"But Who Do You Say That I Am" - Brother Tim Banna

That's the gospel of Matthew chapter 16 starting from verse 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? And they said, some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. He said to them, but who do you say that I am? Simon Peter replied, you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.

And Jesus Christ 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. The word of truth, breathed out for our instruction and delight. You may be seated. Who are you? What makes you you?

Given three adjectives, what would other people say? What words would people use to describe you? Would you want to know? Why are you here today? What brought you here today?

Or who perhaps brought you here this morning to this house church in Des Plaines, Illinois on this Father's Day? You could be countless other places doing countless other things. And yet here you are listening to me speak, listening to the preaching of the word. Who am I? A beggar, miserable, sinner, a broken and a needy man who has been saved by a marvelous savior, a God who is holier than eyes can see, a God who is greater than minds can comprehend, and a God that is more gracious than hearts can fathom.

And I am here today with a burden on my heart and a question to ask you all. A question that has power unlike any other question. A question that has the power to radically change your identity. To restore your brokenness, to remove your destructive habits, to repress your wicked desires, indeed to rid you entirely from them. A question that has the power to redeem your past with all of its suffering, pain, failure, and loss.

What is this question? Who do you say Jesus is? During his ministry, Jesus asked many questions. Some have counted three zero seven, and yet this one, I think, is the most important of them all. And though he asked it to his disciples over two thousand years ago, it is absolutely relevant today.

If you went around the streets of Chicago and asked at random, Who is Jesus? Who do you say that Jesus Christ is? What would you hear? Good moral teacher, an ancient hippie, a failed apocalyptic prophet, a cool dude, as someone once told me. If you approached a Mormon, they might say, he is my Lord and my savior who died on the cross to atone for my sins.

But pressed further, they would add, and he is the spiritual offspring of God the father who is one God among many gods, and I long to become a God one day too. If you asked a Jehovah's Witness they would say, God's perfect son indeed the savior. But pressed further would add, oh, he he is not the almighty God, but he is the first and direct creation of Jehovah also known as Michael, the archangel. He approached a Muslim. They would be very quick to bestow much praise on Jesus.

They would say, oh, Esa. He is the son of Miriam. He is the the prophet of Allah, the miracle worker, virgin born who did many things, peace be upon him. But pressed further would add, oh, he is not divine nor did he die on the cross. Allah just made it appear so.

And so we have here countless different ideas of who this man is and yet the Bible says something very different to all of these. John one:one says, In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God. In verse 14, the author tells us who is this eternal word, who is the creator of all things, who is God, a very God. He is the word that became flesh, dwelt among us, whose glory we have seen. He is the Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

And so my prayer and my plea for you today is that you in this place would witness the true Christ because there are many impostors and there are many conceptions that are not true. Lord Jesus Christ, Redeemer, Savior, Lord, show us yourself. Show us who is the true Jesus, and make us come alive to the reality of who you are. May the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart, Lord, be acceptable in your sight. Amen.

We are reading from the gospel of Matthew, an account, a biography of the life of Jesus of Nazareth. Who is Matthew? Well, Matthew once was a tax collector, and yet upon encountering the true Christ who said, follow me, Matthew dropped everything that he was doing and followed this Jesus. His identity was radically changed. His purpose in life was revised.

His past, which was likely consumed with cheating people to get as much money as he could for himself, as tax collectors were notorious for doing, was redeemed as he now was blessing people and giving people himself and the message of life. The gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. Before verse 13 in chapter 16, Jesus is warning his disciples of the scribes, of the Pharisees, the Sadducees, two different sects of Judaism who commonly fell into the pitfall of championing tradition and man's interpretation over the heart of God's law, of what God was truly trying to convey for his people. Why? For their good, for their freedom, for their joy.

And yet these Jews were restricting people and they were putting things in the place of what God said, which happens very much today. And then we come to our text in verse 13, Now when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, Matthew, the author of this text, as we said, under the inspiration of God himself, saw it as necessary, as valuable to include this location in which Jesus and his disciples were now entering. Why? Well, let's quickly look at Caesarea Philippi. This is a city which today will be found in where is the Golan Heights region in the North Of Israel, North Of Galilee.

So Jesus and his disciples, as they would have been entering this district, would have beheld first a huge mountain, the Mount Hermon. And next, they might see a cave with streams of water gushing forth. And this cave was believed to be the source of the River Jordan and also the birthplace of the Greek god Pan, who was worshiped in this place. They might also behold a white marble temple that was constructed for whom? Caesar Augustus, the Roman emperor by Herod in order to honor his superior.

They would also see temples and perhaps remains of temples to Baal, the Canaanite God who was worshiped there for centuries. And so as you are probably gathering, this city was an important city for what reason? It was a worship center, a place of sacred tradition that was in the shadow of the ancient gods. And it was the perfect place for Jesus and his Jewish disciples to teach them peacefully. Verse 13 continues, when Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi, he asked.

