Saying is Believing (Matthew 16:13-20)

      Historically, this has been one of the most contested passages in the Bible, and the reason isn’t hard to find: it’s because of this one verse: “And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”  The controversy is over how Roman Catholics interpret this verse as opposed to Protestants.  Catholics see this as the basis for Apostolic succession—the doctrine that the authority of Christ is passed down through the Apostles, of whom Peter was the first.  Because they trace their Popes back—virtually at least—to Peter, they hold that they are the one, true Church.  Protestants, understandably, don’t buy this, and they argue that the church was founded on Peter’s confession, not his person, and anyway, they say, you can’t trace the Popes back that far, either literally or virtually.

And being Protestant, you can guess where I come down on this, and I imagine most of you hold the same opinion, or why else would you be here?  Why would anyone associate themselves with a church you consider not to be a valid part of the body of Christ?  It would seem to me to be a waste of time, resources and spirituality.  But there’s more to this passage than a church-authority controversy, so let’s forge ahead.

The Gospels can be read as explorations of the identity of Jesus, as attempts to come to grips with just who he is, and if that’s true, then at first glance this passage would seem to be at the center of that effort: after all, the verb “to be” appears six times in these scant eight verses.  But on closer inspection, it’s not so much about who Jesus is as who people say that he is.  After all, that is what he asks his disciples, “who do people say the Son of Man is?”  And he uses a theological title for himself, the meaning of which is still controversial, but he may be referring to his role as the final judge, whose coming is described in Daniel as “one like the Son of Man.”

At any rate, the disciples answer with what they’ve heard out and about, in the countryside: “Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”  And notice that people have placed him in old categories, in categories they are familiar with. They’ve assumed he’s something they have seen before, and who can really blame them?  After all, how can a person describe something totally new?  People have to have a referent, something to compare something to, otherwise how can they describe it?  It’s like science fiction movies: why are all aliens kinda like human beings, with appendages and heads and the like?  Or at least, like something else in nature?  Because writers and special-effects people have the same problem: it’s impossible to describe something totally new, totally unlike anything you’ve ever seen before.  Heck, even the Blob looked like a big, hungry slime mold.

But maybe there’s something else at work here as well . . . last week we talked about Jesus’ teaching that it’s what comes out of the mouth that defiles, it's what people say . . . and here Jesus asks who people say that he is.  Are the two connected somehow?  Is this another example of defiling speech?

Well.  After the disciples answer his first question, he asks them another: “But who do you say that I am?”  And though he asks the disciples as a group—using the Greek plural “you”—it is Simon who answers, as often is the case: “You are the Messiah, Son of the living God.”  And I get the feeling that he kinda blurted it out, without thinking, impulsive, as he is often portrayed in the Gospels.  And that’s when it all happens: “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah,” Jesus says, “For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father in heaven.”  And notice that this is not a commendation, he’s not saying “good man, Peter, you got it right”.  Neither is Jesus blessing him: he’s (1) telling Peter he is blessed and (2) telling him what the blessing is.  You are blessed, Simon son of Jonah, for, and this is the same as saying “because,” because God has revealed that to you, not anyone human.  Peter is blessed, all right, and the blessing is having Jesus’ true nature given to him by God.

Now.  Following up on our earlier observation about defiling speech, remember that Jesus said that what comes from the mouth defiles because it comes from the heart, but what comes out of Peter is not from his heart, is it?  It’s not from his own consciousness, his own intellect, his own mind.  It’s from God, so it can’t be speech that defiles, can it?  And thinking back, maybe what came out off the Canaanite woman’s mouth was from God as well.  That would explain the apparent contradiction in last week’s lesson . . . If human speech, speech that comes from the heart defiles, no exception, then could what came out of the Canaanite woman’s mouth, like that which came out of Peter’s, be from God as well?

Well.  There’s a technical word for what happened to Peter, and that’s revelation.  Revelation.  God has revealed to Simon Peter just who Jesus is . . . And it certainly isn’t for any visible reason, it certainly isn’t because he is a tower of faith nor anything.  In fact, as portrayed in the Gospels, he’s the one who messes up the most.  But there’s another spin to be put on it as well . . . many scholars think Peter is used as an example by the Gospel writers, that he is supposed to represent the disciples as a group, to represent the average disciple.  If that’s the case, then the revelation is given to the disciples as a group, and the church is founded on the the Apostles as a group.  It’s worth noting that that’s apparently what Paul believed, that his status as Apostle, as the recipient of a revelation directly from God, authorized him to found churches.  In fact, he believed that Peter’s mission was to the Jews and his was to the Gentiles, and he acted on that belief by planting churches all across the Middle East.

