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Jesus asked them, Who do you say that I am? Peter answered him, You are the Christ. You may be seated. In the name of Jesus, amen.
Dear saints, today we rejoice in hearing this confession of St. Peter, where he teaches us to know the second and of two things that every person must know. So I think we’ll review both of them today. There are two things and only two things, not less than two, not more than two, that are required of us to know not only in life but also in death as we stand before the Lord Jesus.
Now some of you might be like in seventh grade and think, Mom, I can quit going to school now if I learn these two things. There’s lots of things that are helpful to know, but there are two things that are necessary.
The first thing that is necessary for us to know is that we are sinners. Now Peter knew this already. He knew this growing up in Capernaum. He knew it going to the synagogue and learning the Ten Commandments. You shall have no other gods. You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God. You shall not murder. You shall not commit adultery. You shall not steal. Peter learned these and confessed these commandments and knew them.
And no doubt Peter also knew that he was guilty of breaking these commandments. There growing up in Capernaum, I mean, we know about Peter later on in life. We don’t know how his childhood went, but we can imagine it. I mean, he was kind of rambunctious even as an old man. No doubt he got in trouble as a kid. And his mom and dad had to send him to sit in the corner for throwing rocks at fish or whatever kids did to get in trouble in Capernaum.
But then he’s grown now into a man who’s married, who has his mother-in-law even living with them, who’s working for Zebedee, who’s seemingly going up the ranks there in that business running on the Sea of Galilee. And also this, that his brother Andrew was a disciple of John the Baptist, that fierce preacher of the law, who was there at the Jordan River telling everyone to repent of their sins and turn away from their evil ways.
And no doubt Andrew and Peter would have had those conversations sitting around the table about the law of God and how it shows us our sins. So that Peter knew he was a sinner. But in fact, it kind of amplifies when Peter becomes a disciple of Jesus. He follows him after Andrew comes and says, we’ve found the Messiah.
Peter is there with Jesus at the wedding at Cana when he turns water into wine. He’s there when he goes into Jerusalem and overthrows the tables in the temple. He’s there when Jesus comes and finds him fishing to call him into permanent ministry. And remember how it was.
It’s… It’s from Peter’s boat that Jesus is teaching the crowds. And then when the teaching is finished, he turns to Peter and says, throw the net in over there. And he says, we’ve fished all night, Lord. We didn’t catch anything, but at your word. And he throws in the net and they bring in this huge catch of fish. And then Peter falls on his face and he says, depart from me, Lord. I am a sinner.
I am a sinner. We must learn this also. It’s hard. It’s hard to learn of our sins because we naturally have a skew assessment of our own goodness. When you just in general talk to people about this and you say, well, are you a good person? And everyone seems to be better than average.
Yeah. I remember, I think I’ve told you this story, some years ago when I was a baby pastor, we went out and we were doing like street interviews and asking people if they’re going to go up to heaven. And even the people who didn’t believe in heaven thought that they were going to go there. After all, I’m good. I try hard. And although nobody’s perfect, I do pretty good.
Now, this doesn’t mean that we don’t have a troubled conscience. I think everybody who has a functioning conscience has a troubled conscience. Everybody says nobody’s perfect. But then we justify that almost right away. We know that we’re not perfect, but how can you be? To err is human. Everybody makes mistakes.
So there’s a way that we recognize that we’re not perfect and we’re not holy, but so is everybody else. And so we sort of figure that God grades on a curve. But we have to think about this a little bit. Because the standard that God uses to judge is not everybody else. Like he’s just going to take the best 25% of people to heaven and the rest are out of luck.
The standard that God uses to judge on the last day is his own divine law, his righteousness, his holiness, his perfection, which means that all of us are lost, all have sinned, and fall short of the glory of God. Now, it is the work of the Holy Spirit to teach this to us, to move us from, here’s how I like to think about it, move us from having a troubled conscience to having a terrified conscience.
A troubled conscience knows that not everything is perfect. A troubled conscience has some regrets. A troubled conscience knows that you haven’t done everything that you should have and you’ve done a few things that you shouldn’t have. But a terrified conscience knows that all of those things are sins.
All of those things are a violation of God’s holy law. All of those things disqualify us to stand before the Lord in His holiness and His perfection. A terrified conscience is what King David has. Remember in Psalm 51, after he sinned against everybody? The whole country and Bathsheba and her husband Uriah and Joash and all of the army and everybody, he says in this confession, against you and you only have I sinned, O Lord, and done what’s wicked in your sight.
In other words… A terrified conscience realizes that God is a righteous and holy judge. And if He gives us what we deserve, if He gives us what we’ve earned, He would give us hell itself and condemnation. So the first thing we have to know is not just that we’ve done wrong, but that because of what we’ve done wrong, we deserve God’s wrath and eternal punishment.
It’s why when Peter says, and he realizes, I’m a sinner, he says, depart from me, Lord. Because in our sin, the presence of God is, in fact, dangerous to us. It’s what Adam and Eve are confessing with their feet when they’re running and with their breath as they hold it, hiding from God in the garden, hoping God doesn’t find them, knowing that they’ve wrecked everything and they’ve deserved his temporal and his eternal punishment.
We’re sinners. This is the first work of the Holy Spirit. to convict the world of sin, to convict us of sin. And we have to know this. But the reason why we have to know this first most important thing is so that we can understand and know the second most important thing, that Christ Jesus is the Savior of sinners. That means you are saved by Jesus.
