Page 1 of 11 LECTIO DIVINA Matthew 16:13-20 21 st Sunday in Ordinary Time Year A Fr. Michael Brizio, IMC www.shareinhisloveministries.com 1) OPENING PRAYER: Come Holy Spirit, fill the hearts of your faithful and kindle in them the fire of your love. Send forth your Spirit and they shall be created. And you shall renew the face of the earth. O, God, who by the light of the Holy Spirit, did instruct the hearts of the faithful, grant that by the same Holy Spirit we may be truly wise and ever enjoy His consolations. Through Christ Our Lord. Amen. 2) READING OF THE GOSPEL (What the Word says): Matthew 16:13-20 13 When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? 14 They replied, Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. 15 He said to them, But who do you say that I am? 16 Simon Peter said in reply, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. 17 Jesus said to him in reply, Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. 18 And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. 19 I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. 20 Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Messiah. 3) EXPLANATION (What the Word means): v.13a: When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples,
Page 2 of 11 Caesarea Philippi, near Mount Hermon 25 miles (40 km) north of the Sea of Galilee, is at the boundary of the Gentile world, and is primarily a Gentile city. By Philip the tetrarch this place had been enlarged, beautified, and named in honor of Caesar Augustus. To distinguish this Caesarea from its namesake, the far more important seaport south of Mt. Carmel, and to indicate its founder, it was called Caesarea Philippi. Near it was a sanctuary to the pagan god Pan, which gave rise to the name Paneas to mark the general site where Caesarea was subsequently located. The very designation Pan is still reflected in Bāniyās, as it is called today. In Jesus day, it had a temple to Caesar. Situated near one of the sources of the Jordan River, with 9,232 feet high majestic Mt. Hermon, snow-covered throughout most of the year, in the immediate background, it was truly a landscape of unforgettable picturesqueness, a place exactly suited to the purpose for which Jesus wished to use it, namely, for prayer (Luke 9:18) and for imparting instruction to his disciples. Jesus seems to go there to escape the Galilean crowds so that he might prepare his disciples for his journey to Jerusalem, which begins at 19:1 - a journey that will end in his death and resurrection. v.13b: Who do people say that the Son of Man is? Jesus chooses this Gentile place to reveal himself more completely to his disciples, perhaps giving us a hint of the concern for the whole world that he will make explicit in the Great Commission (28:19-20).
Page 3 of 11 Rather than telling the disciples his identity, Jesus asks his disciples who people believe the Son of Man to be. Son of Man is the title Jesus most often uses to identify himself (Matthew 8:20; 9:6; 10:23; 11:19; 12:8, 32; 13:37,41; 16:13, 27; 17:9, 12, 22; 19:28; 20:18, 28; 24:27, 30, 37, 39; 25:31; 26:2, 24, 45, 64). The title, Son of Man, comes from Daniel 7:13-14, where the Ancient of Days (God) gave to the one like a Son of Man dominion, and glory and a kingdom, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve him: his dominion is an everlasting dominion, which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which shall not be destroyed. The title, Son of Man, has the advantage of having none of the militaristic connotations associated with the title, Messiah. People expect the Messiah to raise an army, to drive out the Romans, and to re-establish the great Davidic kingdom. They have no such expectations regarding the Son of Man. Scholars give three possible meanings for the title, Son of Man. It might mean (1) humanity in general, (2) I who speak to you, or (3) it might be a Messianic title (Guelich, 89-90). Jesus frequent use of the title in connection with his passion suggests a veiled Messianic title. v.14: They replied, Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. The disciples (not just Peter) graciously omit that some identified Jesus with Beelzebul (10:25). This omission may also be explained by the fact that Jesus was not asking what envious scribes and Pharisees thought of him but what name the people in general applied to him. John the Baptist, who was murdered by Herod. John was such a powerful presence that the people would not be surprised to see him again. Indeed, Herod thinks that Jesus might be a resurrected John (14:2). The prophet Elijah, the worker of miracles, who was expected to reappear before the great and terrible day of Yahweh comes (Malachi 4:5). These first two groups seem to have viewed Jesus as a forerunner of the Messiah. The prophet Jeremiah, who opposed the religious leaders in Jerusalem and predicted the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple. They thought that in the person of Jesus, Jeremiah had returned in order to bring back the tent, the ark, and the altar of incense, which, according to a legend recorded in 2 Maccabees 2:4-8, that prophet had hid in a cave. Finally, there were those who considered Jesus to be neither the Messiah nor even his forerunner, but simply one of the prophets risen again (Luke 9:19). It is clear that people think well of Jesus and have pegged him as a prophet. However, when they try to identify him, they do so in terms of past prophets.