And here’s the thing: if you take that view, then the church is not founded upon the person of Peter—whom Jesus calls Satan just a few verses after this--but neither is it founded on his testimony, as some have claimed.  And if you look at the witness of the entire New Testament, a good case can be made that the church is founded not on one person, but on a revelation from God.

But Pastor, you might ask, isn’t the church founded on Jesus the Christ?  After all, that’s what the hymn says, isn’t it?  “The church’s one foundation is Jesus Christ her Lord?”  Well  . . . yes.  And what is Christ himself but a revelation from God, a revelation of what God is really like, what God’s concerns really are, what God wants us to do?  John doesn’t call him “the Word of God” for nothing . . .

And so the church, the ekklesia, in Greek, is established based upon a revelation from God, an intrusion of God in the world, an intervention, if you will.  And the church—in the person of the apostles, represented here by Peter—is given the keys to the kingdom, which the Roman Catholic Church has interpreted literally, as in you can only get to heaven through them, but it’s pretty clear that what Jesus is referring to is being able to decide what is bound and what is loosed.  And “binding and loosing” is rabbinical language which refers to doctrinal and disciplinary authority.  In other words, the apostles—with Peter as their chief representative—and the church they form are given the responsibility to decide what should become doctrine and what shouldn’t.

In other other words, the church is given the authority to interpret the will of God’s to the world.  And in Matthew’s Gospel, the manner in which Jesus pronounces what is “binding” and what is “loosed” becomes a model for how the church is to practice its task.  We saw it last week: Jesus declared centuries of Jewish doctrine, doctrine based on revelation from God, null and void when he said “. . . it is not what goes into the mouth that defiles a person, but it is what comes out of the mouth that defiles."  Mark wasn’t just whistling Dixie when he said “thus he declared all foods clean.”  As Biblical scholar Mitchell G. Reddish writes “Scripture is not static; it must be reapplied to new situations. Just as Jesus applies the teachings of the Torah in fresh and creative ways, the church must be emboldened to interpret the teachings of Jesus in new and inspired ways, attempting both to be faithful to the teachings of Jesus . . . and to be open to the voice of Jesus that speaks through the church to new situations and problems.”

And right about now, it would be useful to look at how our denomination, the Presbyterian Church (USA), exercises its authority to bind and loose.  It’s particular interpretation of Scriptures is contained in its constitution, which has two parts: the Book of Order and the Book of Confessions.  Both contain theology, both contain our interpretation of the revelation of God that is contained in Scripture.  In other words, both parts contain what we have bound as our guiding doctrine.  The Book of Confessions holds our basic theology, our doctrine, as expressed in, well . . . confessions, historical statements of belief.  There are eleven of them, ranging from the Nicene and Apostle’s Creeds, both from before 350 AD, to the Brief Statement of Faith from 1983.  The Book of Order contains our ecclesiology, our theology of doing church, which is based on New Testament principles and the theology contained in the Book of Confessions.

The thing is, our theology, as contained in our constitution, is changeable, it is adaptable: our motto is “reformed and always being reformed according to the Word of God.”  Like Jesus, who set about overhauling the theology of his day, our charge—and notice that it is a charge, an obligation—our charge is to preside over the binding and loosing in our day.  Notice I said “preside over:” it is not our task to reform ourselves.  The motto is “reformed and being reformed,” and note the passive construction: we are being reformed, and the one doing the reforming is God.  Our job is to discern, to figure out how God wants us to change. It is to make space, to enable, the binding and loosing dictated by God.

As Presbyterians, we have a process—naturally—honed over the past five centuries, for the orderly way of letting the Holy Spirit, the Scripture, and God’s revelation in the world guide the reforming of the way we do business.  A problem is that until very recently, there were no such methods for reforming individual congregations.  Because each congregation has its own “theology,” its own way of doing things, within the broad bounds of our denomination’s way.  I believe that each congregation is called to be reformed and always reforming, lest they become irrelevant to the world.  After all, the vocation of each congregation is the same as the church as a whole: to proclaim the Gospel in thought, word and deed.

So I invite you, sisters and brothers, to join in a season of prayerful discernment, prayerful thinking and asking God how we are being called to that vocation.  We’ve gotten a start in our Sunday school class of last Spring, and I ask you to help think about it, pray about it, and keep this question in your heart: “How are we to witness to and serve our world?”  Amen.