Well, good morning to everyone.
If you care to open your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter 16,
we'll pick up our study in the book of Matthew this morning.
Before we look into our Lord's word, let's go to him in prayer. Our father, which art in heaven,
holy and reverent is your matchless name. Because of your holiness,
your awesome presence, we come before you reverently, worship
with hearts of worship, and bow before you. We bow with fear
and trembling, and yet, Father, we're thankful that in our Lord
Jesus Christ, we can come before your throne boldly, crying, Abba,
Father. And Father, we pray this morning
that you give us a heart of true worship, that you would enable
us to hear your gospel, to hear of our Lord Jesus Christ, and
to worship. Father, be with us, we pray.
Don't leave us alone, but enable us to worship thee. Be with our
children's classes, Father. Be with our teachers, be with
our children. Father, I pray that you'd bless
this time, that you might use it as a time where the seeds
of faith are planted in the hearts of our young ones, that you might
cause it to grow in thy time. Father, we beg of you that you'd
be merciful. Father, for those who are hurting
and who are sick and in deep waters, Father, we pray for them.
We continue to pray for Aaron and Barb, that you'd be with
them in a special way to recover quickly, if it could be thy will.
And Father, again, we pray you'd bless us. Bless us as we look
into your word. Let us see the Lord Jesus Christ,
that we might rest in him. For it's in his precious name
we pray and give thanks. Amen. All right, Matthew chapter
16. I've titled the lesson this morning,
Who Do You Say? Who Do You Say That Christ Is? Our Lord asked his disciples
this very important question in our text. Who do you say that
the Lord Jesus Christ is? And just like in our day and
their day, the world had a lot of different answers to that
question. They're all wrong. Look here at the beginning of
verse 13, Matthew 16. When Jesus came into the coast
of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, saying, whom do
men say that I, the son of man, am? And they said, some say that
thou art John the Baptist. And some, Elias and others, Jeremias,
are one of the prophets. The world had a whole lot of
different ideas, didn't they? miraculous, sound very religious,
sound very astute. A lot of different ideas, but
every one of their ideas is wrong. But the question posed to you
and me this morning is not what does the world think of the Savior? Who do you say that he is? Verse
15, he saith unto them, but whom say ye that I am? See, it doesn't
matter. Our Lord didn't even deal with
what the world said that he is. Who do you say, this is all that
matters, who do you say that Christ is? You know, it doesn't
matter what our family, what our loved ones think of Christ. Who do you say that he is? It
doesn't matter what great preachers of the past, you know, a lot
of people can start quoting different great preachers of the past,
but it doesn't really matter what they say. Who do you say
that Christ is? This matter of knowing Christ,
knowing who he is, and believing him. That is the matter that
must be settled. It must be settled in my heart.
It must be settled in your heart. Who do you say that Christ is? This matter of faith in Christ
is personal. If we would be saved, we must
know Christ and believe on him. But the only ones who can know
him, the only ones who can trust Christ are those who have God
given faith. God must give us the gift of
faith. And you and I can know whether or not we know and trust
the Christ of the Bible. I'm not asking if you know who
Jesus is, the people made up in their minds, who you may have
made up in your mind. I want to know, do we know the
Christ of the Bible? Do we know the Lord Jesus of
the Bible? We can know that. And that's
what I want us to look at this morning. And the first thing
I see here is the confession of true faith. Verse 16 is Simon
Peter answered. and said, thou art the Christ,
the son of the living God. Now poor old Peter, he made a
lot of mistakes by acting rashly, didn't he? Peter said a lot of
foolish things because he didn't just take a beat before he spoke,
he spoke rashly before he thought. But I tell you what, all of us
could do with more of Peter's boldness and Peter's zeal, couldn't
we? We could do with more of that.
And Peter didn't need to hesitate one second to answer this question. Peter, he knew the answer to
this because he had God given faith. And this is what God given
faith, what true faith always confesses. It confesses Christ. Now, Peter didn't know everything
there was to know. Peter had some things wrong in
his mind. He thought some things, you know,
were going to happen that were wrong and the Lord will straighten
those things out later. But that didn't really matter,
did it? It's, What do you think of Christ? Not what do you think
of, you know, when Christ is going to set up an earthly kingdom
or if he's going to set up an earthly kingdom or not, or, or,
you know, when his second coming is going to be, or, I mean, so
many different questions. Those things really don't matter.
Here's the thing that matters. What thinking of Christ and Peter's
confession of faith was in a person. It was not just in a person.
