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St. Peter’s on the Rock

The Rev. Thomas W. Simmons

Here we are on Sunday morning. We are the Church.  We are St. Peter’s church, which is kind of neat with our patron saint so prominently featured in the Gospel. All of us rolled out of bed this morning, got dressed, hopped in the car and drove here for a reason.

Some of you may have come for the first time out of some curiosity or need, searching for something here you haven’t found anywhere else.  For others, coming to church is a decades old habit. It’s what you do on Sunday morning.  Others of you come because this is where your friends are. Or maybe you do it for your children, so they can have a strong foundation – like the rock that Jesus speaks of in our Gospel lesson. 

Others come to church for the community and meaning which are so often lacking in our fragmented world.  Maybe you come to volunteer to help others, or simply because you love God and want to worship and have communion with Jesus at this altar.  Maybe you don’t know WHY you are here.

Whatever the reason, here we are together.  This is church for us: this place, these people, those pews, this altar, our music and mission and classes and fellowship and all the great things going on around here.

But the Church is more than these, isn’t it? We need to remind our selves of that from time to time.  How often do we pause and step out of our weekly experience of church to reflect on the larger realities of Church?

Our Gospel lesson this morning helps us do that. It mentions the Church for the first time in the New Testament and is really a charter – the Magna Carta if you will – establishing the character and mission of the Church. 

All this happens in the exchange between Jesus and his disciples, way up north on the shore of the Mediterranean, in Caesarea Philippi.  This conversation is the climax of Matthew’s narrative of everything Jesus has been saying and doing and all the intense speculation and anticipation swirling around him. 

It’s all been building to this point.  Everyone is asking, who is this man?  Well now Jesus quizzes his disciples. “What’s the word on the street?  Who do people think I am?”  Then he gets down to brass tacks and asks what they think.

Well, Simon, who has emerged as a spokesman and leader of the group, gets it right.  He doesn’t see Jesus like the crowds do.  He has learned from God that Jesus is THE ONE: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God!” 

What a confession of faith!  Jesus is impressed and blesses Simon and grants him a new name.  As with Abraham and Jacob, a new name means a new mission:

“You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it.”

Jesus says he’s building a new ‘ecclesia’, a new community, a Church on the rock – and it’s not the famous wrestler who always has something cooking, or the Prudential insurance company. And it is not a Chevy pickup.  It is St. Peter, who has just confessed the true identity of Jesus.

In our Old Testament lesson Isaiah points to Abraham as an example of faith for God’s people saying, “ look to the rock from which you were hewn.”  Jesus does much the same here with Peter, calling the disciples and us to behold his bold confession of Jesus as the rock on which true Christian community is built.

That means the Church is more than our various weekly experiences of it. It is “at rock bottom” a movement based on God’s revelation to people who know Jesus and boldly proclaim him, as Peter did.  Belonging thus means believing in and proclaiming Jesus .  That’s the rock on which the Church continues to be built.

But Jesus’ declaration has become the most controversial statement in all of Holy Scripture.  Centuries after Peter’s death the Bishop of Rome used it to assert his absolute primacy, as successor to St. Peter, over the whole Church.  Before that he was widely viewed as “first among equals,” as Peter was in the New Testament. The birth of the papacy led to the Great Schism 1000 years ago when the Orthodox Church rejected the new authority of the Pope. 

That’s history.  The important thing is that however you view Rock, it is good to know that the Church is built on it because in this world few things are permanent.  Just think about recent news this summer.  

Some of our most trusted institutions have proven untrustworthy.   On Wall Street we hear of fraud in the boardrooms of companies people used to trust with their investment dollars and retirement funds.  And then there’s professional baseball, that great American institution, threatening to strike.  It seems to be as greedy and hollow as a bankrupt corporation.

The Church has problems, too.  In the Roman Catholic Church we hear of predatory priests and bishops who hear no evil, see no evil. And in the Episcopal Church we have a bunch of bishops on the loony left proclaiming political correctness as though it were the Gospel.  Some “rock,” eh?

Well, despite it all Jesus assures us that the ancient faith we confess and the Christian community gathered around this altar is built upon the rock and the gates of Hell will not prevail against us.

That’s the second thing Jesus says about the Church. “The gates of Hades will not prevail against it.” Jesus is building the Church in the midst of cosmic conflict.  There is a war on and we are right in the middle of it with him. 

We are like Frodo Baggins, the modest, peaceful little Hobbit from the Shire who finds himself at the center of the titanic struggle between the Evil Lord Sauron and those who protect the peace and light and life of the world. Frodo is an unwilling participant in the war, but a combatant nonetheless.

The same is true of you and me.  By joining the confessing community of Christ, you enter the fray .  Just look at the liturgy of baptism.  In it we renounce “Satan and the spiritual forces of evil that rebel against God.”  Next are ”the evil powers of this world which corrupt and destroy the creatures of God,” followed by “every evil desire that draws us from the love of God.” 

These three are our enemies, the true, spiritual “axis of evil.” In the baptismal covenant we vow to “continue to resist evil and whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord.”  Think of it as baptism by fire.  And think of how many dear brothers and sisters in Christ have been martyred for it. In the Islamic world today, Christian converts are routinely executed after being baptized.

“We wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against…spiritual forces of wickedness.”  As Christians we are on the front lines of this struggle. Do you feel it?  To be blind to this conflict is to lose it.  But thankfully, despite our weakness, we are promised victory.  The gates of hell will not prevail! 

Did you notice the wording here? Gates are defensive bulwarks used as protection from assault.  Jesus portrays the Church storming the gates of hell and winning, like little Frodo and his band attack the very heart of Mount Doom.  That’s a fundamental mindset that we need to reclaim for ourselves as we face the evils and uncertainties and opportunities of the world around us. 

Learn to look at the world with the new eyes Jesus gave his disciples when he told them, “All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me. Go therefore into all the world and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.”

Peter and the apostles had this mindset and they succeeded against all odds. And here we are today as a result.  We are the Church.  And we have the same job to do in our generation.  Just look at the new neighborhoods springing up around us. This is our world. It isn’t the gates of hell, but this is where the battle is fought and won through our humble proclamation and hospitality and love.

This is Jesus’ world and he has established our little Christian community here, St. Peter’s Church, on the Rock. We have been born in cosmic conflict and Jesus tells us to step forth boldly to claim the victory. That’s our call this morning as St. Peter’s Church.  AMEN