Finding Purpose in a Broken World | Sunday, January 10, 2021

Hey, Cross Connection. Welcome to 2021. Some of you haven't seen me since January of last year, while others have. I look forward to the day when we can meet face-to-face again. It's been great to see some of you out on the patio on Sunday nights.

So, 2021. I'd like to say it's going to be a lot different than 2020. I want to express my hope that there are signs indicating a return to normalcy. However, I must admit that it can sound a little negative to say that. I don't want it to come across that way. The negativity in our world, the challenges we face, and the fears and anxieties we experience can often lead to anger. Yet, these very challenges can also drive us to our knees, prompting us to seek Christ and ask God not just why things are happening, but how we should respond and what we should be doing.

As we jump into Scripture this morning, we will explore a very important piece of Scripture and a significant question that Jesus is going to ask us. You will need to repeat this question to yourself: Who do you say that I am? This morning, we will look at Matthew 16, verses 13 through 19, and we will be jumping around a bit. Jesus asked this question of His disciples.

As we delve into the Word, it's essential to understand the context of what was happening during Jesus' time. The current events in Rome 2,000 years ago were quite serious. People lived in fear, and that fear was an everyday reality. I know COVID is a very real factor in how we live our day-to-day lives right now, whether it be the virus itself or the way it has been handled, impacting our daily routines. However, in those days, they did not have the modern medical miracles that we have today.

Death and disease were an everyday way of life. In fact, their expectation was not like ours; we expect to go to a hospital and to be healed. Their expectation was that people would die, and they saw people die on a very frequent basis.

Finances are a concern for many people today, and I understand that. However, many of the people in those days lived a hand-to-mouth existence, a day-to-day existence. There were no long-term financial plans, 401(k)s, or anything like that. They weren't concerned with the finances of the nation; they were concerned with their own personal finances. It was a very meager existence. There were plagues, health issues, leprosy—things that were death sentences to people.

Politics? That was a joke. There was no politics; they were just subject to whatever was put before them in Israel 2,000 years ago. A lot of the same concerns we have today were concerns they had then, but they were much worse off and had very little power to do anything about them.

Why do I talk about that? I believe the Bible is current and addresses everything that we're going through today. We are not experiencing anything that our fellow brothers and sisters did not experience 2,000 years ago. I think we need to keep that in perspective as we get into the Word.

A little bit of background here: Jesus is at Caesarea Philippi. It's a beautiful spot today; I've been there. It has trout ponds and a little national park. The place where He is speaking is in front of a large cavern, and local legend had it that this was the entrance, the shaft to hell. Now, it wasn't in reality, but that was what it was known for. When He talked about this, it resonated with the people.

When He speaks of His gospel, He literally says, "This is my gospel, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." This was not a defensive statement; it was a declaration that even the gates of hell could not keep the gospel out. He made this statement in front of that place after He had just fed the 5,000, performing a mighty miracle. He had also just told the disciples to be leery or to be wary.

of the leaven of the Pharisees. Now, what was the leaven of the Pharisees? Part of the leaven of the Pharisees was obviously their legalism, but a lot of it was also the thought that there was going to be a leader that would emerge. The Messiah would be a political leader, one that would restore Israel to its power and prominence that it had before. A leader that would cast the Romans out of the reign and rule of Israel. This was part of the thinking there. They believed that this powerful Davidic leader would somehow make their world different in their political realm and in their day-to-day living. However, that was not God's intention; that was their intention.

In fact, what we're going to learn from this is that some of the things we want to do to make our world right are not necessarily right or beneficial in the spiritual realm, God's realm. So let's start into Matthew chapter 16, and we will be looking at verses 13 through 19.

Verse 13 says, "When Jesus came into the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked the disciples, saying, 'Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?'" So they said, "Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." There were these theories out there about what people were saying regarding Jesus and how they were talking about Him. They provided answers that are a little hard to comprehend because they seem like reincarnation or the spirit of somebody else being in Jesus, but they are not acknowledging Jesus for who He is and what He came to do.

