that he was the Christ. 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, I'll come up to my old spot. I'm not sure this is where Doug stands, but stood here about 38 years, I think. I'm glad to be back and speak with you all. If you happen to have a Bible, you can feel free to have it open, but you don't need to. But if you happen to be a little bit worried today or troubled like I am, I'll give us a little exercise to go through. In fact, maybe you can carry it with you, but I want you to try it right now. So first of all, take a deep breath. And slowly let it out. And tell yourself these words. Breathe easy. I know the Messiah. I am forever blessed. What do you think about Jesus? I know we all talk about him. What are you thinking about Jesus right now in your life? Today I need to take a breath. Our whole family needs to take a breath because tomorrow you know, some of you know what's happening with our two oldest sons. Our next oldest is Ben, who's having two kidneys removed. And our oldest, Luke, is having one of his removed. giving it to his younger brother. So we need to somehow learn to breathe easy through this time. You come to this text here in Matthew 16, takes place approximately two years after Jesus is into his ministry, and a year still ahead of him. Many things to do, things to fulfill, and the will of God to be performed in particular ways. So he's keeping a more or less a lower profile, not ready to run head-on-head in collision with the religious establishment where they will gladly put him to death and he willingly will comply, but not yet. And so right now he's, like I say, kind of flying a little bit under the radar, though he's doing a number of things to catch attention, big things. And so Jesus turns, they're about 20 miles north of the Sea of Galilee, and Caesarea Philippi. And so he turns to his disciples and he says, what are people saying about me these days? What are they thinking? Of course, he knows, but he has them express what's going on in the community, the broader community. And people are saying all sorts of things, as they are today, right? People have, your friends, your parents, your brother, sister, whoever, have different opinions. But in those days, at that time, These are some of the opinions that were going around. Some said John the Baptist, some said Elijah, some said Jeremiah or some other prophet. These are all prophets, even John, though he did no miracle. John said he was the greatest prophet, but as you probably recall that John at this time had been beheaded. He's Jesus' older cousin, about six months older, but he'd already been beheaded. But it wasn't unusual, according to David Friedman in the Anchor Bible Dictionary, that he says the reappearance of dead heroes, like John, was a well-known theme in contemporary Jewish thought. And so some were thinking along those lines. Some, they looked at Jesus, heard about him or whatever, and they said, well, he's Elijah. Well, that one makes, to me, a little more sense. Because as you read the last pages in our Bible, the English translation, you'll see that there's a phrase that says, Malachi 4, verse 5, Behold, I will send you Elijah, the prophet, before the great and awesome day of when the Lord comes. And so, even in Jewish tradition today, some of you know how our Jewish friends practice, some of them, when they celebrate the Passover, Some of them will set a place for Elijah, an empty place, with a chair. And some will even leave the door open for him to come in. I'm not sure which door, but they leave a door open in case he comes into the room where they're celebrating. Some thought he was Jeremiah. And they were thinking, maybe he's Jeremiah. William Barclay has an interesting thought on that. He says that there was an opinion that Jeremiah, whose ministry maybe is a little bit like Jesus, but some felt that he, when the Jews were taken into exile, that Jeremiah took the Ark of the Covenant, if you ever saw the Raiders of the Lost Ark, you know that thing with the Ten Commandments inside, that Jeremiah had taken it and the Altar of Incense, which was about, cut this down the middle, you got the Altar of Incense, which was the priest burned the incense for the people representing the prayers of God. But some thought that Jeremiah, when he ran away and he hid these obstacles, and he would bring them back to the people before the coming of the Messiah. So those were some of the opinions. Some thought he was another prophet, like Ezekiel perhaps, or Daniel, or one of the other prophets. And many people today still hold that opinion, right? Jesus is a great prophet, right? I mean, who would disagree with that? A great teacher. Of course, as you read along and along, if you find out what the teachers really teach in you, you might say, well, maybe I should believe a little bit more than a great teacher, that he's a great prophet because he's got a lot of powerful things and helpful things to say. And if we get it right, we can breathe easier, much easier. And Peter got it right. He asked the question to the disciples at large, and then he turns around and he asks them another question. Who do people say? Then he said, who do you? He's speaking to all of them there in the plural. Who do you all say? And Peter, of course, he's the first to jump into anything. He jumps up and he says, hey, you are the Christ. If we brought it into the Hebrew, we'd say you are the Messiah. That's how the NIV translates it. It's the same thing. The Christ is the Greek way of saying the Messiah. You're the Messiah, the son of the living God. This is God himself come to the earth as Messiah. And if you understand that, it does make it a little bit easier. I keep remembering that as tomorrow gets closer. It's helpful. And it's helpful because as you understand that, what was Jesus' response to Peter? Peter, the first thing Jesus said, you're the Christ, you're the Messiah. And Jesus responds, and you are blessed. What you know about me means you're now, your position before God is declared blessed. In God's eyes, in Christ's eyes, you are blessed. If you know Jesus the