From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him. ‘Never, Lord!’ he said. ‘This shall never happen to you!’ Jesus turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.’
Matthew 16:21-23 NIVUK
Every culture has re-framed Jesus to look like them. There are sculptures and paintings of a white Jesus, a black Jesus, a tribal Jesus, an Asian Jesus...
This where we Evangelicals look on them disapprovingly and accuse them of breaking the Second Commandment. 'You're not supposed to make any graven images, even of Jesus.' we snort derisorily. 'You can't do this! You can't make Jesus look like you!'
But we do precisely the same thing.
Christians from Europe tend to have a more liberal, more understanding Jesus.
Christians from Africa and Asia have a more moral, stricter Jesus.
White Christians from North America tend to have a more right wing Jesus, who would be packing heat if guns had been invented back then.
Christians from South America tend to have a left-wing, liberationist Jesus, who will redeem them from corruption and violence.
Those appalling televangelists - materialist preachers of health, wealth and prosperity - have an aspirational, financially-savvy Jesus who lives to serve their bank balance.
Eastern Europeans tend to have a conservative Jesus who will not tolerate Westernised sin.
Do you see what's happening? All across the world we are guilty of creating graven images - ironically of the God who told us not to make graven images.
Yet there is one Jesus. And He is none of these things.
The cross itself is the place where all our wrong opinions of Jesus are blown to pieces.
The understanding and sympathetic Jesus? Will He be so understanding of the sin that cost Him His life?
The political Jesus - be it right or left? Most politicians won't even sacrifice their core vote to do what they know is right. Jesus went much further - He sacrificed Himself. If Jesus was nothing but a political leader, then He failed because He was never elected or appointed to a single political role and voluntarily died the death of the very least of His constituents.
The prosperity preacher Jesus? Really? This is utterly implausible. Did Jesus tell us to take up our cross or our luxury spa reservation? He was born into relative poverty, spent time as an exile, refugee and asylum seeker, lived His life as an itinerant preacher without anywhere to lay His head (Matthew 8:20; Luke 9:58) and died in utter deprivation, naked on the cross. So tell me, from where do you get the idea that Jesus came to make us rich? Definitely not from the Bible.
The tough and inflexible Jesus who stands in ruthless condemnation of sin? He's not here...
For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him.
John 3:17 NIVUK
The cross is a weapon. It is explosive. It is corrosive. It utterly destroys any wrong thinking about why Jesus came to the earth.
Do you want absolute proof of this?
Have you ever wondered why Peter is so disturbed by Jesus saying that He will go to the cross and die? Yes, it was beyond horrible and utterly unthinkable.
But there is another reason. You see, before these words, Peter confesses who He believes to be:
Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.’
Matthew 16:16 NIVUK
But Jesus and Peter - and, indeed, the other disciples, had completely different interpretations of who the Messiah was and what He would do.
Look at these verses from other disciples:
One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, ‘Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?’ ‘What things?’ he asked. ‘About Jesus of Nazareth,’ they replied. ‘He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place.
Luke 24:18-21 NIVUK
Then they gathered round him and asked him, ‘Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?’
Acts 1:6 NIVUK
You see, their thinking was that the Messiah would rescue the Jews from the Romans who were persecuting them - He would change their physical circumstances.
And at first glance, we might understand how they could reach this conclusion.
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned. You have enlarged the nation and increased their joy; they rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest, as warriors rejoice when dividing the plunder. For as in the day of Midian’s defeat, you have shattered the yoke that burdens them, the bar across their shoulders, the rod of their oppressor. Every warrior’s boot used in battle and every garment rolled in blood will be destined for burning, will be fuel for the fire.
Isaiah 9:2-5 NIVUK
The Jews had been under Roman oppression for many years before Jesus was born. We can absolutely understand how they could latch onto these verses and long for the Messiah to come even more.
Yet when Jesus came they remained in the same situation. Nothing changed. Even after He was raised to the Father's right hand, nothing changed.
In fact, if anything, it got worse. Most of the disciples who were martyred were martyred by the Romans. Paul himself died in the arena.
So ingrained in the Jewish mind was this idea that Jesus' lack of rebellion against the Romans caused even John the Baptist, Jesus' cousin, to question what was happening (Matthew 11:2-6; Luke 7:18-23).
So why did Peter question Jesus and even rebuke Him for saying He would be crucified?
Because Peter believed Jesus was the Messiah and it was unthinkable for the Messiah to lose so spectacularly against the Romans that He would be crucified.
Still today there are Jews who discount Jesus as Messiah for the same reason and long for someone else to come. They have a hard time dealing with their situation not changing too. And the crucifixion? That just makes things worse, as Paul states in 1 Corinthians:
Jews demand signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling-block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength.
1 Corinthians 1:22-25 NIVUK
But why did this happen? If Jesus is the Messiah, why didn't He rescue the Jews from the Romans? And why doesn't He change our situation right away?
The answer is simple, but deeply profound. Jesus did come to rescue His people from a dreadful tyranny, but one way worse than the Romans. He came to rescue His people from the deadly trifecta of sin, death and hell. And at the head of this deadly trifecta? The devil himself:
And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers; he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.’
Genesis 3:15 NIVUK
The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy; I have come that they may have life, and have it to the full.
John 10:10 NIVUK
The one who does what is sinful is of the devil, because the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the devil’s work.
1 John 3:8 NIVUK
Sin is the root cause of our suffering, of our troubled situations. Simply changing our physical situation for the better is a bit like giving paracetomol to a patient with a brain tumour: it might help ease the symptoms, but it does nothing about the sickness. Jesus came to deal with the fundamental sickness of the human heart.
What we see in these verses is the incredible danger of manufacturing a god of our own making and trying to persuade Jesus to conform to our imagination. He has a laser-like aim to destroy the thing that ails us the most. What drew the stern rebuke in Matthew 16:23 is that Peter was fundamentally at cross-purposes with Jesus - he wanted something different from God's plan.
And this is where everything gets really tough. These days there is a huge rebellion against seeing things in a binary manner - as good or bad. This is all ironic, as the devices people use to make posts defending and supporting a non-binary viewpoint work use binary numbers - either zeros or ones.
Jesus, however, sees everything differently. We are either for Him or against Him. There is no middle ground. There are no grey shades. Our self-declarations matter little to Him. It's a case of either following Him or not.
If we make a Jesus Christ of our own invention that takes away from the abject horror of the cross, of our own fundamental sinfulness and our desperate need for a Saviour, then we are at cross-purposes with God. We are against Him. We are not following Him. We are headed in the opposite direction.
While we set aside the cross and deny its power, we cannot, in all good conscience, call ourselves Christians.
In fact, Jesus goes much, much further.
Jesus turned and said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a stumbling-block to me; you do not have in mind the concerns of God, but merely human concerns.’
Matthew 16:23 NIVUK
Set up a Christ of your own invention, rejecting the cross, and you are on the most wrong side of history.
But if we accept the cross, with its inestimable violence and pain, and its devastating verdict on the sinfulness of human beings and our desperate need to be saved, then we are with Jesus. We are His followers. We are truly Christians.
Peter struggled to deconstruct the Messiah he and his people had constructed for themselves. It took a gentle but loving ministry of the Holy Spirit to win him round.
What about you? Will you follow the fake Christ constructed by a lost and bewildered generation, or will you follow the real Christ?
Even if He leads you to your cross?
Questions
1. In what ways has our generation constructed a fake Christ? How can you ensure that you aren't deceived by this?
2. Why was Peter so strongly rebuked by Jesus?
3. How has this second reaction to the cross shaped your thinking about what Jesus came to earth to do?
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