Jesus, among many things, was a teacher and a good one at that. He was a rabbi. And as any good teacher and good learner for that matter, he asked good questions. Jesus, you could call the good questioner. Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother's eye, but do not notice the lock that is in your own eye?

What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, forfeits his soul? Do you love me? There is power in good questions, and Jesus knew the power of a good question to reveal the deepest truths of reality. The problem today is that more people are on a happiness quest than a truth quest, and they are more likely to sacrifice the second truth for the first, happiness. People are more than willing to lay down their own souls for what deep inside they know is true for a fleeting gratification and pleasure in this life.

As the great Christian mind CS Lewis said, if you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end, but if you look for comfort, you will find neither comfort nor truth, only flattery and wishful thinking at first, but in the end, despair. And so my my question, my question to you today, if you are not a Christian or you're an unbeliever, is are you seeking the truth or comfort? And are you willing to believe what is true? I don't have the time to establish the case that there is truth today as much of the culture wants to say. There is no truth or all truth is relative or there is truth, but who cares?

God cares, and so must we. And so I ask, if you knew the truth, would you believe it? And would you lay down whatever gain you had in this world in order to live for the truth? Believer, Christian, brother and sister, do you talk more than you ask In relationships, in family, in friendships, in relationships, are you more quick to say what you think than to hear what others have to say? Good questions can be a form of love.

Attention, as it has been said, is the rarest and purest form of generosity. And Proverbs eighteen two says, a fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his own opinion. Let us not be fools, but let us ask. Let us care. And a couple suggestions I have is we get so swept up, and I do this too, in just asking, how are you?

How are you doing? And unless we are truly earnest and and interested in hearing what that person has to say or how they're actually doing, oftentimes it doesn't go anywhere. And we don't get to know each other deeper as human beings with passions and desires and sufferings and temptations. And so simple questions. You know, what has made you smile today?

Or what has been the highlight of your day? What makes you tick? Let us love one another by asking questions. Back to verse 13, Jesus continues in asking his disciples. The first question of the two in this passage that we read, he says, who do people say that the son of man is?

And so I want us to first look at the alternatives to the true Christ in Jesus' day, then our day, and then make a crucial conclusion from that. In Jesus' day, we read several options were proposed. For one, John the Baptist, and he, of course, was the prophet known for eating locusts and wild honey, who proclaimed repentance and the kingdom of God which is at hand, who baptized many, including Jesus himself in the Jordan River. Then Elijah was proposed. Why Elijah?

He was also one of the greatest prophets of old who did not die but was raised in to heaven and was believed to come back again before the great day of the Lord. Prophesy in Malachi four five records that the Lord says, behold, I am sending Elijah before the great and awesome day of the Lord. And so these were two people that were messianic, and we'll unpack that a bit more in a bit, expectations of Jews in this day. Additionally, we read the third person, Jeremiah or one of the prophets. And this perhaps is because of the prophesy in Deuteronomy, the prophecy in Deuteronomy 18, which speaks of a prophet that is to come that will be like Moses who will speak the words of God.

And so these Jews who were expectant and ready, maybe this is John the Baptist. Or no. No. No. No.

This is it's Elijah. No. No. It's Jeremiah. So there was not a conclusion on this.

We read also in other places that some people thought Jesus was demon possessed. Others thought he was a glutton and a drunkard because he spent time with sinners. He loved sinners. He spent time with them. Even by his own family, he was considered out of his mind.

In our day, we've already talked about a few in the intro, what people say about Jesus. Time magazine did an interesting study. They recorded the most significant people of all of human history. They did a study. They I don't know exactly how they made these statistics happen.

They looked at their reputation, put all these things, computed it some mathematical fashion, and they got you as you can guess, at the top of the list, Jesus, followed by Napoleon, people like Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, and Adolf Hitler. Most popular perspective today is probably the good teacher perspective. The perspective that Jesus is just a moral man who gave us some good things to think about, good morals to live by. And why is this so popular? Well, it's because it is comfortable to us.

There's not much that we have to do for that Jesus. There's not much that that Jesus calls us to do, and yet that Jesus is the farthest from the true Jesus. It is impossible for him to be merely a good man. For what reason? Well, CS Lewis popularized.

He could be a liar. He could be a lunatic. He was lord. Some have added today, oh, that's not all the options. He could have been a legend.

He wasn't who he says he was. Maybe he's not a true historical figure or historical fiction. But there are fatal flaws to each of these. If you look at the life of Jesus, why would he lie? People lie, first of all, for gain, whether it's money or sex or power or to cover up something.

