The Eastside
Baptist Church was constituted 33 years ago, in June 1985 to be a witness to the glory of God. Three goals characterize our church’s ministry:
(i) We are here learning to love God (WORSHIP)
(ii) We are here learning to
love one another (FELLOWSHIP)
(iii) we are here learning to love this lost world
(MISSIONS & EVANGELISM).
We do this all under the auspices of the Eastside Baptist Church.
But what is the church?
What is
the meaning of the word, ‘church’? The English word
‘church’, or the Afrikaans ‘kerk’,
or German ‘Kirche’, or the Oshiwambo
‘ongereka’ are all derived from the Greek word kuriakos, which translates as ‘belonging
to the Lord’ [1]. But the Word
used most commonly in the OT
and NT is the word ‘assembly’.
[OT ‘qahal’ ; NT ‘ekklesia’ ]. It is interesting that
when Martin Luther translated the NT into vernacular German, he did not use the
word “Kirche” to translate ἐκκλησία (ekklesia). He used the German
word “Gemeinde”, which relates to the
word assembly.
Similarly, when William Tyndale
translated the NT into English in 1536, he also did not use the word “church” to translate the Greek word ἐκκλησία (ekklesia). Instead, he used
the word “congregation”[2] – another word for ‘assembly’. But somehow, the word church stuck with us. Taking both words
together then we may say that the church
is the assembly of the people belonging to the Lord. That would surely
constitute a biblical definition of the church.
So then, the church is not an
assembly of a random group of religious people. There are many people
assembling in the name of a religion, and even in the Name of Christ. But they
are not necessarily the church of Jesus. Jesus would say of them: “I never knew you; depart from me you workers of lawlessness.” [Matt. 7:23]. Neither is a church a building. Neither is it a denomination
(e.g. Catholic Church, Lutheran Church, Baptist Church).
The church is the assembled body of a people born again through
the finished work of Christ. They are Spirit-indwelt worshippers of God.
And so the church comes together for the purpose of (i)
worshiping God (ii) fellowshiping with one another (iii) to help the kingdom of God spread in our sinful world in every generation, through evangelistic
and missionary activity.
When you become
a member of a church, this is what you commit yourself to do.
Next time, God
willing, we will take a look at how the early church organised itself in this
regard. We are very aware of the fact
that many people have varied opinions on
the subject of the church and church membership, and my goal is to help you to think through afresh
the primary truths revealed to us
in the Bible concerning the church. This cannot be done in one short sermon, and
so we have decided to do a series of sermons entitled, “Life in the Father’s House”. [3]
Today, we simply want to look at something fundamental
that Jesus said about the church,
and I draw your attention to Matthew
16:13-19, and in
particular to this phrase in v.18 , where Jesus says:
“I will build my church, and the
gates of hell shall not prevail against it .“
Here the Lord Jesus tells you that the church
is His church, and He tells us that, because she is His church, she
cannot fail, as long as this world exists.
The church is God’s and not man’s, and if she is God’s then she cannot
fail. The reason why she fails[4] is
because sinful men continuously attempt to make the church something which God
never designed her to be.
CONTEXT:
We ought to be very aware that the phrase “I
will build my church, and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it “
occurs
in a context, and I must take time to explain this.
In v. 13 we are told that Jesus came into the district of Caesarea Philippi - about 40 km’s north-east of the Sea of Galilee, the
modern Golan heights region. Philip the
Tetrarch, son of Herod the Great inherited the north-eastern part of his
father’s kingdom, all which of course was ultimately under Roman rule. Here he built the city
of Caesarea Philippi, in honour of Tiberius Caesar [Roman emperor from 14 - 37 AD] the reigning Roman emperor, and to distinguish it from the Caesarea on the Mediterranean coast, it was called Caesarea Philippi. It is
here that Jesus asked His disciples a fundamental
question: “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”
It is of great interest
to see where Jesus chose to ask this question. This question was not asked in the
heartland of the Jews. In fact, the area was hardly ever truly possessed by
Israel as their inheritance. This region was scattered with temples of the
ancient Syrian Baal worship. It is here that Mt. Hermon is found, and there is
a place here at the foot of Mt. Hermon where there is a very deep cave, from
which a strong spring flowed, becoming one of the tributaries of the Jordan
river. Apart from all the ancient Baal worship associated with this area and this cave,the Greeks added their
mythology to it, and they
believed that this cave was the birthplace of Pan- the
god of nature. He was
portrayed as a half-goat,
half-human creature, and with horns.
Caesarea Philippi was originally named Panias,
by the Greeks, after this god and today this place is known as Banias.[5]
Now what is significant is that this cave was
also sometimes called the “Gates of Hades”, the gates to the underworld, because it was
believed that Baal would enter and leave the underworld through places where
water came out of it. You will see Jesus
using this phrase in v.18 in
relation to the church. In this
atmosphere and geographic
locality then that Jesus asks, “Who
do people say that the Son of Man is?”
The truth is that the disciples struggled to
truly know who Jesus was and now it is as if Jesus deliberately
set Himself against the background of the world's religions and all their history, and against that background He asks this question.
14 And they said, “Some say John the Baptist, others say Elijah,
and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.” Herod Antipas (the
brother of Philip) who had John the Baptist killed, thought that Jesus
was John
the Baptist who had come back
from the dead. Others said that he was
Elijah etc. They were also saying that Jesus was the forerunner of the Messiah.