Page 4 of 11 Yes, Jesus is a prophet, but he is more than a prophet. He will challenge them as a prophet, but he will also lead in new and unexpected directions. It is interesting to know the people s opinions of Jesus, but Jesus first question simply prepares the disciples for his second, all-important question (v. 15). v.15: He said to them, But who do you say that I am? When Jesus says I, he makes it clear that he is the Son of Man mentioned in verse 13. The real question is what the disciples think of Jesus. The you is both emphatic and plural - addressed to the disciples at large rather than to Peter only (Boring, 344). Accordingly, when one of the Twelve now answers it, he does so as the spokesman for the entire group, and the answer which Jesus gives him must therefore also be regarded as not being altogether without significance for the group. The people are free to believe whatever they want about Jesus, but Jesus has been carefully preparing these disciples to carry on his work. They have heard his teachings and witnessed his miracles. What they think of him is critical. How we answer this question is also critical. Uncertainty equates to unbelief at this point. v.16a: Simon Peter said in reply, Peter is the usual spokesman for the disciples: Matthew 15:15-16; 19:27-28; 26:35, 40-41; Luke 8:45; 9:32-33; 12:41; 18:28; John 6:67-69; Acts 1:15; 2:14, 37-38; 5:29. Nevertheless, his identity is not lost. It is Peter who speaks and Peter who is going to be addressed in vv.17-19. v.16b: You are the Messiah, The word Messiah and the word Christ are the same word; the one is the Hebrew and the other is the Greek for The Anointed One. Kings were ordained to office by anointing, as they still are. The Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed One is God s Divine King (Barclay, 151). We are not surprised to hear that Jesus is the Messiah. This Gospel began with the words, The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ (1:1), and Matthew has used the word Messiah several times by now (1:16-18; 2:4; 11:2).
Page 5 of 11 We cannot know exactly what the disciples thought when they first left everything to follow Jesus. Presumably they have grown in their understanding as they followed him day by day. This, however, is the first time that a disciple acknowledges Jesus messiahship. v.16c: the Son of the living God. Jesus is not only the judge of the future (the Son of Man), and not only the long anticipated Messiah of the past (the Christ); he is, as the Living God s Very Son, the most significant person in the present (Bruner, 571). We first heard that Jesus is the Son of God at his baptism when God announced, This is my beloved Son (3:17). Jesus has spoken of himself as Son (11:27). The disciples earlier worshiped Jesus, calling him the Son of God, when he walked across the water to their boat and stilled the storm (14:33). Matthew doesn t record Jesus response to that corporate confession by the disciples. Jesus apparently neither denied his son-ship nor commended the disciples for their spiritual insight. The living God contrasts with the lifeless idols of the pagans (Isaiah 40:18-31), and of a place like Caesarea Philippi. God is the only source of life for all that lives. To be Christian means believing that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God. Anything else is less than Christian. And, a statement like Peter s demands commitment. Once one had said Christ, one bound oneself to follow the Christ, no matter where that following might lead (Leuking, 95). v.17a: Jesus said to him in reply, Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. Peter identified Jesus as the Son of the living God. Now Jesus responds by acknowledging Simon as the son (Aramaic: bar) of Jonah (or John) while extending to him his blessing. John ) (Blomberg). In the Gospel of John, Peter s father is identified as John rather than Jonah (John 1:42; 21:15). It is possible that the Greek spelling is a legitimate transliteration and abbreviation of bar Johanan ( son of Note that Jesus calls him Simon, the name by which Simon s father would recognize him. It was a reminder of what he was by nature, simply a human son of a human father - just one human being among many. The use of Simon s full formal name signals the significance of Jesus words here. In the next verse, Jesus will give Simon a new name. v.17b: For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you,
Page 6 of 11 Jesus emphasizes that flesh and blood, that is, merely human calculation, cogitation, intuition, or tradition, could never have produced in this disciple s heart and mind the insight into the sublime truth that he had just now so gloriously professed. God has given him this understanding of Jesus. Peter s insight comes by revelation, not deduction. This speaks to us as well. We have no reason for pride if we happen to be more spiritually aware than others. Our faith, like Peter s, is a gift of God. v.17c: but my heavenly Father. In speaking about (or to) the One who sent him, not only the eternal essence-relationship, but certainly also the warmth of love are disclosed by Jesus preference for the designation my Father. v.18a: And so I say to you, you are Peter, Petros, Scripture refers to God as a rock (Genesis 49:24; Deuteronomy 32; 1 Samuel 2:2; 22; Psalm 18, 28, 31, 42, 62, 71, 78, 89, 92). Isaiah also refers to Abraham and Sarah as a rock: Look to the rock you were cut from, and to the hold of the pit you were dug from. Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you (Isaiah 51:1-2). Given these associations, Jesus does great honor to Peter when he identifies him as Rock. He also lays on him a heavy burden of responsibility. v.18b: and upon this rock, petra, What rock? Is it the reality that Jesus is the Son of God? Or the faith that Peter exhibits when he makes this confession? Or Peter himself? There can be no profitable denying that Jesus honors the actual person of Peter here and makes him leader in the church (Bruner, 574). Jesus meaning is plain: Peter is the rock, the foundation, upon which he is going to erect his church... It is a story about Peter and Jesus, and the most plausible interpretation of the passage is that Jesus is, indeed,
