re the Christ. You’re the Son of God. Peter flat says who Jesus is to him. You’re the Messiah. You’re the Savior. That’s who you are. For Peter, it’s true. For Peter, it was a conviction.

Facts may fill your head as infinite as the waters cover the oceans, but I want to say to you only a conviction about who Christ is will swell your heart. Conviction is truth that controls. It’s truth that animates. It moves to action. It breeds passion. Conviction melts away small, less important cares. Conviction is, hear me say it to you, soul sculpting. It determines the way. It determines the manner of a life. Sunday school answers do not do that. God-given convictions do it. Look at the prophet Jeremiah in Jeremiah 29.

He once said, if I say I will not mention him or speak any more in his name, there is in my heart as it were a burning fire shut up in my bones and I’m weary with holding it in and I cannot.

Jeremiah’s frustrated with doing his work as a prophet, but at the same time he knows I’ve been shown a revelation about who God is and I just can’t help keep it inside. All the bad and all the negative. I must speak. The words that God has given me, it’s like a fire in my bones. And you know, Peter’s like that too. There will come a time when Peter tries three times in a row to suppress what he’s been shown. He will try three times to suppress the truth of the gospel, but it won’t last long, will it? Because who is it that gets up at Pentecost and preaches with fiery conviction about who the Lord Jesus Christ is? It’s Peter. It’s Peter. It’s Peter.

Jesus’ response is one of joy and excitement. He says, Blessed are you, full name, Simon Bar-Jonah, because flesh and blood hasn’t shown this thing to you, my Father in heaven. That word blessed, makarios, it means divine favor is upon you. Oh, how fortunate you are. Jesus reveals something here, doesn’t He? He says, Peter, you’re too dull to see what you’ve seen on your own. And you know what? I mean, you’re too dull for it too. He says, my Father in heaven, He’s shown it to you. Heaven has graced your heart to behold the wonder and the beauty of Jesus Christ. It’s a conviction. It’s a God-given conviction. I want to say to us this morning, if we’ve made a good confession about Jesus Christ, that conviction, that confession, it is a personal one. It is a very personal one for us. You should say, mine, mine. The Apostle Paul, Paul had no problem saying mine in relation to the gospel. In Romans 16, 25, he says, now to Him who is able to strengthen you according to what? He says, my gospel, my gospel. Now, how can Paul say my gospel? Because Paul didn’t get up on the cross and die. It’s the gospel of Jesus, right? Right. But Paul had been so radically changed. He had been so radically transformed. By the grace of God, by revelation of who this kind and merciful Savior was, that Paul gave away everything and his whole life was knowing this gospel and making this gospel known so that Paul could only say in honesty, this is all I have. It is my possession. It is my gospel.

Church, I want to say, let us not let the label of Christian hang over us for any other reason that it is precious to us as a dear prized possession. It is. Oh, I’ve got home and I’ve got work and I’ve got hobbies and I’ve got, you know, vacation days, you know, and sick days and I’ve got all these different things in my life. Oh, yeah, and church is there and I’ve got these things. That’s not a conviction.

Conviction says, Lord, here’s my whole life. Here’s my family and here’s my money and here’s my time and here’s the things that I let come into my eyes and into my ears and here’s my attitudes and here’s my thoughts. Jesus, you are the Messiah. I’m convicted that all of me should be surrendered to you. When we’re not convicted, you know what we’re not doing? We’re not laboring to see more of Christ in His Word. We’re not laboring on our knees that God would give us a greater reality and revelation of Christ that He would use us more and more. We’re not meditating on the sacrifice of Christ. That’s what you do with people you love dearly. You know, you live to know you live to know them more. You live to serve them more. You live to make your life more about them.

But secondly, I want to say it’s personal because it’s a free gift.

Jesus told Peter, you see what you see and you know what you know because the Father of heavenly lights has shined it on your darkness. It’s nothing that you deserved. It’s nothing you could have even expected to be given to you. It was a free gift. It was a free gift. Paul tells us in Ephesians 2, don’t boast. The grace of God has done this thing. Christ accomplished this. The Spirit has prompted this in you. Faith has been birthed in you by the Spirit. You didn’t do this. Jesus did this. The Spirit’s working to apply Christ to you. Jesus, who was the Son of God, became, as it were, a criminal on the cross and He bled and He died. You didn’t do this. I could have life and be free from suffering. If you hear that message, you don’t go and we do this so much. Oh, that’s nice. I’ll sing some of those worship songs with my low voice. Right?