The prophet Malachi linked Elijah to the
Messiah "Behold, I will send you
Elijah the prophet before the great and terrible day of the Lord comes"
(Malachi 4:5). To this day religious Jews expect the return of Elijah
before the coming of the Messiah, and to this day they leave a chair vacant for
Elijah when they celebrate the Passover, for when Elijah comes, they know that the Messiah will not be far
away. So the people looked on Jesus as the forerunner of the Messiah. But He was more than that!
Jesus said to
them (v.15) … that is what
others say about me, “But who
do you say that I am?” 16 Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of
the living God.” Peter makes that great statement which
ultimately sets Christ apart from all the great men of the Bible … and which, of
course, sets Him apart from all the human gods. He is the Christ (The Anointed
One, the Son of the living God).
17 And Jesus
answered him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah! For flesh and
blood has not revealed this to you, but my Father who is in heaven. 18 And I tell you, you are Peter,
and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates
of hell shall not prevail against it. 19 I will give you the keys of the
kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in
heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”
Jesus tells Peter
a thing of tremendous
importance: “Peter, this knowledge has come to you not from what the people say,
but from what my Father in Heaven has helped you to see.
You cannot know me naturally. You have to know me supernaturally.”
This is really the basis of biblical
church membership! A true church member is a person who has been helped by God to see Jesus for who He truly is. It is called , the new birth in John Chapter 3.
Now unfortunately the Roman Catholic church have
really messed badly with this text. They say that this text makes Peter the first
pope of the church, and that the present pope Francis, they say, stands
upon Peter’s shoulders having the same
authority! But this is not what Jesus
says here. Let's try to see what Jesus is saying here :
Jesus is using Peter’s name Petros.
His Aramaic name was Cephas. Both names mean ‘rock’. So,
Jesus is using Peter’s name to explain what He
is about to do. In which sense then is Peter, the rock on which Jesus will
build his church? In the Bible God is
often referred to as our Rock, and so Peter cannot possibly replace God. No,
Peter is in a symbolic sense the first stone (the first NT believer) upon which
the Church is founded. He was,
biblically speaking the first man to define and confess who Jesus truly was. And
in ages to come, everyone who makes the same discovery as Peter, joins Peter,
and thus becomes another rock, another stone added into the building of the
Church of Christ. 1 Peter 2:4-8 explains this.
Ephesians 2:20 further explains that ,Jesus is the chief corner-stone. He is the force who
holds the Church together. When Jesus said to Peter that He would build His church on
him, He did not mean that the
Church depended on Peter, in the same way as it would depended on Himself and on God the Rock. He
meant that the Church began with Peter and only in that sense is Peter the foundation of the Church.
Jesus then goes
on to say that the gates of Hades shall
not prevail against his Church. Do you remember the surroundings in which
Jesus spoke these words? Jesus knew
what the church would be up against, and
the book of Acts and subsequent church history bear testimony to the fact
of how the church has had to
battle against the odds and sometimes she has barely survived. And here in in the
shadow of the memory of powerful pagan worship, and the place known as ‘the
gates of hell’ Jesus says ,
“They will not prevail against
you”… “ because I am with you even
until the end of the ages”- using the closing words of the Gospel of Matthew [Matt
28:20].
Here they were
in a place of powerful pagan worship, a place where the gates of Hades were
believed to have been. The
function of gates is to keep things in, to confine them, control them. There
was one person whom the gates of Hades could not shut in; and that was Jesus
Christ. He overcame death[6]. Jesus
is saying here to Peter: "You have
discovered that I am the Messiah, the Son of the living God. The time will soon come
when I will be crucified, and the gates of Hades will close behind me. But they
are powerless to shut me in. The gates of Hades have no power over me!” But Jesus is saying even more. He is not only saying that He is indestructible. He is also saying that the church for which He is laying down His life is
indestructible!
And with that He gives Peter, the first
representative of the church a special sign. He gives to the true church,
represented here by Peter the keys of the
Kingdom. [See also Rev 1:18; 3:7]. And so the authority of Christ on earth came to rest in the true church.
And we see
how this came first true at Pentecost.
The preaching of Peter opened the door to three thousand souls in one day (Acts 2:41) and then many more came. But
it is not only Peter who has the keys of the Kingdom. The church, wherever she
gathers (even as two or three are gathered - Matt
18:20) has it. And into the hands of the church God has committed great
binding and loosening authority (see also Matthew
18:18, where the authority of the church extends to church discipline).
But this text in Matthew 16 is really about the matter of salvation, and in that
sense Peter is the first convert. And the powerful gates of hell that hold so
many prisoners (for all have sinned), cannot withstand the work of the church in prayer and
in the preaching of the gospel.
That is how Ephesus (see Acts 20)
was transformed in Paul’s day. This is how our society is
transformed in our day – by the agency of the
true church of Jesus Christ.
That is how Christ builds His church.
[1] In
this sense it is used in 1 Corinthians
11:20 - “When you come together, it
is not the Lord’s [κυριακόν – kuriakon] supper that you eat” ; Revelation 1:10 “ I was in the Spirit
on the Lord’s [κυριακῆ – kuriake] day, and I heard behind me a loud voice like
a trumpet…”
[3] Dr Wayne Mack and
David Swavely have written a good and helpful book with that title on this subject
[4]
e.g. 5 of the 7 churches in Revelation
2&3 failed
[6] Acts
2:24; Acts 2:27