Page 7 of 11 pointing to Peter as the foundation stone, the principal leader, of this new people of God (Long, 185-186). The natural reading of the passage, despite the necessary shift from Petros to petra required by the word play in the Greek... is that it is Peter who is the rock upon which the church is to be built.... But to allow this passage its natural meaning, that Peter is the rock upon which the church is built, is by no means to deny that the church, like the apostles, rests upon Jesus as the bedrock of its existence. Jesus is after all the builder, and all that the apostles do they do through him (Hagner). Jesus promises to build his church not on Cephas as he was by nature, but on him considered as a product of grace. By nature this man was, in a sense, a weakling, very unstable. By grace he became a most courageous, enthusiastic, and effective witness of the truth which the Father had revealed to him with respect to Jesus Christ, the Son of the living God. Jesus certainly did not mean to say that Peter could now begin to lord it over the other disciples. The others did not understand it in that way (18:1; 20:20-24), and Jesus definitely rejected any such interpretation (20:25-28; Luke 22:24-30). During that very early period (before Paul comes mightily to the fore, in Acts 13-28) Peter was the most powerful and effective human link between Jesus and the church, the most influential means of the latter s inward and outward growth. It was Peter who preached the sermon on Pentecost, as a result of which no less than three thousand people were converted (Acts 2:41). It was again through the testimony of Peter and John (3:11; 4:1), chiefly of Peter (3:12), that two thousand were subsequently added to the membership (4:4). Other events in which Peter took a leading part were: the election of Matthias to take the place of Judas Iscariot (Acts 1:15-22), the healing of the lame beggar (Acts 3:4-6), and the heroic proclamation of Jesus Christ before the Sanhedrin (4:8-12, 29). In the primary or basic sense of the term, however, there is only one foundation, and that foundation is not Peter but Jesus Christ himself (1 Corinthians 3:11). Ephesians acknowledges that the church is built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, while Christ Jesus himself being the chief cornerstone (Ephesians 2:20). But in a secondary sense it is entirely legitimate to speak of the apostles, including Peter, as the church s foundation, for these men were always pointing away from themselves to Jesus Christ as the one and only Savior.
Page 8 of 11 Peter is the first initial foundation stone of the whole Church,... the first man to make the leap of faith which saw in Jesus Christ the Son of the living God,... the first member of the Church, and, in that sense, the whole Church is built on him (Barclay, 155). v.18c: I will build my church, ekklesia, Ekklesia literally means called out, and is used especially to speak of religious groups or meetings. Jesus ekklesia is the church. It is Jesus who builds the church. The church belongs to him. The apostles and other Christians play supporting roles, and those roles are important. However, Jesus has the lead role. The word church is a stumbling block to some scholars, who rightly point out that there is no church, ekklesia, at the time that Jesus speaks these words. However, ekklesia is a common word that can refer to any assembly, and there is no reason to assume that Jesus would not use the word - or that he could not have a vision of the community of believers that will arise after his ascension. The expression my church refers, of course, to the church universal, here especially to the entire body of Christ or sum-total of all believers in its New Testament manifestation, wherever it is truly represented on earth (Acts 9:31; 1 Corinthians 6:4; 12:28; Ephesians 1:22, 3:10, 21; 5:22-33; Colossians 1:18; Philippians 3:6). It is a great comfort that Jesus considers this church his very own Jesus purchased his church with his own blood (Acts 20:28). v.18d: and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. The netherworld is the abode of the dead. Here it is a metaphor for the power of the underworld or the demonic (see Isa 38:10) (Senior, 191). Jesus words suggest that death itself assaults Christ s church, but death cannot crush us... The church will endure until Christ s return and no opposition, even widespread martyrdom of Christians or the oppression of the final antichrist... can prevent the ultimate triumph of God s purposes in history (Keener, 272). Jesus imagery works from either side of the gates. The gates of the netherworld prevent those inside from getting out and those outside from breaking in. They wall in the dead, preventing their escape, and they guard against those who would redeem the dead. However, Jesus will break death s power by his own resurrection, which is but the first fruits of the many faithful who will be raised from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:23). The gates of the netherworld will not
