Sermon Tone Analysis

Big Idea

Tension: Who is Jesus?

Resolution: He is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

Exegetical Idea: Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the Living God.

Theological Idea: Jesus is the appointed Messiah sent from God to save his people from their sins and oppression.

Homiletical Idea: Jesus is Lord.

Introduction

Well, today I want to ask a question that we are going to wrestle with as a church this morning.

And as we will see, there is perhaps no more important question than you can answer in your life.

ANd that question is this, “Who is Jesus?”

Who is Jesus?

Jesus wanted his disciples to wrestle with that question and understand just what was at stake in it.

Because that question and the answer he gave, more than any other, will effect how we live our lives and how our church follows him.

So it is worthwhile to spend some time reflecting today on this question.

Who does our world say Jesus is?

Before we answer this question God’s way, I think we should look at how our world answers this question.

And our passage today points us towards two of the world’s false answers.

And the first answer is this.

Jesus is part of the universal “divine spirit.”

Caesearea Philippi: Now you have to understand, Jesus says all this, and they are at the town called Caeserea Philippi.

Caesarea Philippi was a town that was originally built by the Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus.

And Caesar gave Caesarea to Herod, who passed it onto his son Philip, who renamed the town Caesarea Philippi.

Now, Caesarea Philippi was a Roman place, and they had a huge temple there to the God Pan.

So Jesus is here, walking in teh streets with all these priests of a foreign religion, he is here standing in teh midst of the place where there are all these idols.

It is a dark, pagan place.

ANd Jesus turns to the 12 who are with him, knowing who he is, and asks a few questions.

Caesearea Philippi: First, you have to see, that Jesus is asking them this question at the town called Caeserea Philippi.

Caesarea Philippi was a town that was originally built by the Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus.

And Caesar gave Caesarea to Herod, who passed it onto his son Philip, who renamed the town Caesarea Philippi.

Now, Caesarea Philippi was a Roman place, and they had a huge temple there to the God Pan.

The Roman Approach to Religion: Now to really understand this, you have to understand the Roman approach to religions of the lands that they conquered.

When the Romans would conquer a region, they typically wouldn’t smash out the religion of the conquered people.

They kind of had a different strategy.

On the one hand, they would try to identify that religion with their own in some way.

Or on the other, they would adopt that religion into their own pantheon of Gods.

This was how they legalized various religions.

The Romans were, in many ways, much like the pluralistic society we live in.

The Romans’ approach to religion, in general, was you can worship whoever you want, as long as it does not upset the status quo.

There was even this general sense among the Roman philosophers in which all these different religions led each person into the divine in their own way.

Could Jesus fit into the Roman Pantheon: Now, imagine that you know this.

And you are walking with Jesus in front of this giant temple and all this idolatry and paganism.

And Jesus turns in front of you and asks, “Who do men say that I am?”

The answer that many Romans who were around would have been, “You might be part of the universal spiritual divine spirit.”

The impulse of the Romans around would have been to say, “Jesus, yes, we will worship you as just one of the other gods.

Yes, you can have your place, just don’t ask me to give up my idols, my worship, my beliefs.”

Many approach Christ in the same way today: Of course, many people approach Jesus in the same way today.

When Jesus says, “I am the way the truth and the life,” they think Jesus is saying, “I am a way, a truth, and a life.”

They think of Jesus as just one of the many ways to bring us to God.

They think that, “You worship what works for you, and I’ll worship what works for me.”

Just as long as Jesus doesn’t call me on my sin, as long as Jesus doesn’t tell me my idols aren’t worth it, as long as Jesus doesn’t tell me how to treat my family, how to work in the workplace, how to spend my money, I’m okay.

Jesus was too exclusive: The problem with that is that it just doesn’t recognize just how exclusive Jesus is.

Jesus says, in … and then he says in .... Nobody means… nobody.

Jesus Christ is the only way to the Father, he is the only way to God, nobody can come to the Father except through him.

Nollan Dalla, who is an atheistic writer, says this, “In short, religious practitioners not only invade our space and attempt to alter our consciousness, they also desire to be our lawgiver, our landlord, and — should we break their commandments — our executioner for eternal damnation.”

The problem with thinking that Jesus is just another God, is that Jesus is too exclusive.

Jesus claims to be God, the only God.

You can’t just say he’s another God, because he won’t let you.

Jesus is a human

Of course Jesus’ disciples give another answer.

They say, “some say Elijah, others Jeremiah, still some, John the Baptist.”

Now, all three of these guys are prophets.

They are brilliant, invective, charismatic prophets.

But none of them are God.

In other words, they are all, “humans.”

They are not God.

They are just human.

And the point is that they are saying, “they say that you are a smart guy, a charismatic guy, but that is all.”

The reality is that many people think about Jesus the same way today.

They view Jesus as this human speaker and charismatic guy.

They think that he maybe has some good advice.

They think that maybe he has has some good thoughts.

They think that maybe he isn’t really God.

They think that he had some good things to say, but the idea that he is “very God of God” is just a little bit farfetched.

He was a brilliant philosopher.

C.S. Lewis: The problem with this though is that it is incredibly inconsistent.

Because Jesus claimed to be so much more.

You can’t say that Jesus is just a good teacher, because if you believe what he actually taught, then you have to believe everything he taught.

C.S. Lewis describes it this way: “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 was 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 is 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.”

So, if Jesus isn’t just one of many ways to God, and if Jesus isn’t just a human teacher, who is he?

Well, God tells us.

Who does God tell us Jesus is?

Well, I want to point something out.

Look in vs. 17.

Jesus is going to tell Simon that he is blessed because of what God has showed him.

So we need to talk about this:

My Father has revealed this to you: Now, look at what Jesus says, he says, “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven.”

You see, if nobody can come to the Father apart from the Son, nobody can come to the Son apart from the Father.

We just read that in .

If we are to understand Jesus, we need to first be quiet and listen to what God has to tell us.

What God reveals about Christ: So, let’s make this application as we’re walking through Scripture.

The church’s job is not to try to make stuff up about Christ.

No, our job is to look in Scripture and see what God has revealed about Christ and herald it with all the power we possibly can.