They have various theories that do not get to the true nature of Jesus, the Messiahship of Jesus. These answers are skewed and somewhat ridiculous. Now, He has fed the 5,000 and performed mighty miracles. He has done things that only a prophet can do, yet they are relegating Him to that status. When He asked this question, the religious Jews are thinking that Jesus is a heretic, a loony, or crazy.

He's like a cult leader, and people are going to follow him. The Romans thought that Jesus at the time was an insurrectionist. He was someone who was going to rise up and lead a rebellion against the Roman Empire. In fact, that's one of the accusations that were made to push Pilate to go ahead with the execution of Jesus.

Here's a quote from "Mere Christianity" by C.S. Lewis. I think this quote is very important to consider because so many people resonate with and appreciate the Jesus who is a good teacher, a good man, or perhaps a prophet, but they won't buy into the Messiahship—Jesus being God in human form. They won't accept that. C.S. Lewis says in "Mere Christianity," "I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him. I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God."

That is the one thing we must not say. A man who is merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic on the level with the man who says he's a poached egg, or else he would be the devil of hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was and is the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool. You can spit at him and kill him as a demon, or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.

These are powerful words, and they leave us with a choice. You see, people in the world have no problem with the image of Jesus as the healing hippie. The picture we have of Jesus with the long flowing hair, the lamb next to him, the children, and his kindness towards people resonates with many. However, when Jesus says, "I am the way, the truth, and the life; nobody will come to the Father except through me," that is an exclusive claim.

That is a claim of Messiahship, and that's something that people have issues with. When you start to look at the narrow road that is Jesus and the way of salvation, and examine the scriptural perspective on sin and what is right and what is wrong, much of what is in our Bibles could be construed as being hateful or hate speech, which is a very unpopular notion. Jesus' claim to be the Messiah leaves no wiggle room; He is either the Messiah or He is not.

Let's take a look at verses 15 through 19. Jesus asks one of the most important questions that you will ever have to answer. It says, "Jesus said to them, 'Simon Peter answered and said, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."'" Jesus responded, "Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. 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."

We know the Bible tells us that if we confess with our mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead, then we will be saved. One of the things we see in our day-to-day lives is that people are absolutely terrified of being sick. In this instance, it's COVID, and who knows what it will be in the future. People who walked in the days of Jesus were also afraid of pestilence, plague, leprosy, and sickness. They were afraid as well.

However, we need not be afraid because Jesus has power over sickness and death. In Matthew chapter 8, we see a centurion, a pagan man who is not yet a Christian by any stretch of the imagination, but he is definitely putting his faith in Jesus. He comes to Jesus and says, "Lord, my servant is sick, and he needs to be healed."

And Jesus gathers his things up in front of the crowd, and he is going off to heal the centurion's servant. The centurion stops and says to him, "Master, you don't need to come there. I know that if you just speak the words, my servant will be healed. For I am a man of authority, and I know what authority looks like. I say to a man to go this way, and he goes that way. I say to a man to go that way, and he goes that way. I know what authority looks like, and I know you have authority over sickness and death."

Jesus turns to the crowd, some of whom are very devout religious people, and says, "I haven't seen faith like this in all of Israel." He lets them know that there will be people like that centurion who put their trust in him and will be at the table with Jesus in heaven. What a revelation! What a shocker for everybody in the room, so to speak.

We know that Jesus proves his power over sickness and death. In Matthew chapter 9, a ruler comes to Jesus and says, "My daughter is very, very sick, almost to death. Can you come and heal her?" While Jesus is on his way to the house, she dies. The people are wailing, and there is a scene of lament with the mourners present. Jesus tells them to be quiet and to leave the room, saying that she is not dead, but rather sleeping. They mock and scoff at him.

He goes into the room, heals her, and raises her from the dead. Jesus is proving, again, that he is the Messiah and that he has power not just over sickness, but also over death. Jesus' miracles should make us acknowledge who he is: his power over sin and death, his Messiahship, and his Godship.