Page 9 of 11 withstand Christ s resurrection assault on them. Not only he, but all the redeemed among the dead, shall rise again and stride confidently through the broken gates. The promise is not that the Christians will not go through hell; the promise is that hell does not hold the winning hand and the powers of death will not have the last word (Long, 186). v.19a: I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. The wording has its roots in Isaiah 22:22, I will place on (Eliakim s) shoulder the key of the house of David; he shall open, and no one shall shut; he shall shut, and no one shall open. Eliakim thus becomes the steward of the house, responsible for opening the house in the morning, closing it at night, and controlling access to the royal presence. In this role, Peter will open the gates for three thousand people at Pentecost (Acts 2). Although he will initially resist opening the gates to Gentiles, God will persuade him to admit the Gentile Centurion (Acts 10), and Peter will become the spokesperson to the Council of Jerusalem to keep the gates open to Gentiles (Acts 15). The giving of the keys indicates that the church is the agency of kingdom authority on the earth (Turner, 405). v.19b: Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Bind and release also have to do with rulings regarding doctrine and ethical conduct. In rabbinical language to bind and to release is to declare certain actions forbidden or permitted (Johnson, 453). To loose also implies authority to control admittance to the church - to bar or to admit based on compliance with doctrinal and ethical rulings. Matthew here designates Peter as the Chief Rabbi of Christianity (Hare, 192), the person who will make the tough decisions with regard to doctrine and conduct. He is not turned into a little God, but his faith means that he is charged with the power of God for doing God s will (Soards). Peter is a paradigm of those who teach and interpret with authority in such a way as to open up the dominion of heaven to others (Martin). The assurance is given that whatever Peter, representing The Twelve (Matthew 16:19), or The Twelve (John 20:23), ultimately whatever the church (Matthew 18:18), binds on earth shall be and shall definitely remain bound in heaven; and similarly whatever Peter looses on earth shall be and definitely remain loosed in heaven. It is clear that such authority over faith and morals, and consequently also over the membership, can be exercised only when this is done in thorough harmony with the teachings of Jesus, or, phrasing it differently, with the Word of God.
Page 10 of 11 Jesus definitely condemned any arbitrary binding and loosing, such forbidding and permitting, such excluding and admitting or re-admitting, as amounts to a transgression of the commandment of God (15:1-20; 23:13). When a person is unjustly excommunicated the Lord welcomes him (John 9:34-38). v.20: Then he strictly ordered his disciples to tell no one that he was the Messiah. Jesus is not yet ready for the disciples to tell the world his secret. The world and the disciples are not yet ready to reveal the secret accurately. They understand that Jesus is the Messiah, but they understand Messiahship in conventional warrior -king terms. This might have fanned the flames of enthusiasm about him, as a potential Deliverer from the Roman yoke, to such an extent that the opposition and envy roused by such widespread attention might have brought his public ministry to an untimely end. In vv. 21-28 Jesus will tell the disciples what to expect from his Messiahship - his death and resurrection - and Peter protests mightily, receiving Jesus sharp rebuke. Jesus will not allow the disciples to reveal his Messiahship that until they understand what that entails. They will not really understand until they see the resurrected Christ. That will come soon enough. Jesus will begin his journey to Jerusalem and the cross at 19:1. 4) MEDITATION (What the Word suggests to me): a) We read the Word again. b) Select the word or a brief phrase which touched you or impressed you. Repeat this word/phrase aloud and slowly 3 times. Between each repetition allow a moment of silence for the Word to penetrate into our hearts. c) We will remain silent for 3 minutes, and let the Lord speak to us. d) We now share what the Lord has given us in this word. We avoid discussions or sermons or comments on what others have said. We share what the Lord has told us personally by using such expressions as, To me this word has said 5) QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION: (What the Word asks me) a) Do I constantly try to deepen my relationship with Christ through prayer and meditation? b) What is it in my life that competes for first place in my life? c) Do I take interest in the problems, successes and challenges of the Church in the world? d) Am I still bound by unforgiveness toward someone? 6) WORD OF LIFE (What the Word reminds me): You are the Son of the living God
Page 11 of 11 7) ACTION (What the Word invites me to do): I will do some research on how Christians in other countries live their faith. 8) PRAYER (What the Word makes me pray): PSALM 138 Lord, your love is eternal; do not forsake the work of your hands. I will give thanks to you, O LORD, with all my heart, for you have heard the words of my mouth; in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise; I will worship at your holy temple. I will give thanks to your name, because of your kindness and your truth: When I called, you answered me; you built up strength within me. The LORD is exalted, yet the lowly he sees, and the proud he knows from afar. Your kindness, O LORD, endures forever; forsake not the work of your hands. And may the blessing of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit descend upon us and with us remain forever and ever.