Matthew 16:13-17:8 – Rocks, Confession, a Cross, and Transfigured Bread

These next few verses in Matthew’s Gospel, if taken in isolation, can seem oddly placed and have even produced some radical interpretations. Matthew writes, along with Mark and Luke, this interchange,

13 Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” 14 And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” 15 He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” 17 And Jesus answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.

Matthew 16:13-17

Jesus seems to be polling his disciples about what they and the surrounding community think of him. When Peter gives the right answer, Jesus blesses him and tells him he didn’t arrive at this conclusion on his own; the Father gave him eyes to see. But these are not the aforementioned controversial verses. Following this interchange, we have the following verse that is only found in Matthew’s Gospel. Mathew writes,

18 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.

Matthew 16:18

I’ve heard many sermons discussing this passage: some suggest Jesus is claiming to build his church on Peter, as “Peter” means “a piece of rock”; some suggest the wordplay between petros (Peter, a piece of rock) and petra (large rock) means that Jesus is saying that while Peter is a little rock, Jesus is “The rock” upon which the Church will be built; some even suggest “the rock” is Peter’s confession. But which is it? Interestingly enough, in all the sermons I’ve heard on this passage, I can’t recall any that place this passage in its context of the surrounding verses to help clarify its meaning.

At first glance, these verses may seem unrelated to the prior verses wherein Jesus told his disciples to “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees.” But, if we remember that the Pharisees and Sadducees were the keepers of the law and religious traditions, the religious police for the Jews, and the ones who told everyone what it meant to be a Jew and what they had to do to be right with God, then these verses might not seem so out of place. Jesus appears to be telling his disciples that the cornerstone of his church is the essential ingredient of the Father’s properly leavened bread, something the Pharisees and Sadducees were unwilling to accept: Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

Interestingly enough, the Greek word for church, ekklesia, is only used three times in all four of the Gospels, and all of them are in Matthew (Matt. 16:18 and Matt. 18:17). Ekklesia, you might be curious to know, basically means “a gathering of citizens called out from their homes into some public place, an assembly.” It doesn’t directly refer to a building or a set of doctrines embodied by and held by a hierarchy of people; it just means “a gathering of like-minded people together.” Thus, when Jesus first uses ekklesia in Matthew 16:18, he is saying that his ekklesia — his church — will be built upon our confession that Jesus “is the Christ, the son of the living God.” This confession is not only the cornerstone of his church, but it is also the daily bread revealed to us by the Father that we are to proclaim to the world, and the birthmark of our new family, and. About this new family, Jesus says,

19 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.” 20 Then he strictly charged the disciples to tell no one that he was the Christ.

Matthew 16:19-20

And now we have gotten to the somewhat controversial verses. But, I would suggest that the controversy might be easily resolved if we take a look at the second and third occurrences of the term ekklesia in Matthew’s Gospel. In Matthew 18 we read,

15 “If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. 16 But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established by the evidence of two or three witnesses. 17 If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector. 18 Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 19 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. 20 For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.”

Matthew 16:15-20

When Jesus told Peter in Matthew 16:19 that anything he bound on earth would be bound in heaven and anything loosed on earth would be loosed in heaven, he didn’t really explain what he meant. But when Jesus repeats that phrase in Matthew 18, we find that Jesus seems to be indicating that he has been talking about the power of forgiveness (Matt. 18:15-20). Furthermore, if we look back to that difficult passage in the Lord’s Prayer — “Forgive us our debts as we have also forgiven our debtors” (Matt. 6:12) — and then the passage immediately following the Lord’s Prayer — “if you do not forgive others their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses” (Matt. 6:14-15) we see that God has placed a special emphasis on the role we play in our forgiveness: if we are unwilling to forgive others, then the Father will be unwilling to forgive us. But this statement is not solely directed toward individual believers, it is a power given to the church — the gathering of those who confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God. But this power to forgive, as a church, only comes when we, as individuals are first able to forgive others on a personal level. I might go so far as to say that this is essentially what it means to be a member of the Father’s family on earth: we must, unless the other person is unrepentant (Matt. 18:15-20), forgive others. Looking back at the Lord’s Prayer, I don’t think it is coincidental that the petition following our request for the Father’s daily bread is a request for the Father’s forgiveness as we have forgiven others. Those nourished by the Father’s daily bread must be able to confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and they must be able to offer forgiveness in the same way they have been forgiven.

These two — the confession of Jesus and offering the Father’s forgiveness — are essential elements of Jesus’s church, but they are also something else: they are what properly leavened bread contains. When Jesus told the disciples to beware of the leaven of the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees, he didn’t end his lesson there and begin a new topic in the next verses. Jesus explained the missing ingredients of the Pharisees’ and Sadducees’ leaven: confession and forgiveness. But then, in the next verses, Matthew shows us that the Pharisees and Sadducees are not the only ones who add their own leavening to the Father’s bread. Matthew writes,

21 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 on the third day be raised. 22 And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, “Far be it from you, Lord! This shall never happen to you.” 23 But he turned and said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God, but on the things of man.”

Matthew 16:21-23

Jesus knew that before the bread of Heaven was ready for consumption, it must first be cooked in the fires of persecution. Jesus came to earth, not just to be a good moral teacher but to be the one who conquered sin and death for all who believe. But, to do this, Jesus had to be lifted up on the cross and then buried in the ground. But Peter didn’t understand this and, as such, wanted Jesus to follow the path he had in mind, not the path Jesus had in mind.