The other day, I received a call during a Sunday evening devotion. I looked at my cell phone, and the name that came up was Jesus. So, just a little advice: if Jesus ever calls you on your phone, pick it up!

It turns out it was not Jesus, but it was my friend Jesus. My friend Jesus was a sport fishing boat captain and a man who knew about God. Let's just say this: he knew the claims of God. He knew that there was a God, but there was no personal walk or relationship, really, with God.

Recently, he was walking through a diagnosis of brain cancer. He went from living a life where he was retired and starting to realize all the fruit and relaxation that come with retirement, to facing a diagnosis of cancer. As more and more bad news was revealed to him, he began to call out for God. Thankfully, as a friend, we would exchange texts and calls. During one of those calls, he told me that he had given his life wholeheartedly to the Lord.

The things he was telling me about his experiences—just God pouring into him—were none other than the Holy Spirit affecting and changing his life. As he was walking through one of the most horrible things a person can face medically, God was doing a fantastic work in his life and in his heart, as well as in the lives of those around him. He went from a man who knew about God to a man who deeply knew and trusted God.

Nobody would ever ask to go through the trial of cancer. However, in the spiritual realm, in God's economy, that was the greatest thing in the world because it drove one of His children to a place of communion and communication with Him. Jesus, my friend, got to know how much love God had for him and how much God loved and cared for him.

As he shared his praise and testimony with other friends, it was such a blessing to watch him walk so closely with the Lord. Again, remember that what sometimes seems bad in our economy is not bad in God's economy.

One has to only turn on the news to find ourselves getting very angry. Most of what we get angry about is related to the things going on, particularly in politics. We become discouraged by who is in power, who said what, and what seems so contrary to Scripture that is taken for good. The good things of Scripture are often viewed as evil, which can be frustrating and discouraging. However, we don't need to be frustrated, discouraged, or angry.

Jesus demonstrates his lack of concern for the kingdoms of this world and shows that this is not a fight other than a spiritual one. He illustrates this in the garden when he is betrayed by a friend. When the priests and soldiers come to take him away, a sword is drawn, and Peter, his disciple, cuts off someone's ear. We know that Jesus restores that servant's ear and lets his disciples know that this is not the kind of fight they are in. He had legions of angels at his disposal if he needed them to fight, but he did not want them to engage in battle. He was going to be taken willingly to suffer at the hands of men because this is not an earthly battle; it is not a political battle. This is a spiritual battle.

We see him go before Pilate, and I think this exchange is important to read. Let's go to John 18, starting in verse 31. Listen to this exchange between Jesus and the man who could set him free. It says, "Then Pilate said to him, 'You take him and judge him according to your law.' Therefore, the Jews said to him, 'It is not lawful for us to put anyone to death,' that the saying of Jesus might be fulfilled when he spoke, signifying by what death he would die."

Then, in verse 33, it says, "Then Pilate entered the praetorium again, called Jesus, and said to him, 'Are you the king of the Jews?'" Jesus answered him, "Are you speaking for yourself about this, or did others tell you concerning me?" Pilate answered...

Am I a Jew? Your own nation and chief priests have delivered you to me. What have you done? Jesus says, "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would fight, so that I should not be delivered to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from here."

Pilate therefore said to him, "Are you a king then?" Jesus answered, "You say rightly that I am a king. For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears my voice."

Then we look before Pilate in John 19, beginning in verse 7 through 11. It says, "The Jews answered him, 'We have a law, and according to our law, he ought to die, because he made himself the Son of God.' Therefore, when Pilate heard that saying, he was the more afraid, and went again to the praetorium, and said to Jesus, 'Where are you from?' But Jesus gave him no answer. Then Pilate said to him, 'Are you not speaking to me? Do you not know that I have power to crucify you, and power to release you?' Jesus answered, 'You could have no power at all against me, unless it had been given you from above. Therefore, the one who delivered me to you has the greater sin.'"