And Jesus, at the point of his death, he could have said, I'm not who I say. I'm not the son of God, and therefore, there's no there's no big deal. Don't kill me. And therefore, he would have been let free, but he went to his death. He died on a Roman cross for you and me because he was who he says he was.

Legend. Why can't he be a legend? Well, if you just read the gospels and compare them to other legendary texts, you will very clearly see there is very little to none legendary language which use exaggeration and heroic type language. And yet you look at the gospels, and you see Jesus described in very embarrassing ways. Some say he's a drunkard, a glutton.

The demanding sayings of Jesus, the embarrassing sayings, not only that, that make this utterly illogical, but for legend to develop, historians have said, requires at least two generations to pass before legend can come into a document or a writing. Why? Because if there are eyewitnesses to what is being spoken of, they can see and say, that's not true. That's not who he is. And yet with this word that we have, the gospels that we have, they were written by eyewitnesses or those who knew eyewitnesses.

And so therefore, it cannot be. It is improbable at best. And lunatic, read the Jesus of the word and tell me how you can see he's a lunatic. Matthew five through seven has been considered by by literature, lit, by people, by scholars as to be among the best of literature, superior morals, stunning writing, and much more could be said about this. But in our conclusion, there are many perspectives, and yet none of them hold under scrutiny.

And any honest person when examining the evidence, when seeing what the word says and seeing what the alternatives say, must come to the conclusion, if they are willing to die to themselves, that Jesus is who he says he was. That takes us to the second question. So direct your eyes back to verse 15. But who do you say that I am? Simon Peter replies, you are the Christ, the son of the living God.

Peter responds on behalf of the disciples, and Jesus blesses him. And so let's look at this blessed confession, breaking it into three parts, discussing what it's not and what it is, and then discover why Jesus responded in blessing. The first thing he says is you are the Christ. And I want you to notice something. Look at this text and see what is different about Jesus rather about Peter's response to the second question than the response to the first question.

How does the first question's response begin? Some say dot dot dot, and yet when Jesus asks, who do you say that I am? Peter with the boldness of the spirit says, you are the Son, the Christ, the Son of the living God. He does not say, I say you are the Christ. Or we say you are the Christ.

He declares you are the Christ, the son of the living God. It is a declaration, not an impression. It is a confession, not a conjecture. And it is a proclamation of reality, not a mere man's persuasion. And it had the stamp of divine origin and approval.

And so the first part of Christ, of this confession is that he is the Christ. And so what is this not Jesus' last name? Christ is not Jesus' last name. That's all I say about that. What it is is that the Christ, the Messiah is what it was in Hebrew.

This is the anointed one. He was an expected deliverer, a king from the line of David who would come and establish God's rule for the Jewish people and to bring peace for the people of God. And yet during his day, there were many zealous Jews who had false expectations of this Jesus. They wanted to make him something that he was not, And that is why Jesus says in verse 20, don't tell them who I am. He strictly commanded them not to tell them that he was the Christ.

Why? Because many Jews in that day thought that he wanted him to be the one who would kick out Rome, who would destroy the Roman Empire and establish Jewish rule and rid Jerusalem over the Gentiles and make a Jewish kingdom. And yet Jesus was very clear that that is not what he came to do then. His kingdom is from another world. And in John sixteen five, we read, they were about to come and take him by force to make him king.

And so Jesus knew what was going to happen if they spread this. And that's why we read in the gospels and see this secrecy at first because Jesus had to accomplish what he was going to accomplish. Today, we do a very similar thing, except quite to the opposite of what the Jews in that day did. And that we make Jesus too in our own image, we make a Jesus that we want to worship, a Jesus that we want to believe in. But he's not a violent Jesus, he's not a political leader, he's not an insurrectionist, he is a tame Jesus who says love, but not repent.

Jesus who says, do not judge, but not cut off your hand if it causes you to sin. A Jesus who doesn't at all speak about hell, though he is the number one spokesman of hell in the whole bible. And a tolerant Jesus. We make a tolerant Jesus that is not the true Christ. A Jesus who says, I am a way, a truth, and a life, not the truth, the way, and the life.

And that is this Jesus. The second part of this confession is that he is the Son. He is the Son of God. And what does that mean? Well, we know what it doesn't mean.

It does not mean that he is the offspring of a father god and some goddess who had demigods or whatnot as Greek and Roman mythology explained. That is not what he was talking about, nor is he the Son of God merely as the Jews would have understood as spoken of as an angelic being or a king, even the Messiah figure, but not divine. Nor was he what the Romans believed the Son of God was. And this is most peculiar. In Roman ancient religion, when a Caesar, the Emperor, would die, they would deify him oftentimes.

Deify means make him into a god to worship. And so when Julius Caesar died, when Caesar Augustus died and Tiberius Caesar would have been reigning during this time in Jesus' life, he He would have been made a god and his current son who would be living and reigning would be called what? The son of God. And so Peter's saying this confession, you are the son of what God? Of the living God.

