Who do you say that I am?

Address given at St Mary's Cathedral, Limerick on Sunday 27th August 2017, the 11th after Trinity

Today’s Gospel reading (Matthew 16:13-20) is about the answers to two questions.

First, Jesus asks his disciples, ‘Who do people say that the Son of Man is?’, referring to himself, and they reply, ‘Some say John the Baptist, but others Elijah, and still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets’.

Notice that all of these are figures from the past. Even John the Baptist, who was Jesus’s contemporary and cousin. Herod, the ruler of Galilee, had ordered John’s execution, and we are told he believed Jesus must be John returned from the dead, when he heard reports of Jesus’s ministry.

Second, Jesus asks, ‘But who do you say that I am?’, and it is Peter who replies on behalf of them all, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God’.

Jews at the time believed that God would send his Messiah, meaning ‘anointed one’, to be a king on the throne of Israel who would restore the fortunes of the Jewish people.

Notice this is not the first time Jesus has been named as the Son of God – if you remember 2 Sundays ago, the disciples in the boat ‘worshipped (Jesus), saying, “Truly you are the Son of God”’, after he came to help them in the storm.

The same story is told by Mark and Luke, as well as Matthew - but only Matthew records Jesus’s reply to Peter. Let’s look at the story from 4 different perspectives: that of Jesus, of Peter, of Matthew, and finally of ourselves today, 2,000 years on in Ireland.

Why, I wonder, did Jesus ask these two questions when he did?

The disciples have been following Jesus for quite a while, watching his ministry, learning the ways of the kingdom of heaven from him. Jesus’s fame has been spreading, crowds are pressing around him, wondering if Jesus might herald the arrival of the Messiah. The Jewish authorities are suspicious, starting to question his ministry, and preparing to oppose him. Jesus surely knows that the time is coming soon when he must go to Jerusalem to confront them, and quite likely be killed by them.

But are the disciples ready for this? Are they up to the task of continuing his ministry, of building the kingdom of heaven? I think Jesus decides to test them. First he asks an easy question – by their answers he knows they understand the context of his work. Then he asks the hard one – and it is Peter who speaks for all of them. Jesus sees that Peter has leadership qualities, despite all his weaknesses. And he praises Peter, marking him out as the rock on which the church – the ‘people of God’ – will be built, with a pun on his nickname Peter, which means a rock in Greek.

The disciples must have passed Jesus’s test, because from then on he intensifies his teaching. He begins to prepare them for his final trip to Jerusalem, his crucifixion, and resurrection – as we will hear in next Sunday’s Gospel reading.

But why is Jesus so secretive, why does he order them to tell no one that he is the Messiah? Because, I think, a public claim to be the Messiah would be very dangerous both for them and for Jesus - it would be like raising the banner of revolution. Jesus does not see himself as an earthly king, and besides, it is not yet time – he still has a lot to teach the disciples before they are fully ready for their task.

Peter is loyal and bold, but also impetuous and foolhardy - as we saw two Sunday’s ago, when he tried to walk on water, lost his nerve, and began to sink.

Peter could also be obtuse and wrong-headed – next Sunday we will hear Jesus publicly chide him, saying, ‘Get thee behind me, Satan!’, when Peter tries to dissuade Jesus from his path of sacrifice. But at this moment Peter for all his faults surely feels encouraged by Jesus’s praise. And Jesus’s assessment of him is correct, of course - it is Peter who will take the lead in publicly proclaiming Jesus as Messiah on the day of Pentecost.

I wonder if Peter was puzzled when Jesus said, ‘I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven’? Jesus is telling Peter he is like the steward of a rich man’s household, who is given the keys of the house and authority over the other servants when the master travels away. A bit like Carson the butler in Downton Abbey, I suppose.

Over the ages Popes have claimed that by these words Jesus has given them authority over other bishops, because they are Peter’s successors as Bishop of Rome. But I find this entirely unconvincing – surely Jesus confers the position of steward on Peter in a personal capacity.

And indeed, Peter does go on to act as steward of the infant church at the Council of Jerusalem, when he sides with Paul to persuade the church to accept gentiles into full membership - but that is to jump ahead. Jesus’s plan for salvation works through human history, and Peter will not understand the implications of his words for many years to come.

Matthew the Evangelist who wrote the Gospel is unlikely to be the tax-collector Matthew whom Jesus called to be an Apostle.

Scholars believe that his Gospel was written after the destruction of the Temple in 70AD for a Jewish Christian audience. He is writing at least 40 years after Jesus’s death and resurrection, and the events of Pentecost; and 20 or more years after the Council of Jerusalem.

Matthew is keen to reinforce the Jewish roots of Christian faith, while welcoming the growing numbers of gentile Christians. This, I think, is why he, more than the other Gospel writers, emphasises Peter’s role in the story. It is Peter’s belief that Jesus is the Messiah that is the rock on which the church has been built, and it is Peter’s role as steward of the kingdom of heaven that has brought the gentiles into it.

Matthew writes from a Jewish perspective in the light of his own time, a time when the split between Jews and Christians is crystallising and becoming sharp. His audience would surely have understood that Jesus asks his questions not just of the first disciples, but of them as well. And it is the answers they give that will determine how the kingdom of heaven grows.

Fourthly, what is the significance of Jesus’s questions for us today in Ireland, 2,000 years on?

The tide of history has ebbed and flowed since Matthew’s day. The small church of Jewish and gentile Christians grew to take over the mighty Roman Empire. The historic trinitarian creeds were forged in attempts to answer Jesus’s question, ‘Who do you say that I am?’. Over centuries empires have come and gone, churches have split and the parts prospered - or not, and belief has waxed and waned. In our own day, we see Christian belief contracting in some parts of the world, including our own, but growing in others. But this has happened many times before.

Throughout this history Jesus has continued to ask each generation, ‘Who do you say that I am?’, and it remains the case that the answers we give will determine how the kingdom of heaven will grow. We share with Peter an identity as flawed disciples who are forgiven and empowered by Jesus to face whatever lies on the path ahead. May our answer be like his, and may we serve like him as stewards to build the future of the church, and with it the kingdom of heaven.

Let me finish in prayer:

O God, the fount of all wisdom,

in the humble witness of the apostle Peter

you have shown the foundation of our faith:

give us the light of your Spirit,

that, recognising in Jesus of Nazareth

the Son of the living God,

we may be living stones

for the building up of your holy Church;

through Jesus Christ our Lord,

who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit,

one God, now and for ever. Amen