Jesus had the power to escape the suffering at the hands of Pilate and the Romans, but he didn't. He didn't do that because he wasn't about trying to make his world better or his experience better. Jesus was about trying to fulfill prophecy, ultimately to be on God's path, to do what was best for the kingdom of God, his Father, and to do what, thankfully, was best for us.

If we're not careful, we can fall into that way of thinking, where we're trying to sanitize our world, trying to make our world a more comfortable, happy place. We can easily forget that we need to be on mission, to do what's best for God's kingdom, not our kingdom.

I think it's very telling that Jesus, as he is crucified, rises again from the dead and is seen by hundreds of people. Somehow, he forgot, you think?

To get rid of the Romans? I don't think so. Jesus left us behind to deal with one of the cruelest governments that ever existed. The Romans took our people—yeah, I said our people—and at the hands of the Romans, our people suffered. They were crucified, they were tortured, and they were fed to lions. They suffered in Colosseums, and they made the worship and following of Jesus illegal and punishable by death.

This was not good for us in the temporal world, the immediate world, but what did that do for the kingdom of God? Well, we know that when God's people are pressured, they're pushed. They literally get pressed into every bit of society. Every nook and cranny of this world has Christians living in it. The harder you press us, the more that the heat goes up, so to speak. The more fruitful and substantial our presentation of the gospel becomes. The less we have hope in the world and our surroundings, the more that we have hope in the future to come—heaven. The gospel becomes the most important thing in our lives.

You see, prosperity is not always that great for us. Two hundred forty-four-year-old America was a country that was birthed in adversity. The people that came here were brave people, but they were also people with conviction. Some came because of pressure where they couldn't worship God as was biblically fit, and so they came here. Many others came here as evangelists and missionaries. It's one thing a lot of people don't know: they came here with a conviction to serve God wholeheartedly, to do what was great in God's kingdom.

In 244 years, the country that was based on those basic foundations has thrived, prospered, and become a place that we all love. But sadly, sometimes, under too much prosperity...

When things become too easy, sometimes we get in a position where we become lazy, or our convictions become more about fixing what's around us than about going and spreading the good news and the gospel of Jesus Christ. This nation, which was born in adversity, is changing. As we look around, all of this can sound a bit challenging. You might have wanted to listen this morning and be super encouraged.

Well, I'll tell you this: one of the values that Cross Connection has as a church is that we have an optimistic view of the future. Now, you might not have put that together from what I've been talking about, considering some of the challenges we've faced and some of our brothers and sisters faced 2,000 years ago. However, the reason we have an optimistic view of the future is that we know Jesus is going to come for His church one day, and we pray it will be soon. The trials, travails, plagues, and the things we suffer here will be a distant memory.

In that time, we only need to do one thing: abide and make disciples of all nations. The optimism we have is that Jesus is on the throne, and nothing will happen apart from His knowledge and His hand. So, what do we do? How do we think? How do we act until that time?

Philippians 4:8 says it really well: "Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy, meditate on these things."

The most constructive things that we can do while we're ministering to others are to become what is true, what is noble, and what is pure. As we demonstrate those actions and dwell in those things, we know that whatever we dwell on, whatever we think about, our heart soon follows. If we can walk in this way, we will be aligned with the truth and purpose that God has for us.

Through a world that is perishing, a world that is looking for answers, we are called to be that light in the answer to people. We would have done our job if we think about it. If somebody is complaining next to you that they have an issue with plumbing and you're a plumber, you're going to give them your card and tell them about what a great plumber you are, and that you can fix what is hurting and what is wrong.

If you're a real estate agent and somebody is lamenting that they need to sell their home quickly, you would give them your card and your contact information, letting them know that you could help them with that. How much more should we respond in a world where there is hurt, suffering, anger, and fear? We have the answer, and we know that the answer is Jesus Christ.

For ourselves personally, as we sit and maybe struggle with some of those same things, one of the best things we can do every day is to sit down and consider the question of Jesus: "Who do you say that I am?" We should go back and answer with the miracles, the joy, and the confidence that He gives us in Jesus Christ. God bless you.