And that brings us to the text of the Confession of St. Peter. Now, the background is that Jesus has taken his disciples way up north in the region of Caesarea Philippi. So it’s up above Galilee, way up in the kind of foothills of Mount Hermon in northern Israel. And they’re there by themselves.
And as they’re going along in the wilderness, Jesus asked the disciples, Who do people say that I am? And they give the responses of the crown, which is interesting for us to think about. He says, well, some people think that you’re John the Baptist, risen from the dead. Some people think that you’re Elijah the prophet that Malachi promised was going to come before the great and terrible day of the Lord, Malachi 4.
Some say Jeremiah, that’s in the book of Matthew. Some say that you’re the prophet. That’s the prophet promised in Deuteronomy 18 from Moses. Raise up a prophet like you from among the people. So they give this list of all the people that they think it is, but then Jesus looks at the disciples and say, okay, set that aside. Who do you say that I am?
And now Peter steps up to answer for all of the apostles, and he gives this most wonderful confession. You are the Christ, the Messiah, the anointed one. The one that we’ve been waiting for, the one that we’ve been longing for, the one that we’ve been hoping for, the one that the prophets talked about, the one that Moses was looking forward to, the one that God promised to Adam and Eve in the garden.
You’re the one who’s coming to rescue and deliver us. You are the Christ, the son of the living God. In the Gospel of Matthew, we hear Jesus’ reaction to this confession. He says to Peter, blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for flesh and blood hasn’t revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven…
And from this point on, you’re Peter, and on this rock, I’ll build my church. In other words, while the knowledge of our sin, this first thing that we have to know, comes through nature and the law, the Lord has established the church so that he can make known to us this second most important thing, that we have a Savior, Christ.
Now, there’s a little work that Jesus is going to have to do with the idea of the Christ. And this is especially for the disciples who still have this kind of lingering idea that the Christ is going to be a political figure, that he’s going to sit on the throne of David, that he’s going to rule with armies and he’s going to throw off the Romans and bring about an earthly kingdom.
He has to teach them that his kingdom is not of this world. That his kingdom is putting the name of God on all people, of all nations. That his kingdom is a kingdom of righteousness and peace, and that that kingdom is brought about through suffering and death. He does it like this.
He began to teach them that it was necessary for the Son of Man to suffer many things, to be rejected by the Pharisees and scribes, and Sadducees, and to be killed. And then on the third day to rise again. Now, an amazing thing happens in the text.
I mean, it’s amazing for us to think about Peter here, who knew so profoundly his own sin, but was rebuked so many times. In fact, I think we’ve talked about this. Peter’s on the windows in here, and he’s represented in two distinctly different ways. Like the window up here has the keys. That’s the representation of Peter who has the office of the keys.
But Peter is back there on the pulpit side, on the lower window, represented as a rooster. We remember that when he denies Jesus three times and the roosters crowing twice. And I wonder, I just wonder, if you were to ask Peter, hey, we’re going to put you in the windows, he’d say, well, don’t do that. But you’d say, well, we’re going to do it anyways.
What do you want to be represented by keys or by a rooster? You want to be represented by the office of the preaching and the office of the keys, or you want to be represented by this confession of your own denial of Jesus? I think Peter, I don’t know, I think Peter would pick the rooster because he knew he was a sinner in desperate need of Christ’s saving work.
And we see it in this text. Peter takes Jesus aside, astonishing. He takes Jesus aside and he begins to rebuke him and say, far be it from you, O Lord, you can’t suffer, you can’t die, you’re supposed to be the Messiah, the one in charge, the king, you can’t do all of these things.
And Peter goes back to the other disciples. He’s going to rebuke Peter so that everyone can hear it and he says to him, get behind me, Satan, because your mind is not on the things of God, but on the things of man. So that Peter has to learn what it means that Jesus is the Christ. It doesn’t mean that he’s an earthly ruler or king.
It means that he’s the Savior who dies to forgive our sins. And in this way, Peter is taught to confess the second most important thing, maybe the second of two things that we have to know, but the most important thing that we have to know, that Jesus is the Christ, the Savior of sinners.
And we rejoice in this confession of Peter, not just because we get to see Peter confess and watch him make this confession of faith, but because we get to join him. Dear Saints, the Lord has called you to know these two things that are impossible to know on your own. They have to be taught by God, but he has called you to know these two things.
It’s the business of church. It’s the business of our confession. It’s the business of every sermon. It is our Christian business to know that we are sinners. First, and then to know Christ, the Savior of sinners. The one who shed his blood to wash away your sin. The one who suffered and died to save you from the wrath of God.
And to open the doors of heaven for you. So we rejoice in this. We know our sin. You know your sin, and I know mine. But more than this, we know our Savior. The Lord Jesus Christ, who took our place under the wrath of God to forgive us and to welcome us into life eternal.
To know these two things, by the way, is to repent and to rejoice in the saving work of Christ. So may God grant us the joy, not only in hearing of the confession of St. Peter, but joining him in his confession, that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.
And knowing this, to know the heart of God, to know eternal life, to know the love of Jesus, and to rejoice in it. May God grant it for Christ’s sake. Amen.
And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, guard your hearts and minds through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.