Messiah, say this word. You can whisper it, say it out loud. Say, I am blessed. Say, Jesus declares I am blessed. Jesus declares I am blessed. Now, you do a little word study. This is something I just learned. I should have known it. I've been preaching for 40 years, not lately, in the last seven years much. But the translation is often put, you're declared happy. You're declared to be a fortunate person. But when you actually break it down further and look at the root word, it's mockery. Makarios, the first part of that word, it means to lengthen. It means somehow that God has added a length or a depth. He's expanded your life now that you have an awareness of the Messiah, who the Messiah is. Somehow he, if you might want to put it this way, that he's enriched it. He's expanded it. It's easy to think of when we say he's given me eternal life. Then the word works really good for us. I'm blessed in that my life has expanded way out there and will continue going. You are blessed if you know Jesus. And you're particularly blessed and can breathe much easier because when you know him, you know the role of the Messiah. The role of the Messiah was what? To deliver us. Mary didn't pick the name for Jesus when he was born, right? The angel came and he said, here's what you're going to call him. What? Yeah, here's what you're going to call your son. You shall call him Jesus because he will save his people from their sins. He will deliver them from their sins, which means all the consequences as well and everything associated with being a sinner. He will deliver you. That's his promise to you who know the Messiah. When some terrible problem comes our way, like tomorrow or today, we need someone to deliver us, don't we? When your life seems to be falling apart, we need someone to deliver us. When we're standing before the last judgment, at the last judgment, we need a deliverer. And when you're guilty as charged, you definitely need a deliverer. When you're unworthy of God's help, you need a deliverer, and in this Messiah, you have such a help. We can rest much easier as we reflect and remember that we have a deliverer, but also remember how we got here in this blessed condition. You didn't get here on your own. What is Jesus' comments to Peter when Peter says, you are the Messiah? He said, blessed are you, because flesh and blood hasn't revealed this to you. It's not something that you, as a human being, figured out on your own. It's not something that your mother told you, now I got it, mom told me. It's not just some counselor or some psychologist telling you, hey, you're blessed, you're okay, No, nothing to do with humanity whatsoever, although many people helped us along the way. In fact, my great, my grandmother, she had 17 children. Five, I think, I forget, it was five from the first husband who passed away, or it may have been 12, one or the other. But 17 kids, and they're all grown up, and somebody asked her, she says, about her relationship with God and how she was feeling about being here on Earth, getting older. She said, you know, there's only one thing that's keeping me here right now, She says, I want to see all 17 of my children come to know the Savior. She wanted to know that they were safe and secure before she left. She wanted God to open the eyes of her kids. Isn't that what we want if we're parents? We want the eyes of our children, the people we love, husband, wife, And Peter's eyes were open. I like to think it was an answer to somebody's prayer, maybe his mom's prayer. Maybe Andrew's prayer because didn't Andrew introduce Peter? Or was it the other way around? Was Andrew introduce Peter? Come, look what I found here. Suspect he was praying for him. Keep praying, keep praying. With your example, as imperfect as it is, and with God's help and your prayers, The light may come on, you never know. Right now my nephew has been staying with us off and on because he sold his house and relocating but still got his job here. So I thought he knew his eyes had been opened for a few years and we got talking at length maybe for an hour the other night. He's asking a lot of questions and I'm praying that his eyes will really be open because I don't think he's quite there yet. to see what he's seeking. He's interested and wants to know. And 38 years of studying the Bible, I've got a couple things to tell him. I'm just trying to hold back and more or less live it before him and let it come out little by little. But now he wants to know right up front. Come on, come on. And every time we finish the conversation, he says, I've got more questions. I'll tell you the next time. I'll ask. Ask him next time. You know, it's a gift if your eyes have been opened. It wasn't like you worked for like an employee or you performed well like some Olympian and that's why you got it or like some CPA or lawyer who studied, studied, studied and passed a test. No. The grace of God has come to open your eyes and how grateful you are. You're in a privileged position. We can breathe much easier if our eyes are open because also now, We've been given the keys to heaven. We've been given the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Jesus turns to Peter, and not only does he tell him that you didn't just figure this out on your own, but now that you've figured it out by God's grace, I give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. And I believe what Jesus said to Peter, he would say to all of us, as Robin Mark, who Did a concert here back in 2013, I believe it was. That one song I sang is, he opened the gates of heaven. He opened the gates of heaven, right. He opened the gates of heaven and now we're free to enter in. Bethany will keep me on pitch a little better, I think. But we're free to enter in. We've been given the keys to the kingdom. And when you have the keys to the kingdom, something magical can happen. It can get you access to God, access to God's blessing, access to his promises, the peace, the comfort, whatever he's telling us, the promises he gives to you, coming to me, all you who are weak and heavy laden, I'll give you rest. We have access now through