Confession and Cost (Matthew 16:13-28)
Use this guide to help your group discussion as you meet virtually this week.
Transcript
Good morning my name is Isaac i'm on staff here with Mill City Church of casey and it's so good to be with you guys this morning as we worship in person and if you're joining with us online we appreciate the fact that you've taken time out of your morning to come together and worship with us um we believe that Jesus is better than everything else in the middle of the chaos that the world is kind of going through right now through pandemics through injustice through political uh powers trying to work it out we believe that.
Jesus is better than all that in our life and the way that we practice that through our daily lives here at Mill City is we join community groups and that's where we live life with each other and if you look up on the screen you'll see a qr code if you're new with us this morning or you're joining online you'll notice that you can scan that qr code and that'll take you to our main website page you can fill out a form that will give us your contact information where you can learn more about us and we can give some information to you um that the the groups is really where we live out that.
Truth where we can be life on life with one another so that when we're going through those difficult things in life so that when the world gives us those difficult things like global pandemic like injustices in the world we get to walk that truth out that Jesus is better than everything else whether or not you're new here or you've been here for a long time you'll notice that there's some construction going on that there are some walls taken out and there's a big open area and we're very excited about the way that.
God has provided for us to be able to update some of the facilities around here and what that does mean is that those main bathrooms down there are not usable and it'll probably be a couple months before they are and so in the meantime this building over here women if you go up the stairs to our offices and take a left there'll be a bathroom there that you can use and men if you go down the stairs and to our kid city area we are not offering kid city right.
Now and so it's safe for you to go down there and there is a restroom down there for you as well i'm going to pray and then we're going to read from psalm chapter 16. God we thank you for the opportunity to come together and worship this morning and we pray that you would prepare our hearts to be able to worship as one as your Church as your bride we pray that as uh spencer comes up and preaches later that you would use your word to impact our life that your spirit would take the truth that you've written and turn it into actions.
If you stand with me we're going to read from psalms chapter 16 preserve me o God for in you i take refuge i say to the lord you are my lord i have no good apart from you as for the saints in the land they are the excellent ones and who is all my delight the sorrows of those who run after another God shall multiply their drink offerings of blood i will not pour out or take their names on my lips the.
Lord is my chosen portion and my cup you hold my lot the lines have fallen for me in pleasant places indeed i have a beautiful inheritance i bless the lord who gives me counsel in the night also my heart instructs me i have set the lord always before me because he is at my right hand i shall not be shaken therefore my heart is glad and my whole being rejoices my flesh also dwells secure for you will not abandon my soul to sheol or let your holy one.
See corruption you make known to me the path of life and your presence there is fullness of joy at your right hand there are pleasures forevermore my hope is built on nothing less than Jesus blood and righteousness i dare not trust the sweetest is is is i rest on his unchanging grace is is is kindness your your satisfaction if show me who i am is sing this truth with us never be the same myself my sin has been erased foreign amen this is a reading from isaiah 53.
I'm gonna read if you'll just listen with me who has believed what he has heard from us and to whom has the arm of the lord been revealed for he grew up before him like a young plant and like a root out of the dry ground he had no form or majesty that we should look at him and maybe that we should desire him he was despised and rejected by men a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief and as one from whom men hid their faces he was despised and we esteemed him not surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows yet we have seemed esteemed him stricken smitten by.
God and afflicted but he was pierced for our transgressions he was crushed for our iniquities upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace and with his wounds we are healed let's continue to worship the sun of God in my place is hallelujah you know is can it be is hallelujah just our voices when he comes when he comes hallelujah God before your throne we proclaim hallelujah what a savior we have nothing else to proclaim hallelujah what a savior hallelujah what a savior.
Jesus we thank you that you came we thank you for your sacrifice on our behalf for the forgiveness of our sins and we thank you that in power you rose from the grave and we get to follow behind you in eternal life we are grateful for that this morning and as your Church here on this earth now we need you to speak to us and to lead us and we ask that you would do that now in the name of Jesus and by the power of the spirit in.