That’s your response to the Gospel? Lord, have mercy when we’re not gripped by it. When we’re not convicted by it. More than daily, I want to be hourly convicted by the wonder, of Christ. Who is He to you? Who is He to you? I was thinking about the wedding ring on my finger this week, you know. That thing’s been on there over a decade. I rarely take it off. But, so often I don’t see it. You know? And I think that’s why a lot of marriages live in suffering or die because people end up being married on a technicality. Yeah, I walked the aisle and I said the thing and I got the ring and it’s there. But people who really see the symbol for what it is and the label for what it is, they live to love their husband and or wife. They live to know their spouse. They live to improve themselves. That’s a marriage that flourishes. Friends, how much more if Christ has called us into His fellowship, if Christ has shown Himself, we shouldn’t just say, oh yes, I am a Christian. But it should be a conviction for which we live daily. We’re not quick to starve it. We’re quick to feed it and know it and be fueled by it.

Are you in love with Jesus? Are you in love with Jesus?

Are you distracted by small things? And I think time would fail me to talk about everything from money, to job security, all the things that we say, oh, that’s my conviction. That’s what I’m living for. Friend, I want us to see the beauty of the Gospel so that Christ would be the one focal point for which we exist. Is He the one focal point? I think what we have to do is daily, hourly, sing that old hymn, Lord, I need Thee. Every hour, I need Thee. I need to live with the consciousness that Jesus is better and so much more. More beautiful than anything I could have or anyone I could know or anything I could attain. So Jesus, if You showed me by the Spirit the beauty of who You are and how wonderful it is that You save me, Jesus, I need Your Spirit to constantly prick my heart and remind me and remind me and convict me and convict me when I settle for any other lesser, smaller conviction. Christ be my conviction. Christ be my conviction.

It was the second thing, though, I think a genuine confession has with it. See back in verse 18. Jesus goes on to say, and I tell you, 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 have, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. And whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Remember back in chapter 7, verse 24, way back, Jesus said the person who built his life on my words, obeys my words, build your life on me, you’re like a person building your life on a rock. You’re like somebody who is not going to be blown away when storms come. So how are we to understand then, Jesus is a rock, and then the apostle Peter is some other kind of rock? No, that’s not what Jesus is getting at here at all. Peter was a man like any other man. And by grace, the Father revealed Jesus to Peter. Peter wasn’t this different special thing. Peter sunk like a rock when he took his eyes off of Jesus on the water. Peter denied Jesus three times,

Peter, years and years after Christ ascends into heaven, he cowers to the Judaizers, and Paul has to publicly condemn him. So Peter’s a lot of things, but a solid rock on which the church will be built. I’m kind of scratching my head at what Jesus could possibly mean.

What does he mean he builds his church on Peter? Well, he means it in the very same way, friends, that Jesus has been building his church for the last 2,000 years. Through imperfect people who are filled with the grace, truth, and power of the gospel. Peter was not innately special, nor were any of the disciples. They had been shown a special thing. And their faith and their surrender, as imperfect as they were, and as imperfect as you and I are, that was the means that God used to establish his church. At Pentecost, when Peter gets up, he’s not a worthy man to be there. But he’s a worthy man to be there. But Christ has given him a worthiness to be there. Christ has loved him, and Peter wants to proclaim that. So Jesus alone, friends, he is the rock beneath our feet. But being a state of wonder, and we should be, it is you and it is I, imperfect people, through which Christ is building his church up upon himself. It’s an amazing thought.

In Ephesians 2, verse 19, it says, So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens and saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the very cornerstone. So this gets at what is called the Patrine Theory. And I think it is a foolish and a devilish doctrine. The Patrine Theory holds this, that because of the fact that we are all of this passage, Jesus was saying that Peter will be the first in a long line of successors who will serve as a vicar of Christ, or a representative it means. Okay? That’s what it means. Friends, let’s praise God for the obedience of Peter and all the apostles. And in Scripture, recognize what they suffered as apostles to build the church, to plant churches, to die, what a wonderful honor to be apostles. But let us not go any further to give them an adoration that really belongs to God alone. Charles Spurgeon says this, if there had been no Romanist or Catholic to twist this passage, it would have presented no difficulty. Jesus is the builder and he and his apostles make up the first course of stone in the great temple of the church. And this first course is one with the eternal capital, capital R, rock on which it rests. Apostles are not the foundation of our confidence meritoriously, saying that they have some merit above us. He says only they underlies as to date. They’ve come before us chronologically. And we rest upon their testimony concerning Jesus and his resurrection. And this last line is funny. No unsophisticated reader of his Bible sees any trace of potpourri in this passage. The wine of Romanism is not to be pressed out of this cluster.

