| The Church: Her Builder |
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The Church: Her Builder
Matthew 16:13-18
Every week, we enter into this building for a variety of reasons stemming from worship to fellowship to adult and child Bible Study. And when asked by our friends or fellow workers what we are doing we respond with the phrase, “Going to Church.” Is that an accurate statement? I suppose on many levels it is. I can’t help but think, however, that in some way this isn’t entirely true. Isn’t the church more than a building or an event which we attend somewhat regularly? In other words, is the church a particular event or place or is it the people of God who congregate at a certain time and place for the worship of God and to fellowship in his name? Peter refers to the Church as a “holy priesthood, a royal nation, a people for his [God’s] own possession” (1 Peter 2:9). In line with other divinely inspired biblical authors, Peter conveys to us an understanding and definition of the church that extends beyond the walls of a particular building and has influence outside an organized event or group with global and eternal implications.
Therefore, over the next twelve weeks we will endeavor to complete a series of sermons designed to help us maintain a better grasp on the biblical understanding of the Church. In order to do this, we will begin with the Church’s Builder, the Lord Jesus Christ, and then work our way systematically along a path of biblical exposition which will leave us ultimately understanding our Church’s place within the grand scope of the Church universal.
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The Lord Jesus Christ builds his Church, not as a mason with clay and mortar, but with the illumination of the Holy Spirit in the hearts of the elect and upon the confession of the saints that “Jesus is Lord!”
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I. THE ILLUMINATION OF THE HOLY SPIRIT IN THE HEARTS OF THE ELECT (VS. 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 16:17
Notice, in response to Peter’s confession of the Lord’s identity as the Son of God, he states, with two clear phrases, two important truths about the life of faith: humanity couldn’t have known this truth on its own; therefore, the truth had to revealed to humanity by an external source, namely God the Father who is in Heaven. God reveals truth to those in whom he has chosen (the elect) to reveal his truth, which he does through the work of the Holy Spirit.
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Pre-Regenerate Man (Pre-Christian Man for our purposes) cannot see the light of God’s grace. He is blind to the light of God due to his devotion to flesh and the world.
“Life was in God from the beginning and that life was the light of men; this light shines in the darkness, but the darkness comprehends it not (John 1:4-5). He [John] shows that man’s soul is so illumined by the brightness of God’s light as never to be without some slight flame or at least a spark of it (Rom. 1); but that even with this illumination it does not comprehend God. Why is this? Because man’s keenness of mind is mere blindness as far as the knowledge of God is concerned. For when the Spirit calls men ‘darkness’ he at once denies them of any ability of spiritual understanding.” (John Calvin, ICR, 2.2.19)
1 Corinthians 2:14 -- The natural person does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are folly to him, and he is not able to understand them because they are spiritually discerned.
i. Paul, here in 1 Cor. 2, discusses the inability of the natural man to accept the things that are proclaimed by the Spirit of God which especially deal with the fact of Christ crucified and the wisdom of the Spirit in which he came to preach to them. When discussing this wisdom, in fact, he refers to it as an eternal, secret and hidden wisdom which none of the rulers of this age have understood. If they had they would not have crucified the Lord of Glory, Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 2:7-8). The reason Paul goes on to give for their rejection of this wisdom is their status as natural man. In other words, their humanity in its sinfulness was unable to grasp the wisdom of God.
ii. In the same vain, Paul records in elsewhere in Romans 8:7-8, “For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; indeed, it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.”
iii. And, in another of his letters, he declares, “And you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience” (Eph. 2:1-2).
iv. But, perhaps the most telling reference to pre-regenerate man’s inability to see the glorious things and wisdom of God is given by our Lord Jesus Christ himself. He, when discussing this topic with the Jewish teacher Nicodemus, unabashedly declares, “"Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born again[a] he cannot see the kingdom of God." "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.” (John 3:3,5)
2. Man in his natural state of humanity as a result of sin, then, needs to be enlightened to the Gospel Grace and the things of God (See above quote of Calvin). He who performs such an illuminating work is the Holy Spirit.
“The Spirit’s work of radical renewal firstly implies intellectual illumination: the Kingdom of God, which before stood unrecognized, now becomes clearly visible” (Sinclair B. Ferguson, Contours of Christian Theology: The Holy Spirit, 121).
i. The Bible explains this in several ways, most clearly though, in the words of John as he describes it in terms of an “anointing” that comes directly from the Holy One (1 John 2:20). The ‘anointed’ ones no longer need any assistance from others to teach them any truths of the faith. For He teaches them everything (1 John 2:27). The truth of this teaching is affirmed in that it comes from God himself, the Holy Spirit, who has the responsibility and task of teaching all things as he is sent from the Father through Christ (John 14:26).
ii. Of course this is the heart of the promise of the New Covenant as it is realized and found in Christ. “But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord: I will put my law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be my people. And no longer shall each teach his neighbor and each his bother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the Lord” (Jer. 31:33-34)
iii. Thus, man is illumined by the work of Holy Spirit in order that man may see and experience the Kingdom of God in Christ. Without this illumination, he will not see the light of the Kingdom (John 1:4-5).
II. THE CONFESSION OF THE SAINTS THAT JESUS CHRIST IS LORD (VS. 16)
Jesus, while walking with his disciples, turned and asked them, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” Their varied response included John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, and one of the any other prophets. Unsatisfied by their response, he pursued the question further by asking them, “But who do you say that I am?” (vs. 13-15)
A. The Question
1. Jesus asks the small band of disciples an intensely personal question. Notice the emphasis placed on the personal pronoun. The object of the question is clearly conveyed, the disciples. What does this indicate to us?
i. It signifies the personal implications of salvation; it is a personal matter. Though one may be surrounded by an immense number of opinions on the identity of Christ, the opinion that matters for a relationship with Christ is the individual personal thoughts of the one to whom the question is posed.
ii. Isn’t this the heart of Peter’s message to those gathered on the day of Pentecost as he cries out to them, “Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins, and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit…Save yourselves from this crooked generation?” Those who received his word were baptized, and three-thousand joined them that day (Acts 2:38-41).
1. Parents, grandparents, friends and other family members can’t make the decision for each other. It is theirs to make.
B. The Response (The Rock)
1. “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.”
i. This is the Rock upon which the Church is built. The Lord doesn’t intend to build his church upon Peter as a man, but rather on Peter because of his confession of Christ. Peter is not the first of a long line of leaders to whom the Church pays homage. Rather it is in being like Peter in the confession and affirmation of Jesus as the Son of God, the anointed Messiah that the Church finds its origin and continuation.
ii. The Church consists of believers who confess that Jesus Christ is Lord. “That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). The community of the Redeemed cries out in unison, “Jesus is Lord!”
Who Do You Say That I Am?