Jesus name amen you may be seated good morning my name is spencer i'm one of the pastors here uh we're back in Matthew gonna be in chapter 16. if you want to turn there uh flip there we're gonna be walking through uh some passages there uh we have three weeks of messiah 2020 i know some of you wanted to go all the way up to election day uh but i know for some of you three weeks was good i was thankful we got to walk through that together as a Church.
But we're back in matthews and go ahead and flip there one of the things that i have appreciated about the merger of our two congregations is now uh we have a wide spectrum of marriages right so we had uh when we were just Mill City not middle school Church of casey we had marriages that were newlyweds five years 10 years up to 20 years now we have 30 40 50 all the way up to 60 years of marriages yeah celebrate that um and the encouraging part of that is we get a wide spectrum of love stories uh and a lot of wisdom that comes with that.
Because marriage is very difficult uh it is hard uh it's it's it's something that takes a lot of effort uh we try to prepare people for this when we do uh weddings here so we we do premarital counseling to get you ready for marriage because reality is is that many of us have a picture of what we think marriage is and what it's going to be and then you stand together at an altar or outside or wherever you get married and you and you confess before.
God and men this sacred confession that i'm covenanting to to have life together to love someone until death do his part and from that sacred confession all the way to the honeymoon somewhere in the first few years that picture of what you had that marriage was uh gonna be is brutally murdered that happens for some people to get back from the honeymoon and it's just i mean it's a drive-by shoot it's just it's it the first year is very difficult for others it takes a few years.
But you added a few crises and a few children and the and what you thought marriage was going to be is just crushed but here's the deal uh for those uh that persevere for those that work through the difficulties the the miscommunication the conflicts all the kind of pain and suffering that come with working through marriage what you discover as time goes on is that you found something so much more you found something better something deeper something more true something uh this this kind of love that as you grow and marriage is what i love be around people have been married.
For 40 50 60 years they are seeing that they've lived that they understand they found something so much deeper and better than what they initially confessed on the day that they got married and that's a little bit of what we get to see today as we follow Peter in this story in Matthew 16 that we're going to see him confess Jesus as the messiah and from this it's going to be a quick honeymoon because what he thought following Jesus was what he thought confession of the messiah and and being a follower of.
Jesus was quickly changes what he realizes is and what the disciples are you learn what we're going to learn today is that it actually requires your life it requires your life in exchange for an eternal life so we're going to walk through this we're going to follow up Peter along as he stumbles through this story but i want us to do this reflectively this morning looking at our own lives maybe you're uh new to following Jesus uh maybe you've been following him.
For a few years but we get to to walk alongside this and see that the call to following Jesus and the call to confess him as messiah is so much deeper and so much better as we'll see in a moment so let me pray and then we'll jump into the text father i thank you that you have given us these stories that instruct us that cut to the heart God i pray that you would help us be present this morning whether in this room or you're listening online i pray that you would speak to our hearts and what comes out of this is true confession true faith true repentance and the denial of self we.
Ask in Jesus name amen all right so we're in Matthew 16 where we left off before we did messiah 2020 uh was Jesus was performing miracles and teachings that he's done so regularly and the religious establishment the pharisees come and they want him to perform a sign show us that you're the messiah perform something for us Jesus and he's like no that's not how this is going to go so they leave here and then we pick up in verse 13. now.
When Jesus came into the district of caesarea philippi he asked his disciples why do people say or who do people say the son of man is so everyone has a take on Jesus the religious establishment does the crowds are trying to figure this out so he's asking who the people say that i am and in verse 14 it says and they said some say john the baptist which is something we know at least herod had feared herod had john the baptist put to death.
Jesus is performing miracles he's thinking maybe this is john the baptist resurrected reincarnated something like this some say john the baptist others say elijah because Jesus performed miracles that were just like the prophet elijah so others jeremiah jeremiah being a prophet from the old testament that spoke hard truths to ears that did not want to hear them just as Jesus is or one of the prophets verse 15 he said to them but who do you say that i am so not just disciples what are the people saying who do you say that i am and who is the.