It was a person, the person of the Lord Jesus Christ. And Peter
says what all true faith says. Thou art the Christ. You're the
son of the living God. Peter knew that the Lord Jesus
Christ was God's promised Messiah. This is the one God promised
would come. And he is the only savior of
sinners. And God almighty sent him to
save his people from their sins. And Peter says, I trust him.
This is the one God sent. This is the one God promised.
This is the one God purposed. I trust him. And he's the son
of God. And since he's the son of God,
He's eternal. The Lord Jesus Christ is the
eternal surety of God's covenant of grace. And I'll tell you what
that means. That means that salvation is
all of the Lord. It's all of God's grace. Salvation
is all of God's promise. It's all of God's purpose. And
it's all carried out by the Lord Jesus Christ. It's all found
in him. And Peter knew what all saving
faith knows. Salvation is a person. It's the
Lord Jesus Christ. Salvation, saving faith, knows
and believes and trusts that the Lord Jesus Christ, He is
God's promised Messiah. He was promised throughout all
of the Old Testament, and He has come to fulfill all of the
Old Testament types and all of the Old Testament promises of
the Savior. Now, just a I'm trying to think of the right
word, a doctrinal, just a human knowledge kind of thing can know
that Christ came to fulfill all the Old Testament types and promises.
This is what saving faith knows. He came to fulfill those types
and those promises for me. This is just the most amazing
thing ever was. Christ came to fulfill those
promises to save me. He did it on purpose. So he's
my only hope. Christ came to be the Passover
lamb for me. He died so I could live. He died
in my place and his blood was applied to my heart. So that
when the father sees the blood of Christ applied to my heart
in justice, he's gonna pass over me. He sees that blood, that
blood says there's already been death here. The death of the
substitute, justice is satisfied. Christ died as the Passover lamb
for me so that I would be saved. Christ came to be the scapegoat
for me. My sin was transferred to him
and he took it away to a land uninhabited where it would never
be seen again. He separated my sin from me as
far as east is from the west. He's a scapegoat for me. Christ
came to be the sin offering for me. He came to die for me to
have my sin transferred to him and to suffer and die and by
his blood pay for all my sin. He came to be the scapegoat for
me. Christ came to be that prophet like Moses. I'll hear a lot of
preachers, but I'll tell you this, when I hear Christ, that
prophet speak, I'll believe him. I'll believe everything he says.
Christ came to be that priest like Aaron. He came to be the
priest who would offer the sacrifice for sin, that would put sin away
once and for all. Aaron offered countless sacrifices. Christ offered one. And it put
my sin away. I know it did, because when he
offered that sacrifice, you know what he did? He did something
Aaron never did. He sat down. He sat down because the work's
finished. Christ came to be the king like David. When I see him,
I'll quit being so stiff-necked and such a rebel, and I'll bow.
I'll bow at his feet and beg him for mercy. He came to be
my king. Now, Peter didn't have every detail of the kingdom down
just right, but Peter did confess that he trusted Christ alone.
Now, do you? I know Peter did, it's recorded
in God's word. Do I? Do you? Is that your confession
of faith? You don't know everything there
is to know, but you know that Christ is the Savior. Do you
know that? That's the confession that true faith makes. All right,
here's the second thing I want us to see. I want to see the
man or the woman of faith. How does a man or a woman come
to have this faith and the confession of faith like Peter had? Well,
the Lord tells us how we have it. Look at verse 17. And Jesus
answered and said unto him, blessed art thou Simon Bar-Jonah, for
flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my father,
which is in heaven. Our Lord said, Peter, The reason
you have this confession of faith, the reason that you believe in
me like this, is you're blessed. Blessed of God. Flesh and blood
did not give you that confession of faith. You don't believe this
because your mama and daddy believe it. Flesh and blood didn't teach
you this confession of faith. You know what flesh and blood
taught you? You know what Peter's mama and daddy taught him? They
taught him the law and the ceremonies. That's what they taught him.