those promises by faith, to get a lot of benefits down here and of course, the big one coming at the end of the rainbow. Somehow, when you have access to God, you can sleep better. You can lower the anxiety. You can give your resilience to get up. You think you're done? No. You find strength to get up, take another step. You find strength to take another. and you just keep moving on because you now have the keys to the kingdom of God. And he's there to help us along the way. Now we get, this brings me to verse 19b after Peter said, I give you the key, he's told, I give you the keys to the kingdom. I feel, I don't really want to say much here because I don't want to take the time, but I feel a bit obligated at least to say something about this because it's the elephant in the room. He tells, Peter, I give you the keys to the kingdom, verse 19, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. So I say this almost as an aside. I must admit it's difficult and it's been greatly debated among many people. So I'm not going to be dogmatic. This is my view at this point. I think it captures the heartbeat of what many of the Protestant interpretations are in this. So I'm going to read it kind of literally. I'll try to stay here. Verse 19, Jesus said to Peter, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven. Whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. And understood, I believe, Jesus' words here are the teachings of Christ. He's speaking about the teachings of Christ. Christ is passing along His teachings to Peter. and to the other disciples. The teachings of Christ are intrinsically authoritative. I had a Bible here. I do have one. No, it's a hymnal. That won't work for that one. Because that's not authoritative. It's got a lot of good stuff in there. But the teachings in here are intrinsically, inherently authoritative. What you find in here, if you find and you read it correctly, it is binding to us. It can bind and it can release. It has the power because it's God speaking through an authoritative word. It has the power to bind or release. This first seems to be about Christ passing along his teachings to Peter, who will Peter then be passing these teachings along to others. And so Jesus is telling Peter that these teachings that Peter receives from Christ carry a sense of his authority. as Peter will be going out and be sent out later on. Not right now, he's holding back. But Jesus wants his disciples to speak with divine authority, to speak with a confidence as Christ has taught them things from heaven that they're going to have to call to express on earth and live by. In other words, when Peter or a preacher or anybody proclaims a teaching of Christ on earth, God will stand behind those teachings in heaven. The teaching of Christ gives authority to proclaim the mind of God. We proclaim the teaching of Christ whether someone is free or whether they're bound. You're free to make choices over here, but you're bound when it comes to choosing over here. You're free from your sins here, or you're not free from your sins. That's what I think this passage is about. Having said that, with authority from Christ's Word, I would say if you've asked Christ to forgive you, Christ declares you forgiven. If you've not asked Christ to forgive you, you're still bound by your sin. And when you face God, I hope you have found a savior by then. I hope you find someone who's giving you a defense. Because unless you find Christ, there is no good defense whatsoever. He is the one with the perfect life that you need. He is the one who takes the judgment for our sin. Somehow those sins got to get away from us and we got to get away from them so that God can accept us. Well, we who know the Messiah, we can breathe easy if we know him because we're forgiven. We've been given the keys to heaven and now we're part of Christ's growing community, which cannot be overcome. Christ said, after speaking some words to Peter, giving him the kingdom, and so forth, or before that, he says to Peter that, and you're Peter, Jesus identified, I mean, Jesus was identified by Peter. He said, Peter, he said, to Jesus, you are the Christ, you're the Messiah. Now Jesus turns to Peter, and he says, and you're Peter. And upon this rock, he's speaking about Jesus, the confession of Peter, not Peter himself. He said, upon this rock, I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it. This is a verse really rich in meaning, and I'm not gonna take, I'm gonna try to keep the time down here, as we go toward this latter point in my sermon. But if we look at verse 18, Christ makes a promise. He says, I will build my church, right? You're Peter, and on this rock I will build my church. The church is an assembly. That's what the word means, ecclesia. He's gathering people from all over the world. He's going to build a church. And the rock upon which the church will be built, this assembly, is not Peter. Peter's a sinner. We see that later in the scriptures, where he's a little bit prejudiced. The rock is Peter's confession, what just came out of his mouth. That's how Christ's going to build his church. That's how people are going to get into the kingdom. That's how we'll get access to God. As the late president of Westminster Seminary, Ed Clowney, who was one of my teachers, he said that The rock is Peter's confession of Christ, his understanding of Christ, his understanding of the gospel. And this is how Christ will bring people into the church, and Christ promises to build his church. Now, I want to give you an image here. When we hear the word church, we typically think of what? Right, we got brick and mortar, or in this case, we got some boards slabbed together with nails. And you got on top, you got a steeple, and then you got a cross. Those things didn't exist back in Jesus' day. He didn't have any steeples with crosses on them, I can tell you that. So when he talks about building a church, I'd rather you think something like this. Think about a long passenger train. A long train of passenger cars being pulled by the engine with an engineer who's built the train and is in the engine