First to speak up it's Peter nine times out of ten it is going to be Peter Peter is bold he is quick to speak he's quick to act as we saw about over about two months ago we walked through the story of Jesus walking on water it's a terrifying scene they're out in the storm he's walking on water and who's the first to say i want to be a part of this i want to join this miracle it's Peter it's who he is and he speaks up.
First in verse 16 and he says it says simon Peter replied you are the Christ the son of the living God he believes the hype this is whom the old testament the law of the prophets this is this is who it is this is who they have prophesied about you are the Christ you're the son of the living God verse 17 and Jesus answered him blessed are you simon barjona which means son of jonah in hebrew for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you.
But my father who is in heaven which highlights a truth about the Gospel he didn't figure this out flesh and blood didn't reveal this to him just like anyone else who believes it is God the father revealing himself who goes to work in our hearts first and he chooses Peter he reveals this to him Peter confesses it and verse 18 we're going to see what comes with this confession 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 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 so this is a blessing and it's a prophecy because this is what Peter who Peter is going to be he gets a name change here his name was simon and Jesus says no your name is now Peter which means rock in greek so Peter gets to go around saying he's the rock which has a little bit of a different meaning.
For us but it's a it's a newfound meaning for him that he is the rock he's a pillar in which Jesus is going to build his Church which is a new word for the gospels they haven't heard this word yet that this movement that Jesus is going to build is his Church it's the assembly of God's people and then he gives another blessing that's for the Church the gates of hell will not prevail against the Church which if you step back out of this.
For us as an encouragement a lot of people get worried as american Christians so the culture is turning against the Church turning against christianity there's all these fears swelling about oh what's going to happen and i just want to very clearly point this out the gates of hell do not prevail against the Church as we win read the end of the story Revelation 20 21 the Church prevails because Christ is behind it so that's the blessing that he gives to Peter and it is a blessing.
But there's something for us as protestants that we make this we make this passage fairly weird and the reason why is because we have this uneasy feeling about it because catholics have used this uh this verse and this passage as the foundation for their understanding of one leader of the universal Church the pope and the papal secession the the see the the popes that come out of this Peter being the first pope getting the handlers of the keys of the kingdom as it says here and he's the sole authority and this gets passed down and we get weird about this or we make weird jokes about how he's at the pearly gates and you got.
To solve some riddle to get in because we don't have the the healthiest relationship and i don't think we should make this weird at all so let me for the sake of this if anyone has any catholic background or any confusion about this i want to dispel this that Peter this is not the proclamation that he is the first pope so and if you have more questions about this after afterwards we can stand six feet apart and we can discuss the merits of this part of catholic doctrine all right.
So the reason why is if you read this passage just without any without any Church tradition that comes from the catholic Church you would not come to the conclusion that what this is saying is that Peter is the first pope you would not come to that conclusion you know why because the rest of the Bible you would have to completely rip this out of its context in Matthew you have to rip out the context of the rest of the new testament.
Because the rest of the new testament that comes out of this i mean you're the book of acts the book of acts uh Peter is not the sole leader of the Church you can go to acts 15 when they're trying to solve this crisis of what do we do with these new gentile believers and it's not Peter that makes the call it's collection of people Peter speaks of that counsel Paul and barnabas speak at that council james actually ends up having the final say you don't.
See anywhere in the book of acts that that Peter is the sole leader of the Church you don't see it in galatians 2 when Paul corrects Peter and puts him in his place you don't see it in passages like ephesians 2 20 it says built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets is not built on the foundation of the of Peter it's built on uh Christ that is the cornerstone and leaders and his Church so we don't have to be weird about this as we walk through passages like this we can actually.
Look at this and see that Peter is blessed without incorporating a whole bunch of other stuff into it i mean i've heard some protestants that will look at this and say no no this means Peter his confession is blessed and therefore anyone who confesses like this receives this type of blessing and it's like that's not what the text says it says that Peter is blessed that he's going to be a pillar a rock and the Church just as james and john and Paul and other leaders are in the Church.
So he confesses this and with this blessing it says 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 and what that is saying is he's looking at Peter and he's saying i'm giving you authority and what you do what you bind and loose here on earth has an eternal impact in heaven you've been blessed with this that what you're going to do is going to have an impact in eternity and all you got to do is flip two chapters which we'll get to in about a month.