Peter and the rest of the disciples, Even after the Lord died and
rose again, they still could not get this thought out of their
head. Christ is going to come set up an earthly kingdom and
set us free from the boot of Rome. I mean, they just so deeply
ingrained in them. Somebody taught them that. Flesh
and blood taught them that. Flesh and blood didn't teach
them that our Lord has a spiritual kingdom. They were looking for
an earthly kingdom. Flesh and blood didn't teach
you that. Peter, you trusted me because you're blessed in
God, blessed of God. The Holy Spirit revealed Christ
to you. That's the only reason any son
of Adam can confess Christ like that and truly believe him like
that, is the Holy Spirit gives faith. Now the world can have
a lot of opinions about Christ, but only one is right. Only one is right. You can have
an opinion about whether coffee or tea is better. I love coffee,
you could love tea, we can disagree on that, we get along fine. You
can have an opinion about Pepsi or Coke. Your opinion would be
just fine. Any of you that know my dear
wife very well that know this. Janet has a very strongly held
opinion that Pepsi's the best. She just don't buy Coke. And
you know, you go to a restaurant and you order Pepsi and they
say, is Coke all right? You know, she wants to tell them
no, but you know, it's just whatever. Just to her, Pepsi's the king
now. Last week, she bought Coke, had Coke in our house. You know
why? Chris Cunningham was staying there, Chris likes Coke. Chris
can like Coke, and Janet can like Pepsi, they can be friends
just fine. It's just an opinion that does not matter. You can't
have a different opinion on who Christ is. You can't have a different
opinion on how sinners are saved in Him. There's only one opinion
that's right. Jesus is the Christ. He's the
Savior of sinners. And our Lord tells Peter, you
have the right opinion here. You have the right faith because
God gave it to you. Because God revealed Christ to
you, taught you the truth. Peter, don't you get full of
yourself, Peter. The only reason you believe Christ
like this is God gave it to you. Look in Ephesians chapter one.
This is what the Apostle Paul says. You're blessed. You are blessed of God. If you
believe Christ, you know him and you believe him like this.
God's the only one that can teach you that. Ephesians 1 verse nine,
or verse seven, excuse me, verse seven. In whom we have redemption
through his blood, the forgiveness of sin according to the riches
of his grace, wherein he hath abounded toward us in all wisdom
and prudence, having made known unto us the mystery of his will,
according to his good pleasure, which he hath purposed in himself.
How do we know this? God made it known to us. He made
known the mystery of his will by teaching. He teaches all of
his people who Christ is and gives us the faith to believe
him. Now that was Peter's faith. He's a man of faith. Does that
describe the way you came to have faith? Did God give it to
you? Did God teach you who Christ
is? Everybody believes something. Now everybody here, you believe
something. How did you come to believe it?
I mean, is it something you figured out or did God teach you? Did
God give it to you? Are you so dead in sin that God
the Holy Spirit had to give you life? He had to. Are you so just
in your flesh in such darkness and ignorance that the only way
you could know anything is God the Holy Spirit to teach you?
Is that your experience? Did God give you this faith or
did you figure it out? Because you're smarter than the
average bear and you can read the scriptures and you could
read, you know, a couple of commentaries and figure this thing out. Or
did God teach you? Now which is it? If God saved
you, he saved you without any input from you, and God gave
you faith in Christ, you have the same confession that Peter
did. God gave it to me. God gave me that. That's the
man or the woman of faith. All right, here's the third thing. It's the foundation of faith.
Verse 18 and I say unto thee that thou art Peter and upon
this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not
prevail against it. Now this is such a misunderstood
verse. Catholics and a lot of other people think that the Lord
is making Peter here, the first Pope, they're making him the
vicar or the representative of Christ. on earth and the Lord
is saying, Peter, you've got a better ranking now than these
other disciples and other believers. And Lord's telling Peter, I'm
going to build my church on you. You're going to go out and do
this. I'll build my church on you. That Peter, Peter is the
foundation of the church. Now that if that doesn't show
you the darkness and the ignorance of flesh, I don't know what could.
Nothing could be possibly be more foolish than that thought.
Peter's a man of faith now, but Peter's a man unstable as water. I mean, this man who's in such
boldness and such confidence in just a few chapters is gonna
curse and deny he even knows the Lord. He's as unstable as
water. If the church had been built
on Peter, the church had dissolved a long, long time ago. By his
own admission, Peter said, I'm a sinful man. He said, Lord,
depart from me, I'm a sinful man. Nothing holy could be built
on Peter, could it? The Lord's not building his church
on Peter. This is what the Lord's saying. He's going to build his
church on Christ who Peter confessed. Christ is the rock, not Peter.
And you know what? Peter knew it. Look at first
Peter chapter two, the Lord's referring to himself as the rock,
not Peter. Peter knew that. And Peter taught
us that he wrote this first Peter chapter two. Verse four, to whom coming? See, his confession of faith
is a person. It's not coming to a set of doctrines.
