Matthew 16:13-20
“Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of these your faithful, and kindle within us the fire of your love. May our words and our hearts together glorify you, O God, our Rock and our Redeemer. Amen.”
“Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”There is always a lot of scuttlebutt on the streets about who Jesus is. Everyone has an opinion: denominational leaders, the religion columnists in the New York Times, the twenty-something internet blogger, the guy who bags your groceries at Stop and Shop. Baptists, Catholics, United Methodists, Presbyterians; pundits on Fox News and MSNBC; Republican and Democratic candidates for President all have some opinion about who Jesus is, and the differences in those perspectives are often pretty easy to spot. I often wonder how much these opinions on Jesus are, rather than an honest and open discussion, simply a way of furthering an agenda. However, that’s another sermon.
“Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Thumb through the gospels, and you can’t help noticing that people say a lot of things about Jesus. He is the King of the Jews. He is Mary’s Son. He is the light of the world. He is a prophet without honor in his own country. Jesus is the one who can heal your child, cast out your demon, forgive your sins, lead your revolution. Jesus is the one you invite to dinner and then invite to leave the district. He is a messiah, a prophet, a rabbi, and a pain in the neck. He is alive, he is dead, he is risen, he will come again. People say Jesus is a lot of things.
And, of course, in today’s world, you can’t help noticing that people say a lot of things about Jesus, too—theologically, historically, sociologically, pastorally, colloquially, politically, biblically; you name it. They say it out loud and on street corners. They say across the kitchen table and on the internet. They say it in classrooms and in pulpits. In just about any context you can imagine, people say all kinds of things about Jesus, because nearly everybody has an opinion. You don’t have to be a follower of Jesus to understand that the man is big; he is as influential a figure as the planet is likely to ever see. So people say a lot of things about Jesus. They describe him, decry him, defend him, deconstruct him. They explain him, complain about him, and just plain old shoot-the-breeze about him. Jesus is easy to talk about in this world. Pick your context, pick your method, and go.
In today’s Gospel lesson, we have a very particular context for that lingering, pesky question, “who do people say that the Son of Man is?” It is interesting, and perhaps most oddly appropriate, that of all the places that Jesus and his disciples have journeyed through in the Galilean area, it is Caesarea Philippi that is the spot of Jesus’ question and Peter’s proclamation. You see, Peter could have proclaimed Jesus as the Messiah, the Christ, in many places. The choices were practically limitless. He could have done it in the Temple, on a mountaintop, or on a boat by the sea. But, no. Jesus had, inexplicably taken his disciples to Caesarea Philippi. Caesarea Philippi is at the far north of the land of Israel. It was originally named Paneas, after the Greek god Pan, the god of music. This far northern region was known as "the panion"--the region of Pan. In 198 BCE, the Seleucids (the Greeks of the middle east) defeated the Ptolemies (the Greeks of Egypt) at the Battle of Panian. This re-established Seleucid control over the region, which lasted until the Maccabean revolt about thirty years later. The Seleucids built a monument to Pan in the city. Rome, of course, later conquered the entire region. In 20 BCE, Caesar Augustus gave the town to Herod the (so-called) Great. Upon Herod's death in 4 BCE, his son, Phillip, "inherited" the city and renamed it after Caesar and himself. Still a center of Pan worship, it was believed that this god, was born in a nearby, creepy looking cave, called: the Gates of Hell. Since Pan was connected with fertility, it is believed that Pan worship was highly sexual in nature, and such orgiastic rituals are said to have involved goats. This was NOT the place you’d go to find decent, respectable company. This is a place where Jesus brought his disciples.
I think Jesus wanted them to experience this place. I think he wanted them to know what the world is really like. I think he wanted them to know that not everyone spent all day in the Temple arguing about the finer points of Jewish law. And, then again, I think Jesus’ motivation was about more than “experience.” He was looking for something from the disciples. After Peter correctly identifies Jesus as the Messiah, Jesus tells Peter that he is the “Rock” upon which his church will be built. AND, that “the Gates of Hell” won’t prevail against the church.
Jesus says that the Gates of Hell won’t prevail against the church built on the Rock. It’s an interesting image, those gates. Sure, there’s the cave looming over Jesus’ shoulder, the legendary birthplace of Pan, those “gates of hell,” and that obviously adds a layer of meaning here, but there might be more to what Jesus is saying. Gates are used in military strategy. But, gates aren’t offensive weapons. No one ever won a battle by breaking out a great gate and using it to attack the enemy. Gates are defensive in nature. So, when Jesus talks about his church struggling with the forces of evil, Jesus just assumes that his followers will be on the offensive. He assumes that those forces set against the kingdom of God will be counting on their gate, in defensive position. And when it does, that gate will not prevail.