pulling the passenger cars. The train's destination is a heavenly place. Okay, and the engineer guarantees a safe arrival for all the passengers who are on board. Every passenger who gets on board needs a ticket. The ticket's not complicated. You just got to know the engineer, and he befriends you, and you take him as your friend. And then you pull out, because the starting place for the train is Jerusalem. In the Bible, Jerusalem is the center of the world. What's happening there is big stuff, and we need to pay attention to what's happening there. So the train pulls out of Jerusalem, and some passengers got on board. A lot of people had been offered to come on board. In fact, a whole genre of people, they had no interest, except for a little break off, some of these people named Peter, James, John, Andrew, and others, they got on board. And he picks up these passengers, and guess what? They're going to pull out of Jerusalem and they're going south. They're going into Judea, down into the southern part, telling people stuff about introducing people to the engineer, and he slows down, stops, people get on board, others are not interested. And then they go up north. Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria. A lot of people just go around this place, not even interested because that's kind of a rough place to be. People living there is like a little taboo and have a lot of stigma with them. But nevertheless, the engineer drives the train right through Samaria. A woman from the well decides she's going to get on board. Hey, I kind of like this guy. He knows a whole lot about me. She gets on board. And it goes further and further. find themselves going to Rome and they're traveling to all over the world in this train. They go to Italy and India, Egypt and into Africa. In the far reaches of the world, this train is moving. People getting on board, some here and there. Train's filling up. Before you know it, you know, you got people hanging off the sides of it. Just grabbing a hold of some rungs here on the side of the car and they're hanging on. But they're on board and they're good and they're tight they're not going to be falling off. And what they find, though, that as they're on this train, a lot of them sitting there comfortably inside, and they start speaking, they're trying to speak, and they realize, hey, this guy doesn't understand a word I'm saying. What is he speaking, like Portuguese, or he's speaking Italian, he's speaking Spanish? I don't know, some of you might know a little Spanish, but speaking other languages, maybe old Acadian or whatever. But the one thing the passengers No, they might not know each other in terms of because of their language, but they all know the engineer. The engineer all knows them and he knows what they're speaking and how they feel about him. And they all believe he's a kind engineer, the kind that's going to get them to their destination, this heavenly place that he's promised. Come hell or high water, they're going to get there. I will build my church in the gates of hell. It's not going to stand against it. You know, how many of you saw the movie E.T.? You ever notice that image, that big moon? And they got E.T. up there in front of it on a bike. You know, you got Elliot on the bike and you got E.T. sitting in a basket in the front, right? But if you look a little closer at the movie, you'll find that there's some other bikes. A handful of his friends are on bikes behind. So you got E.T. in the front, you got Elliot, you know, and there's these bikes behind, I think four or five of them. But as you saw with the action just before that, you know, E.T. is running, Elliot's running away from the cops. And they got his friends, and they're out in all the trouble, they're being chased by a whole bunch of guys, they don't want to get a hold of them. And so, and they're like pedaling away, they're like going like this, doing whatever they can. And next thing you know, like there's a whole bunch of, there's a roadblock, cars blocking them, trouble behind, coming down on them. And then suddenly you just see elevation. The bikes just start going up in the air and they're like pedaling along, pedaling along. And you see this big bright moon behind them, just a black profile. It's a beautiful picture, you know, of like what God is doing with his people. He's gathering a whole lot of bikes, one after the other, a train filled with people. He's going to elevate up a great multitude of people. In Revelation 7, puts the matter this way, 7, 9, After this, I, John, looked, and there before me was a great multitude, that no one could count, from every nation, every tribe, people and language, standing before the throne, and before the Lamb. And they were wearing white robes, and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice, Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb. And all the angels were standing around the throne, and around the elders and the four living creatures, and they fell down on their faces before the throne, and they worshiped God, saying, Amen. Praise and glory and wisdom and thanks and honor and power and strength be to our God forever and ever. Amen. Who is Jesus? People have a lot of opinions. Who is this Jesus many of us claim to know? He is the one who declares you blessed, if you will believe it. He is the one who has opened your eyes to His grace. He is the one with authority to grant you forgiveness. He is the one who promises safely to deliver you to deliver you in a long train of other believers. He will do it. He will do it. Come hell or high water. He who began a good work in his church will complete it. So this week, the next time you're worried, breathe easy. Take a deep breath. Slowly let it out. Do it now. And tell yourself, breathe easy. Breathe easy. I know the Messiah. I am forever blessed. Amen. Father, we thank you that we know you. We know your son, Jesus Christ, whom you sent to forgive us. We now meditate on our own lives, take a few minutes here to think about where we fall short. And we ask your forgiveness and quietly recommit our hearts into your care.