He's coming to a person. To whom coming? As unto a living
stone. Disallowed indeed of men, but
chosen of God and precious. Ye also as lively stones are
built up a spiritual house and holy priesthood to offer up spiritual
sacrifices acceptable to God by Jesus Christ. Wherefore also
it is contained in the scripture, behold, I lay in Zion, a chief
cornerstone, elect, precious, and he that believeth on him
shall not be confounded. Unto you, therefore, which believe,
he is precious, but unto them which be disobedient, the stone,
this stone, which the builders disallowed, the same as made
the head of the corner and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense,
even to them which stumble at the word being disobedient, were
unto also they were appointed. But you're a chosen generation,
a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar, a purchased people
that you should show forth the praises of him who has called
you out of darkness into his marvelous light, which in time
past were not a people, but are now the people of God. which
had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy. Peter could
be more clear here, couldn't he? Christ is that rock. It's
all built on him. Look at 1 Corinthians 3. The only foundation of faith
there can be is the Lord Jesus Christ. It can only be built
upon him. 1 Corinthians 3, verse 10. According to the grace of God
which is given unto me, as a wise master builder, I've laid the
foundation, and another buildeth thereon, but let every man take
heed how he buildeth thereupon, for other foundation can no man
lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. The Lord Jesus
Christ is the only foundation of faith. You can't have a different
opinion about that and have eternal life. He's the only foundation
of faith. And I tell you this, sooner or
later, that faith is going to be tested. Everybody here believes
something. Everybody believes something.
Sooner or later, our faith is going to be tested. It's going
to be tested by the storms and trials and persecution of this
life. And what we claim to believe
will be tested. If it's built on Christ, our
faith is going to stand. It's going to stand on Christ
as solid rock. And anything not built on Christ, any other trust
that we have that's not Christ alone, it's sinking sand, and
it's gonna fall down flat. And great will be the destruction
of it. It'll be great, complete, total destruction, and it'll
be so sad. Anything not built on Christ alone is gonna fall
now. Oh, but you take comfort, you
who believe on Christ. Anything built on Him's gonna
stand forever. Because He's gonna stand forever.
He's the solid rock. Now the Lord Jesus Christ is
the only foundation of faith. We who believe, believe him. We believe that he is all of
our salvation. Now is that your faith? Is that
what you trust in? You trust in him like that? Or
do you think you gotta put some of your works in this thing to
shore it up a little bit? Which is it? If Christ is all your
hope, you got the same confession of faith that Peter had, built
upon Christ alone. All right, here's the fourth
thing. the builder of faith. Verse 18
in our text, Matthew 16. And I say also unto thee that
thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and
the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. Now the Lord said,
I will build my church. I will build my church. Now the
church is not a building. The church is not an institution.
The church is God's It's his body. That's what Peter told
us. Your lively stones built up a spiritual house. God's church
is his people. God gives faith to his people.
You don't wait for them to come up with it. He gives them faith.
They're just dead stones. How do they become living, lively
stones? God gave them life. He gives
his people life and faith in Christ. And he adds to the church
such as should be added daily, every single day. And he puts
them in their place, the place that he has prepared for them,
the place that he has purposed for them from the foundation
of the world. Now the Lord is the architect of the church.
He purposed it and he planned it. He's the one, he's the builder
of it. He laid the foundation, he puts
up the walls, he puts up the roof, he puts all the people
in his church in their proper place and he's the one that holds
it all together. Let me show you that in Ephesians
chapter two. He built it. from the foundation up, from
the bottom up. And he's the one that holds it
all together. Ephesians chapter two, verse 19. Now, therefore, you no more strangers
and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household
of God. And you're built upon the foundation
of the apostles and prophets. You're built upon the same foundation.
The apostles and prophets were built upon. Jesus Christ himself
being the chief cornerstone in whom all the building fitly framed
together groweth into an holy temple in the Lord, in whom ye
also are built together for an habitation of God through the
spirit. God builds his people. God builds
his church. He dwells in them. He holds them
all together and causes them to grow up, to grow in him. Now,
since the Lord is the one who builds the church, this is what
I can promise you. It will be successful. It will
be successful. The gates of hell itself cannot
stop God's church from going out and gathering God's elect
from the four corners of the world and having God put them
in their proper place. The gates of hell cannot stand
up and stop it. You know, the church is not a,
it's not in a defensive position. The church is on the offense.
We're on the offense, we're going out seeking God's sheep, calling
out God's sheep, seeking that people might know the Savior.
And I'll tell you this, we will be successful. I don't know how
many numbers that'll be, but I can promise you this, we'll
be successful. God's gonna call out His sheep,
He's gonna feed them, He's gonna give them life, He's gonna cause
them to grow. God's gonna do that. That's how
we know to be successful. Now is that your experience?