In the pagan worship of that strange place, Peter is able to see the Light in the Darkness. It’s there that he’s able to see the Messiah, the one who came to give abundant life, to shine light in the darkness, to teach everyone that death never has the last word. And Peter finally sees him, in ways that he wasn’t able to see him at the Temple, or the mountaintop, or by the Sea of Galilee. It’s there, in that awkward place for a field trip, and far, far away from cleanness and rightness and proper religious expression – that Jesus, the Christ, is finally recognized and proclaimed. It is also in this place of stark contrast that the questions shifts, as it necessarily must, for both Jesus’ disciples and for us. It is no longer “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” but, “Who do YOU say that I am?”
That little word "YOU" can make all the difference in the world when asking a question or giving direction. It implicates a person. Insert that little word YOU-- "Who do YOU say that I am?"-- and you find out that the stakes get a little bit higher. Talking about Jesus as an idea is a far cry from trusting your life to Jesus. Listening to the minister give a sermon about who Jesus is is quite different from having the question posed to you. It's the difference between talking about love and telling someone that you actually love him or her. I'll take a kiss from my wife any day over her simply reading to me from a textbook about what love is.
Emily Dickinson once wrote a poem to a distant and unexpressive lover of hers. It began with this line: "To love me is one thing; to tell me you love me is another." That's the kind of difference Jesus seems to be hinting at. Something in his question--"Who do you say that I am?"--was searching for a read on the disciples' love. How would the disciples respond to their teacher's unannounced question? Some of them probably tried the "statue option," standing very still and avoiding eye contact, hoping that Jesus would mistake them for Plaster of Paris and call on someone else. Others likely stuffed their panic inside, cupping their chin in their hand and looking down as if studious and reflective on the whole situation. Whatever happened, Peter was the first to speak up. And without any equivocation, he said: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God." Something in those words struck Jesus as completely genuine, full of love and personal passion. It wasn't anything like the textbook responses that the other disciples were thinking up. No, this was Peter through and through, heart and soul, all Peter. It felt to Jesus like Peter was saying directly to him, "I love you." And all Jesus could say in astonishing reply was, "Blessed are you."
The question is posed to us today as well, and they way we answer it makes all the difference in the world. You see, when you come to your own Caesarea Philippi, that place where darkness is overwhelming and goodness seems to have vanished, who Jesus is to you can either let the darkness keep on enveloping you, smothering everything in its wake, or it can cut it, dispelling the darkness with God’s inexhaustible light. When Jesus asks you"Who do YOU say that I am?" are you ready to answer him with your life, your money, your decisions, with everything that you are and all that you have? Are you ready to display your capacity to express love rather than just talk about love? Are you prepared not to play the statue trick or to fake an answer? Because whatever you say, and however you say it, you will not only be saying something powerful about Jesus, you will also be conveying to the world something that is deeply personal. You will be communicating what is really important to you, what you value, what makes you who you are, and how Jesus fits into all of that.
And this is why what Jesus says is so powerful! When we answer the question - Who do YOU say that I am? - with everything we have, with all that we are, those forces of darkness, those gates of hell, begin to shake a little. You see, I think this is the crux of the story. It’s not so much about about Peter, or this secret about Jesus being the Messiah; it’s all about how the question is answered. There is tremendous power in the answer, so much that the forces of darkness, those evils of injustice, oppression, inequality, don’t even stand a chance. For when we answer this question honestly, passionately, proclaiming our belief in the power of Jesus Christ, the forces of wickedness and evil will shake when we come near.
But our faith teaches us that it is not just enough to answer the question; we are also called to action, acts of justice and mercy that burst out of a place of gratitude for who Jesus is and what Jesus has done for us. When our sisters and brothers are starving in Africa, we are called to help provide. When our young sisters in south Asia and eastern Europe are kidnapped and sold into the sex slave industry, we are called to bring freedom and hope. When the forces of war put machine guns and machetes in the hands of our young brothers, we are called to bring peace. When our neighbors, our friends, our family members are enslaved to addiction and depression, we are called to bring hope and comfort. However grim the situations might appear, if we commit ourselves to the passionate pursuit of Jesus, we can be assured that even the gates of Hell won’t be able to stop us.
Because the Light always shines in the darkness. And the darkness does not overcome it.
It will not prevail.
Glory to God. Amen.
