"Who do YOU say I am?"
This coming Sunday, I have the distinct honor of preaching on Sunday morning in my own church. I've preached before, but it was at a Community Lenten Service at the United Methodist Church, so I'm pretty psyched about this coming Sunday.
I've spent the past two days working on my sermon and the passage of scripture I've been looking at is Matthew 16:13-20 and I keep putting myself there. Here was Jesus... the Son of God, the Messiah, and everyone was saying He was someone else. They weren't even giving him the benefit of just being Jesus of Nazareth! Nope, He had to of been John the Baptist or Elijah, Jeremiah... or someone!
So Jesus pulls his disciples away from the crowds so that He has them alone and asks them THE question. That question? "Who do you say I am?" Forget what other people are saying... who do you say I am?
I sort of imagine a hush falling over the disciples at this point, but enter Peter who steps up to the plate and says "You are the Christ (the Messiah, our rescuer)." At that point Jesus must be thinking "He's got it now!" The very answer to that question changes the entire rest of Peter's life (which Jesus explains to him).
Back then, words like Christ and Messiah meant something to them. Were it not for the rise of Christianity, most Americans (were there to be an America as we know it) would have no knowledge of the words Christ or Messiah. Today they do, but they're essentially hollow words like Prime Minister, Czar, etc. They know what the words mean, but they have no real impact on their lives.
So today in this age we once again find Jesus asking us that very simple question again... "Who do you say I am?"
I've spent the past two days working on my sermon and the passage of scripture I've been looking at is Matthew 16:13-20 and I keep putting myself there. Here was Jesus... the Son of God, the Messiah, and everyone was saying He was someone else. They weren't even giving him the benefit of just being Jesus of Nazareth! Nope, He had to of been John the Baptist or Elijah, Jeremiah... or someone!
So Jesus pulls his disciples away from the crowds so that He has them alone and asks them THE question. That question? "Who do you say I am?" Forget what other people are saying... who do you say I am?
I sort of imagine a hush falling over the disciples at this point, but enter Peter who steps up to the plate and says "You are the Christ (the Messiah, our rescuer)." At that point Jesus must be thinking "He's got it now!" The very answer to that question changes the entire rest of Peter's life (which Jesus explains to him).
Back then, words like Christ and Messiah meant something to them. Were it not for the rise of Christianity, most Americans (were there to be an America as we know it) would have no knowledge of the words Christ or Messiah. Today they do, but they're essentially hollow words like Prime Minister, Czar, etc. They know what the words mean, but they have no real impact on their lives.
So today in this age we once again find Jesus asking us that very simple question again... "Who do you say I am?"