I’ve often read the Bible and thought, “If only it said…” There are many things for which I would like the Bible to grant me freedom, but it doesn’t. There are things I’ve wished God would do differently, but he hasn’t. And, if I were God, the world would be different, but it isn’t (thankfully). My plans for this world, unless they match the Father’s plans for this world, are nothing more than words from the Devil. Take, for instance, the first temptation as stated in Genesis 3:1: it began with a simple question, “Did God actually say…?” I don’t think it an overstatement to say that every sin since the Garden has been rooted in that very question. We don’t want God’s words to actually say what they do, so we question them and we do what Eve and Adam did: we make ourselves like God, determining good and evil as we see fit. We make our own plans; we determine our own destiny; we tell God how he is supposed to operate. Yet, even as we do this, we judge the Pharisees and Sadducees for doing the very same things. The leaven of the Pharisees and Sadducees was evil — they added to and subtracted from the word of God. But Peter’s rebuke of Jesus was also evil: he wanted to restrict Jesus from the path set before him. When Jesus told Peter to “Get behind me Satan!” he was fully justified, just as he is also justified when he rebukes us when we elevate our plans and deny his.

Just as Jesus, the daily bread of the Father, came to do the Father’s will on earth, we, as followers of Jesus, must also submit our own will to the Father. This should mean, at the very least, that we do not eat the bread leavened with the teaching of the Pharisees and Sadducees, but it also means that we do not add our own leaven to the simple message of the gospel: Jesus is the bread of heaven come down to feed us, and unless we take that bread as it has been offered, then we can not be part of the Father’s family.

Jesus explains this further in the next verses. Matthew writes,

24 Then Jesus told his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. 25 For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it. 26 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?

Matthew 16:24-26

Following Jesus must be done completely and without reservation. “Taking up our cross” has little or nothing to do with bearing the pain of a broken toe, a goiter, or some other physical ailment. Neither does it have anything to do with enduring the consequences of our own stupidity, sinfulness, or some sort of heartbreak. Taking up our cross is the voluntary submission of our will to the will of the Father. In other words, we can hold onto our own expectations and our own definitions of good and evil or we can give up our “rights” to determine our own destiny and live as the Father would have us live, but we can’t do both. You see, when Peter said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” he was also saying that whatever Jesus would have him to do, he would do. Ironically, it only took Peter a few verses before he chose to impose his own will upon the work of Jesus, and for that, he was rebuked.

However, before we judge Peter too harshly, we must realize that we often do the same thing. We confess Jesus but in our next breath, we chose to tell Jesus how he is supposed to behave; we tell Jesus how we want the world to be. Just like Peter, when we place our will above the Father’s will, we are “seeking to save our own lives.” We want what we want and want it to last forever. Had Peter continued pressing his will upon Jesus, Peter would have lost his life and soul just as did his fellow disciple, Judas. The case is no different for us. We must submit to the cross of Christ and accept the bread of heaven just as it is sent by the Father, and we must do this without adding any leavening of our own. This is not a request or a suggestion; this is the truth, it is reality, and there are consequences to be had whenever we set our will against the Father’s reality. Jesus continued and said,

27 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.

Matthew 16:27

When Jesus returns he will reward those who take up their cross daily and will punish those who do not (also read Psa. 149; Matt. 7:15-23; and Rev. 19:11-15). Notice how Jesus worded this warning; he said, “according to what he has done.” Jesus does not beat the tar out of people because he doesn’t like them; Jesus repays people according to what they have done. Now, before you get your works-salvation panties in a bunch, Jesus is not talking about good deeds or bad deeds. Jesus is talking about whether or not a person chooses to submit to the Father and confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God. This entire collection of these verses is part of one conversation — Peter’s confession, the family of the church, Peter rebuking Jesus, Jesus rebuking Peter, taking up our cross — it is all about whether we accept the properly leavened bread from the Father or whether we choose improperly leavened bread from the false prophets on earth. But, instead of spending any time on those who don’t confess Jesus, as many of us would like to do, Jesus focuses on those who do confess him, and for them, he offers a small glimpse of the glory that awaits. He said,

28 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.” Matthew 17:1 And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James, and John his brother, and led them up a high mountain by themselves. 2 And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became white as light. 3 And behold, there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. 4 And Peter said to Jesus, “Lord, it is good that we are here. If you wish, I will make three tents here, one for you and one for Moses and one for Elijah.” 5 He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.” 6 When the disciples heard this, they fell on their faces and were terrified. 7 But Jesus came and touched them, saying, “Rise, and have no fear.” 8 And when they lifted up their eyes, they saw no one but Jesus only.

Matthew 16:28-17:8

We often put a break between Matthew 16:28 and Matthew 17:1, but I think reading them together makes much more sense. Jesus promised that some would see the Son of Man coming into his kingdom, and many did see the resurrected Jesus. But, before that glorious day, Jesus, along with Moses and Elijah, appeared on the mountain to Peter, James, and John, granting them a brief look at the glory to be given to him by the Father. Furthermore, in one of the few times the Father speaks in the New Testament, we are given an unequivocal message that Jesus is the Father’s beloved son and Jesus’s words are worth listening to. The creator and ruler of the universe allowed Peter, James, and John, for just a moment, to see the glory of the coming king, Jesus — foreshadowed by the Law, predicted by the Prophets, and cloaked with the Father’s glory, — the bread of heaven given to us from the Father for our daily sustenance.

Peter’s seemingly simple confession about Jesus being the Christ, the Son of the living God, is the bread that feeds the Father’s church and gives us the strength to forgive others just as the Father forgives us. It is pure bread, unleavened by earthly wisdom, baked in the fires of persecution, and shining with glory the likes of which the earth has only seen once by three men on a mountain some two thousand years ago. This finished loaf of heavenly bread feeds all who confess that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

• Click HERE to go to the page containing all the posts for this study on The Lord’s Prayer and Matthew’s Gospel