When you get to Matthew 18 and guess what while Peter gets this first blessing the rest of the Church does as well in Matthew 18 he's setting up the Church Jesus is and he says truly i say to you whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven again i say to you if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask it will be done for them by my.
Father in heaven for where two or three are gathered in my name there i am among them the authority is going to reside in the Church and there's going to be a plurality multiple leaders in the Church Peter gets this first blessing he is going to be a rock a pillar in which Jesus builds this movement so Peter gets receives this blessing he's human so it's it's reasonable to think this might have gone to his head a little bit which might make sense of what happens next.
Verse 21 it says from that time Jesus began to show his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes and be killed and the third day be raised all right so from this point forward this story along with what we're going to tackle next week in the transfiguration this is the shift in the Gospel of Matthew everything has been happening in galilee Jesus ministry has been in galilee and we're making the shift towards Jerusalem and every step forward is going to be towards the cross.
Jesus is preparing his disciples telling him this is what's going to happen i'm going to be turned over i'm going to die i'm going to be raised and Peter with his newfound authority decides to speak up again verse 22 and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him saying far be it from you lord this shall never happen to you but he Jesus turned and said to Peter get behind me Satan you are a hindrance to me for you are setting your mind on things of.
God but on things of man and man like a rock i mean he falls right back down to reality i mean he he absolutely Jesus rebukes him uh he he re he recognizes that Jesus is the messiah and it comes with this uh this rebuke because what Peter does he takes the lord of the universe aside and says lord far be it from you this is not going to happen so why is Peter doing this why is he taking Jesus aside and trying to correct him it could be.
For a couple of reasons one of the ones we see is in the gospels it's clear the disciples expected that this movement was going to be a political one that when Jesus comes to Jerusalem he is going to set up a an earthly reign in Jerusalem just as the messiahs had attempted to do before just as the great kings of old that he was going to take back the land from the romans and this is going to be a political earthly movement it also could be simply just.
Because Peter's saying i don't no one's going to harm you i'm going to protect you he's not going to do it very well he's going to make an attempt with a sword he doesn't know how to use it he's going to cut off somebody's ear but he's going to make an attempt at at saving Jesus and Jesus comes back with a harsh rebuke get behind me Satan you are a hindrance to me you are not setting your mind on things of.
God but on things of man he could have just said no Peter you're wrong no let me let me show you what no he says Satan calls him Satan you are uh the embodiment of evil uh the accuser the the adversary the one who's at war with the plans uh the good plan of God you are Satan now that's pretty sharp rebuke once you try that in your next argument try that with your spouse so you stop no stop it Satan i don't recommend that.
But if you do come and talk to me we do post-marital counseling as well he says get behind me Satan uh why such a sharp rebuke and the reason is is because if Jesus does not go to the cross if he does not have his blood shed for us if he doesn't take the full cup of God's wrath on him for sinners if he doesn't rise and conquer death and give us new life everyone is still dead in sin and everyone goes to hell and that is the very desire of Satan that everyone would go to hell Peter's got his mind on earthly things this political revolution that.
Jesus is going to come in and he says no no this is way bigger than that i'm here for an eternal kingdom not an earthly one which is what he was offered in Matthew 4 if you could think back months ago at the temptation of Christ what is the last temptation that Satan gives hear the kingdoms you can have it here on earth right now you don't have to keep going you can stop right now and Peter does the same thing and it's satanic it's it's of the devil.
So Peter after just getting called the rock after just getting this blessing he gets humbled and not only that in his humility Jesus is going to use his uh his stumble as an example to teach the disciples which is something only Jesus can do because if like if matt freeman made a mistake and then i just upheld look at this mistake now let me teach off this for it just wouldn't go well but Jesus pulls it off he upholds Peter's mistake here.
Verse 24 and he starts to teach from it he says then Jesus told his disciples if anyone would come after me let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me for whoever would save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it for what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul what shall a man give in return for his soul for the son of man is going to come with his angels in the glory of his.