Perhaps perhaps this could also be an underhand stab at the at the divinity or the rule of the emperor and saying, No, Jesus, you are the son of God. Not this Roman emperor who would have been deemed the Son of God. Indeed, we have it in scripture that says, Caesar, divi filius, the Son of God. And the last part I want you to draw your eyes to is that word, living. Jesus is the son of the living God.

Unlike Julius Caesar, unlike Augustus Caesar who were dead emperors worshiped as deities, Jesus is the everlasting God. He is the son of the living father, and so I want you to direct your, your eyes to first Kings 18. And so turn there in your bibles to the story of Elijah. In the beginning verse 20. So Elijah has been encountering idolatry in Israel.

People worshiping a foreign God, he describes them as limping between two different opinions. They're worshiping Baal on one hand, the Canaanite God, and worshiping Yahweh on the other hand. And so Elijah, the prophet of the living God, comes up with a brilliant plan, and that is what we are going to read from verse 22. Then Elijah said to the people, I, even I only, am left a prophet of the Lord, but Baal's prophets are four fifty men. Let two bulls be given to us and let them choose one bull for themselves and cut it in pieces and lay it on the wood and put no fire to it.

And I will prepare the other bull and lay it on the wood and put it on fire. And you call upon the name of your God, and I will call upon the name of the Lord. And the God who answers by fire, he is God. And all the people answered, it is well spoken. Then Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, choose for yourselves one bowl and prepare it first, for you are many, and call upon the name of your god, but put no fire to it.

And they took the bowl that was given them, and they prepared it and called upon the name of Baal from morning until noon saying, oh, Baal, answer us.' But there was no voice and no one answered. And they limped around the altar that they had made. And noon, Elijah mocked them saying, cry aloud for he is a God. Either he is amusing or he is relieving himself or he is on a journey or perhaps he is asleep and must be awakened. And they cried aloud and cut themselves after their custom with swords and lances until the blood gushed out of them.

And as midday passed, they raved on until the time of the offering of the oblation. But there was no voice. No one answered. No one paid attention. And so today, we live in a place where people call out to to millions of gods, whether it's in the Hindu pantheon, or whether it's to Allah in Islam, or whether it's to any other conception of God or the divine or spirituality and practices that people do in order to get some response, in order to get some sensation, in order to experience something, in order to have some connection to something more than this natural world.

And yet none none of these gods, none of these spirits, and we do live in a spiritual world. Paul tells us that we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers and the authorities and the cosmic powers over this present darkness. And so there are spirits perhaps behind these things that might give people, that might give you some temporary pleasure or sensation of peace, and yet it will never fill the void. It will never fill what we all are craving, and that is to be satisfied by our maker, to be satisfied by the God who made us, and the God who made us for Himself. And He alone will answer us in our time of need.

In verse 36 of that chapter in first Kings, it continues, and at the time of the offering of the oblation, Elijah the prophet came near and said, oh Lord, God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word. Answer me, oh Lord. Answer me that this people may know that you, oh Lord, our God, and that you have turned their hearts back. Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt offering and the wood and the stones and the dust and licked up the water that was in the trench. And when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, the Lord, he is God.

The Lord, he is God. And so I wanna conclude with saying that Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life, That he is the Christ, the son of the living God. And that he asks each of us this question, who do you say that I am? And he calls out to each of you to answer this question and to respond in faith. But know that if you're sitting here today and you haven't confessed or you've confessed and it's not real to you, that this cannot be done by yourself.

You cannot do this on your own. It must be, as it said in verse 17, something that the Father in heaven reveals. And so on this Father's Day, whether you have had a good father on earth or a bad father, a father who is mean or kind, who is cold or tender, who is distant or who is near, who is alive or dead. The Father in Heaven, He hears. He sees.

He is living. And the gift of Jesus Christ is yours to be received if you call out in faith. And that is what we all must do. Call out for mercy, and he will save. I'll conclude with the words of Jesus in Revelation 22.

Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me to repay everyone for what he or she has done. I am the alpha and the omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end. Blessed are those who wash their robes so that they may have the right to the tree of life, and that they may enter the city by the gates. What can wash away my sins? Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

What can make me whole again? Nothing but the blood of Jesus. Oh, precious is the flow that makes me white as snow. No other fount I know. Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

Living Lord, God of Gods, King of Kings. I ask according to your righteousness, according to your character, as a God who is jealous for his glory, that you would have your way in each of the people that are here today. And each person who sitting here, that they would know you, that they would be convicted by you, and that the word of Christ would penetrate their hearts, and that they would walk with you, that they would know you, and that they would love you. Lord, may your fatherhood draw all of us to you in humility and joy as a father who never leaves nor forsakes. And it's in your son's name we pray.

Amen.