Is God the one that gave you faith? Is God the one that called
you out? Is God the one that settled you
on the Lord Jesus Christ? If that's your experience, you
have the same saving faith that Peter had, the same builder,
God himself. All right, now here's the last
thing. The end result of faith, verse
19. And I will give unto thee the
keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind
on earth shall be bound in heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt loose
on earth shall be loosed in heaven. This is another verse that is
commonly misinterpreted. The Lord did not give Peter and
the other apostles here the power to forgive sin. He didn't give
them the power to put people into God's kingdom or put people
into heaven. The Lord certainly did not give
Peter the power to damn people and to keep them out of the kingdom
of heaven. He didn't do that. that power belongs to Christ. Now the father has given all
judgment under the son. This, this matter of life and
death, heaven and hell, knowing Christ, having faith in him and
not having faith in him, all that power belongs to God. Now
the apostles, they would be, be given some, some special gifts. They would be given the inspiration
of the Holy Spirit to infallibly, write the word of God. These
men, Peter himself was going to be given the gift to write
things that are infallible, that are true now and forever. They're true now on earth. They're
going to be true in heaven and eternity. The things that the
apostles wrote direct the church. They govern the church and they
will be forever. These things are binding. They're
unchanging. I don't, well, I do know where
it, people get this idea that we ought to have women be pastors
and so forth. You know, that we think somehow
we've grown, you know, from, from when the word of God was
written 2000 years ago. Um, these things are binding,
binding and not because women aren't smart enough or spiritual
enough is just God's order. It's just God's order. And these
things are binding. They're not changing. Now, nobody
has that power today to write infallibly. We need to be careful
when we quote these great preachers of the past. Don't quote them
now like you're quoting scripture. They're not infallible. But the
Lord gave those disciples a key. And he gave you and me the same
key. We have this same key. And the key is Christ. If you've got Christ, if you
know him, you believe him, You've got the key that unlocks the
gate to heaven itself. If you know who Christ is, you
see him, you believe him, you've got the key that unlocks all
the treasures of God's kingdom. He's the key and he's the treasure. And anybody who believes Christ,
anybody who believes Christ right now on this earth, you're bound
to Christ. You're bound to him. You have
union with him, just like the head to the body. You have union
with him. You're bound to him. And you know what? You'll be
bound to him for eternity. You will never be separated from
him. Anybody who does not believe
Christ, they're loosed from Christ. And if they die in that state,
they'll be separated from him in eternity. Now that's serious business.
That's serious, serious business. I hope we always remember this. We're not playing games here.
We're not playing games. We're not having a religious
club and trying to kind of climb the ladder somehow, the social
hierarchy. We're not playing games here
now. We're not trying to build a following for ourselves. We're
trying to build a following for God. We're preaching God's gospel. praying that God will give people
faith to believe him. That they'll be taken up with
him, him. I tell you, if we're taken up
with him, all these other differing opinions ain't going to matter.
This is, we're not playing games here. I can't tell you how many
funerals I've preached. I tried to count them up there.
I can't even think of them all. How many funerals I've preached. I don't know if frightening is
the right word. Sobering, certainly. To think of how many people heard
me preach and stepped into eternity. We're not playing games here.
I want you to believe Christ. I want you to know Christ. And the end result of faith in
Christ is eternal life. That's the end result. It's to
be made just like Christ. To be brought to be with Christ
and be with Him forever. That's the key we have. But there
is a difference between at this moment when the Lord was speaking
to Peter and to the other apostles and disciples and to us. And here's the difference. Verse
20. Then charged he his disciples that they should tell no man
that he was Jesus the Christ. Now doesn't that sound odd? That
seems strange. Seems like they ought to go tell
everybody Jesus is the Christ. Well, they will one day. When
the Lord rose back up into the clouds, he said, you go into
all the world and tell people this, but not right now. Not
right now, because his hour had not yet come. His hour to reveal
his glory on Calvary's tree was not yet come. So the disciples
stayed quiet for a while. But now, the church now, 2021,
now Christ's glory has been revealed. Christ has been crucified. He
did die. He did rise again. He has ascended
back to glory. So our job is to tell people
Jesus is the Christ. He's the Christ, the Son of the
living God. Now you've heard who Christ is.
You've heard it this morning. You've heard it in all the other
times you've been here. You've heard who Christ is. Now
who do you say that he is? You know he's preached from this
pulpit. You know what this pastor believes.
You know what the majority of this congregation believes. But
who do you say that he is? You've heard him. You've heard
who he is. Now trust him. Trust him. I pray God will give
us the grace and the faith to do it. All right. Lord bless
you.