Sermon Tone Analysis

Date: 2022-07-10

Audience: Grass Valley Corps ONLINE

Title: The Gates of Hell and the Kingdom of God

Text: Matthew 16:1-20

Proposition: Citizens of the Kingdom hold the keys to Hell

Purpose: Agents of the Kingdom help set captives free

Grace and peace

If you follow the Jordan River north, you’ll find three springs of free-flowing water which have been its source since ancient days.

The most dramatic of these, in modern times, pours out of an underground channel just below the mouth of a cave which gapes low and wide from a mountain of rock 25 miles north of the Sea of Galilee.

That stream is called the Panis Fork.

Its channel changed in the 1800s when an earthquake collapsed part of the cave entrance but for millennia prior to that the river had come directly from the cave – a shimmering ribbon passing from the hidden depths of the earth out onto the surface lands where its precious liquid turned a long stretch of desert into productive farmland.

Since water brought life, some of the peoples that inhabited those lands believed that this stream was a gift from their gods, and they told stories of how it tumbled freely from the underground winter home of those deities.

Spring, they said, was when those great beings came out of their underworld realm to bring fertility to the land, if they could be coaxed out!

Many sacrifices were made and rituals performed to ensure that these gods were appeased and encouraged to return to the surface.

The people and tribes that controlled the territory changed hands from time to time, but the altars around the dark cavern remained.

In time, Israel took possession of the Promised Land.

The tribe of Dan ended up around the Panis Fork and, like those who had come before them, they never removed the pagan places of worship.

Their God had instructed them to, but somehow they never quite got around to it, and people continued to visit the shrines and those gods of darkness and fertility.

The time of the Judges came and went, and Israel’s cycle of sin and salvation continued, but these sacred places of other gods remained.

The early kings worked to unite the tribes of Israel into a single nation.

David finished the task, more or less, and Solomon reigned over a united kingdom, but shortly after his death the Northern Tribes rebelled and separated themselves from the southern tribes, even though the Temple of the LORD was in Jerusalem in the south.

Appalled to find themselves cut off from their center of worship, many of the priests and Temple workers left the northern kingdom and moved south to Judah to be near their national God.

The rebel King of Israel responded by creating statues of calves and goats out of gold and placing them in various regions for people to worship.

He said that they represented his people’s God, or that perhaps they represented other gods who had power in this area.

The yawning cave in the rock above Panis, already an ancient shrine, was the main place he designated for these new idols to reside.

The prophet Amos would come to stand outside a worship gathering here, warning the people that the evil they committed in this place would lead to destruction.

Which it did, but it was the destruction of the nation, not of this place.

Fast forward to the time of Alexander.

The Greeks ruled the world, bringing their pantheon of gods with them.

Hearing stories about this cave where the underworld touched the land of the living, they declared it to be a gateway to Hades, the realm which held souls of the deceased, a place only the gods could come and go from.

They erected a temple here for Pan, the half-goat, half-human god of fertility and debauchery, and his worshippers would come and perform rituals involving bestiality and child sacrifice and other acts we would call horrible and profane.

Statues and icons of the satyr were erected here, and a town called Panis rose to service the needs of the followers of the goat.

The time of the Greeks came to an end, but the town remained outside the cave and the dark rituals there continued as well.

The Romans generally allowed worship practices of the lands they conquered to remain unchanged, so long as the defeated gods did not object to paying Imperial taxes.

So Panis continued to stand around the dark, forbidding rock which poured waters of life from an angry mouth that was also a gateway to the land of death.

The greatest of Roman allies from the region, a Hasmonean named Herod, was given control of this territory along with the title “King of the Jews.”

But he paid it no mind, being focused on solidifying Israel instead.

After the death of Herod the Great, Herod Philip tried to win the favor of Caesar by building Panis into a capitol city, naming it Caesarea Philippi.

In the new city, he added a temple for people to worship.

And the city became a crossroads for trade.

But that little village near the Hell-mouth remained to service the shrine there.

The Jews had grown to hate this area.

It had been part of the Promised Land once, but now it was ground soaked in pagan culture, the blood of children and goats, and other impure things.

Even speaking of it was discouraged in polite company and to travel anywhere near the city was to become unclean.

To go near the temples was worse, even shameful.

But there was a certain First Century rabbi who led his disciples to this northern city.

It was about the third year after he had begun to travel throughout Israel, leading and teaching disciples who were expected to emulate their master and follow him everywhere.

In one biography of that rabbi, the book of Mark, we are told that 27 Jesus and his disciples went on to the villages around Caesarea Philippi.

On the way he asked them, “Who do people say I am?”

28 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, one of the prophets.”

29 “But what about you?” he asked.

“Who do you say I am?”

Peter answered, “You are the Messiah.”

30 Jesus warned them not to tell anyone about him.

[1]

Does this seem an odd place to make sure they understood who he was and what his purpose was?

Mark downplays where they were, saying only that they were around Caesarea Philippi.

He may have been trying to avoid arguments or shame by being vague.

Matthew is less concerned with such niceties.

Matthew 16:13-14

13 When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, “Who do people say the Son of Man is?”

14 They replied, “Some say John the Baptist; others say Elijah; and still others, Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”

[2]

The word “region” is an English understatement of the original Greek word which is better described as meaning a portion of the city.

Church tradition claims Jesus led the Twelve Apostles and perhaps a few others to a hillside overlooking that unholy cave in the rock and then asked them the question.

I wonder if he didn’t bring them right to the mouth, standing along the edge of the water, peering into the shadowy depths of the cavern.

If you were the Messiah, seeking to restore the world, does it seem fitting that this would be the place to start?

Jesus asked who the people think he is, and they suggest those few answers.

Then he makes it personal.

Matthew 16:15-16

15 “But what about you?” he asked.

“Who do you say I am?”

16 Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.”[3]

Except, this isn’t quite right.

Oh, what Simon said is spot on.

But he’s never actually called “Simon Peter.”

His name is Simon, and at the very beginning of their association Jesus gave him a nickname – Petros – the stone man.

Back then Simon had a reputation.

He was headstrong, impulsive, prone to fly off the handle… He was more like a fish just tipped out of a net onto a deck, flopping wildly this way and that, than he was like a stone: Still, unmoving, waiting to be picked up and thrown at a target.

Was Jesus promising him that some desired change would come about or was he gently making fun of him?

In that first meeting, in John 1:42

42 And he brought him to Jesus.

Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon son of John.

You will be called [Kay-fahs]Cephas” (which, when translated, is Petros).

[4]

(Key-fahs) Cephas is a Syriac word which means rock or stone, just as petros is a Greek word meaning a stone.

Simon, you will be called a stone.

That was then.

Here, in pagan lands, beside a cave which has been a pagan temple for thousands of years, Simon the Stone has just declared Jesus to be the Jewish Messiah.

And in Matthew 16:17-18 we hear that

17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.

18 And I tell you that you are [Petros], and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.[5]

Simon, I tell you that you are petros, a stone.

The word generally meant something that was small enough to be picked up.

It could be moved.

You are petros, and on this petra I will build…

Petra is Greek for Rock, as in an immovable mass or a solid hillside into which homes could be carved.

A hillside like the one they stood beside; the one with the cave and the other niches carved into it in which the gods were said to live.

The one steeped in centuries of evil and death, which was called the Gates of Hades.

Did I forget to mention that?

Gates don’t mean as much to us as they used to.

In a city, the gate was the most important structure.

It was the weakest point of the wall, as it was made to open and close, and so the gate was often what invaders would attack as they tried to batter their way in.