Father and then he will repay each person according to what he has done truly i say to you there are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the son of man coming in his kingdom so i want us to look at the logic of what Jesus just taught because it is profound he says in verse 25 for whoever would save his life will lose it whoever loses his life for my sake will find it for what will it profit a man.
If he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul or what shall a man give in return for his soul Peter confesses that Jesus is the messiah but he doesn't understand the nature of what that means he doesn't understand the economy of Jesus kingdom if you try to cling to this world you will lose the next one if you try to gain this life you will forfeit your soul that faith in this kingdom is going to be the repeated denial of self and the taking up of your cross taking up suffering.
For the name of Christ and that should be an absolutely sobering reality for us as american Christians because in our culture there are so many things that vie for our worship for our attention for our attention for our affection for our desires i mean we're literally built on the american dream that so much of our energy and our effort in this life and this country is striving to have financial security striving to make your dreams here on earth good to make your best life here on earth striving.
For security and everything the american dream and everything that money can get you in having a secure life having the comforts of this world our entire economy is built on consumerism on having the next comfort and the next comfort you'll never level up and you'll never get that you you'll always want the next house the next big truck the next newest and nicest things is consistently vying for our attention it's calling us and so many people put so much of their worth.
So much of their life and that and what Jesus just said is if you are willing to do this you will forfeit the next life you do this american dream you can do this with just with sex in general that so much is of our culture is thrown at you as to is to explore it outside of marriage explore before marriage explore the wide spectrum of sexuality it's thrown at us over and over and over again and we as Christians say no what does the culture say oh you are backward you are bigoted you are old ancient puritans prudes.
And so much of what Jesus teaches throughout the rest of the Gospel so much the Bible is going to continue to say is that the denial of self in this area is for the sake of our souls you will go down a roll a road that you will not come back from denying this temporary pleasure and that is what it is is temporary it is temporary pleasure you are exchanging that at the loss of eternal pleasure in God you can do this with anything you do this with acceptance on our culture which has been a big thing as the culture starts to shift against uh the the ideas of the Bible.
So much of of the culture is is is shifting against us and there's this uh there's this desire in us to just want to be accepted to want to be liked to not be the weird one in the workplace not be the weird one uh in your school there's this this pressure that if i can if i will bend to the ideas of culture then i'll be accepted you see it all the time online someone who's been around the Church for years all of a sudden starts posting things that are against the Bible and they get claps people like it's.
So good to see that you've come to this understanding it's so good to see that you've moved away from this there's this thing in us that just wants to be accepted we will do this with any part of what the world offers us we will go after it again and again and again and we'll exchange it all at the loss of our souls many of us are familiar with the old folklore tale about someone making a deal with the devil it's very it's an old folklore tale that i mean ends up being shows up in songs and movies over and over against classics someone uh stumbles upon the devil makes a deal.
For fame for money and we look at those stories and we're like how foolish i would never do that but the reality is you come in this world absolutely doing that that is exactly what we do we will go after anything else we'll forfeit it all or to gain life in this moment right now and Jesus is trying to pick our heads up and see that's insane that is crazy that you would look at this life right now and put so much stock in our life is a moment it's a spec the Bible says it's it's like dew on the grass it's here.
For a moment and then it's gone it is a drop of water compared to the ocean of eternity that awaits us and so much of our desires and so much of our worship and so much of our pursuits is bound up in this moment we're looking at this trying to get as much as we can out of this life he's trying to help us see how insane that is that you would forfeit eternity for worthless pursuits and compared to who he is he's helping us.
See that denying ourselves in light of this eternal logic is the only thing that makes sense that we would deny our version of the good life in exchange for an abundant better life that never ends that we would deny ourselves that we would take on suffering that we would take on suffering in any form that it takes to follow Christ and ultimately it means that you will avoid judgment here's the final picture here of the kingdom being ushered in ultimately judgment is going to come.
But more than avoiding judgment when you deny yourself in this life deny your desires when you take up the cross what you get is God the logic he gives here is for whoever would save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it he's helping us try to find him lose this life and when you lose this life you find Christ you find the ultimate author of goodness the perfection of beauty you get eternity with him which means what is this life really worth what are the things that we spend.