Jesus is not building his church on some man. He’s building it upon himself. But he’s using imperfect people by his grace to carry out that work over time. And that’s a wonderful thing to consider because it means that you and I, even now, you and I are being and God desires to use us to build his church. So let that be. Let that be a happy reality to you. The church is not dependent on a man or a set of men with all their whims and decrees and thoughts and feelings and traditions. No, it’s founded on Christ. Christ himself is called the builder of the church. Christ himself is the captain of the church. So if Jesus is so involved in the work of the church as its foundation, as its builder, and as its captain, who will see it through to completion, friend, what encouragement is that to you and I and all our imperfections and all the imperfections we see in the church? No, no. God is going to build his church. All will see how beautiful Christ is. More will have this conviction. The church will be built. God’s people will be brought home. The gates of hell can’t fight against Christ. They can fight against my flesh and blood. They can fight against Peter.

The cruelest schemes of Satan can undo me. But not Christ. The powers of darkness certainly will undo an organization made up of men. But no man can stand against the man. The devil can’t stand against the capital M man, the God man. He’s the source and he’s the builder and he’s the completer and finisher of our faith and of the church.

See the goodness of Christ and his nearness to us. And his spirit all throughout the ages. Christ will build his church. He is our vicar. Christ is his own vicar. He doesn’t need nobody to represent him. He came to represent himself and his father and the spirits come to represent him and his father in each one of us.

So Jesus says this to us next.

He says, I’ve given you keys. I’ve given you keys of the kingdom. While Christ does stand as the builder of the church and he’s the foundation of the church, he’s working through us. He has given us, as it were, keys. We’re key holders. We’re imperfect people, but you know what you and I should be doing? We should be preaching the gospel. That first thing we talked about, if we have a real personal conviction, you know what we’re doing. I’m going to go tell people about this church Jesus is building. I’m going to tell them about this church that Jesus is building. I’m going to tell them about this church made up of imperfect people who are being made perfect in the image of Christ. I’m going to be, Paul says, an ambassador for the kingdom. He says, go, you’re ambassadors for the kingdom. So I’m preaching it to others. And you know what we’re doing as the church? We’re keeping a watch on ourselves. Is there truth here? Oh, I see error in the church. No, we want to guard and keep ourselves so that we’re kept and guarded in the kingdom. So yeah, Jesus is the door, but he’s calling on you and I to take people to the door. And you know, there’s joy in it because through discipling and preaching the gospel, we see people loosed, loosed to salvation, loosed to greater growth. We see the work of heaven being done in the hearts and lives of men. And it’s joyous for us. Sometimes it’s sorrowful because we see people shut out because through their own unrepentance, they don’t want the goodness and love of Christ. So it’s a tough thing to abide with the gospel and to abide with the church. But here’s what we can know. Through it all, Christ, Christ, through everything, Christ is building his church.

So friends, if our confession’s a good confession, it’ll be personal. Oh, it’s mine. And as much as it is mine, I want mine to be yours. I want my gospel to be your gospel. But I also want it to be a visible gospel. Jesus says, let your love and let your holiness and let the Spirit among you be a light to the world. Let it be a burning lamp for all to see. Nobody likes a candle with an unlightable wick. That’s useless. No. That little song you sing when you’re a kid, this little light of mine, I’m going to let it shine. Hide it under a bushel. Nope. I’m going to let it shine. So Christ is calling us with all of our imperfections to shine through word and indeed that his church would be built.

The very last verse, he says, it says that Jesus strictly charged his disciples not to tell anyone. You say, well, why would Jesus not want anyone to know? Because if this is so great and Jesus is so beautiful and man, we can go and tell people and they can be brought to eternal life and we can be regenerated and made to love one another and be this community of heaven on earth. Why wouldn’t we go and tell? Well, I think contextually because Jesus didn’t want a political riot. In that time, Jesus wasn’t to the place yet of dying, of being resurrected and the church going forth in the power of the Spirit. But let me say something to you. That was then.

This is now. And Jesus says, go. He says, if you have a good confession, you better go make it. As much as you love it, you ought to share it. As much as you live it, you ought to show it. That’s our calling as a church. Let us make our good confession and let us keep confessing and keep living for our Lord until He comes back for us or until He calls us home. So, let’s pray together.

Father, only on the basis of

the finished work of Christ and Your grace that reveals the goodness of Christ are we here in confidence this morning

to believe that, Lord, You are calling us to see You and know You and find all satisfaction and joy in You.

All the things that we can make life about. All the things. Father, You’ve called us to the greatest of joys and that’s knowing Your Son, Jesus. To convict us, Spirit of God.

Take down the idols of our heart.

That have the best of us. Only let us give the best of us to Christ. Only let us as the church love one another with the love of Christ. Let us be a visible community of the love of Christ on earth.

And we’re praying all that and we’re asking all that and we’re believing all that in faith because Jesus, You said You would build Your church. And You said that hell won’t prevail against it. And You said You’d bring us all safely home. So Lord, help us trust Your promises as good. And to know that we are kept day by day.