So much of our time and so much of our effort and so much of our money and so much of our desires on what is it possibly worth it pales in comparison to life with God you can gain him if you would just lose your life here he's been there he understands what attorney with God is it's the same thing for someone who's been married for 50 years and they understand that persevering through marriage and finding something so much better Jesus stands between eternity and in this moment right here and says i'm telling you it is better deny yourself in this life take up the cross.
And if you do this you will find something so much sweeter so much better and something that's actually eternally good lindsay's going to come up and we are uh i want us to just reflect in this moment and i want us to think through uh what it is that we need to give up what it is that we need to deny what form of cross form of suffering we need to take on the reality is is it could be daunting when you think about doing this denying yourself.
For the next 10 20 30 40 50 years of following Jesus and i know that it can get discouraging it's like how in the world i'm gonna make it to the end and i think a good encouragement from this story is to watch the rest of Peter's life play out because the reality is it's gonna get a whole lot worse for Peter before he gets better the other night that Jesus is betrayed he denies him three times denies him but after.
Jesus is raised Peter's brought back into fellowship with him and from this Peter becomes the pillar of the rock that he was prophesied to be that he preaches the first sermon at pentecost thousands come to know Christ and the rest of his life is the daily pursuit of knowing more of God denying himself and taking up the cross to follow him and for us taking up the cross is suffering but for i would want to bet for most of us for all of us it's not going to be the cross it's not going to be a literal cross where we'll be martyred.
But that's exactly what it is for Peter because Peter at the end of his life he goes into martyrdom he goes on a cross upside down and for the last to hear this for the last 2 000 years Peter has experienced nothing but endless joy the presence of God and from the moment he breathed his last breath he's not one step closer to the end of that reality and that is what you're being invited into some of you need to confess.
Jesus as lord for the first time you need to believe in him it's this life is not worth it it will fail you with a savior who will not fail you and my hope and my plea for you this morning is that you would believe in him that you would exchange your life for a more eternal one if you're a Christian and you are walking through sin if you're walking through struggles i don't know where this is for you right now my hope is this week in community groups that you would come ready and honest and open about the things that you pursue that you'd be willing to bring those out in the open.
That you would see those put to death that you would deny yourself for gaining more than him my hope is that someone you would pray some dangerous prayers we have the rockies in our Church who prayed some dangerous prayers and they're going to honduras and they're going to take this message of the Gospel elsewhere the hope is is that the rest of our Church would join in praying dangerously asking what's the cross you want us to bear what suffering do you want from us what do you want from me.
Lord and that may take you across the world it may take you across the street it may mean opening up your wall in some bigger ways it may be denying things i don't know what that is for you but i promise you if you will deny yourself you will gain something so much better and so much more sweet you'll gain God let me pray God i'm so thankful for this story i'm thankful for the example we have in Peter gotta pray there's anyone here who's not confessed to you as.
Lord that i pray this morning they would but right now you would make yourself so clear to them that you would go to work in their heart and for the first time they would confess that you are the messiah you are their only hope and they would believe God pray for us as Christians i pray that we take very seriously this message i pray that we would repent of the things that we have pursued at the cost of you so God help us in our repentance help us in our denial help us believe and gain more of you ask us in.
Jesus name amen together oh to see the oh sinful oh everyday is forgiveness is is we oh to see my name is so amen you may be seated thanks for being with us today if you were here in person or if you joined with us online we're glad that you joined with us for worship today again we as a Church want to live out our faith in community with other believers which is very different right now so some of our groups are meeting in person some of them are meeting in person.
And then setting up a computer where people can get online and join with them virtually but now is a great time to hop in you can go to our community groups page on the website or snap a picture of the qr code if you would like to connect with our groups again for our Church family you can give online or you can give up front here in these slots that are in our front walls you can give before you leave but again thanks.
For being here with us today let me send us out with a word this comes from ephesians 3 beginning in verse 17. may Christ dwell in your hearts through faith that you being rooted and grounded in love may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge that you may be filled with all the fullness of God amen you guys have a great week.