Isaiah 51:1-6 Psalm 138
Romans 12:1-8 Matthew 16:13-20
The copies of the Greek New Testament indicate that they were written in all capital Greek letters. Hebrew Scripture was also written in single case letters.
In our reading of the English Old and New Testament, we use upper and lower case. We capitalize proper nouns like the names of people. And we capitalize the name of the Most High God, as well as the titles which came to be used in emphasizing the significance and importance of Jesus. And we have read today the famous confession of Peter, Jesus is the Son of God and the Messiah, the Christ, with the capitalization habits of the English language.
Jesus in the Gospels is often portrayed associating himself with a figure known as the Son of Man. This use is consistent with literature available to those whose lives were impinged upon by the Roman occupation of their territory. For centuries, a long oppressed people lived reading superhero genres presenting visions of intervening heroes. One such hero was known from the Book of Daniel and from the apocryphal Book of Enoch. This hero was the Son of Man who would be a history changer.
The presentation of Jesus in the Gospel of Matthew is about five decades after Jesus walked the earth. It is two to three decades after St. Paul's letters were written to the churches in various locales. The word church, a Greek word had gained currency for the naming of the gathered community of Christian believers.
That "the church" had gained proper noun significance in the Gospel of Matthew indicates that having a name for the organization and having published writings meant that a significant institutionalization of the formerly rather informal Jesus Movement groups had begun to take place.
What do we know from the writings of Paul and from other New Testament writers? We know that there was significant disagreement among people who claimed to follow Jesus. Institutionalization occurs to standardize and provide direction and leadership succession within growing communities of people.
We might call the famous dialogue between Jesus and Peter as a presentation of an early "proto-orthodox" instruction for the community. And this dialogue involves a significant inserted anachronism upon the lips of Jesus, which should be a signal to us as readers, that the Risen Christ was speaking through the leaders of the Matthean community and such words were regarded to be channeled words of Jesus himself.
We find in this dialogue between Jesus and Peter, the root for the claim of Petrine Primacy for the bishops of Rome. In the many views that might have existed for telling the significance of Jesus of Nazareth, what standard should be used for the establishment of the people who were called together as the church?
Jesus, is presented as using his self designated title to stimulate and draw out the confession of the disciples or those in the literature who would be stand ins for all disciples who were reading this discipleship manual. "So, guys, I'm known as the Son of Man, this figure referred to in Enoch and Daniel as one who would change the course of human life in our world; and what are the current opinions about me?" Some of the opinions about Jesus? One who had received the prophetic mantle of John the Baptist, or a return of the great prophet Elijah who did not know an earthly death, or like the great suffering prophet Jeremiah, or perhaps like another prophet, such as Ezekiel who was referred to as the Son of Man, or Son of Adam.
But then Jesus asked the disciples directly, "Well, that's what many people are saying, but what do you say, you are are closest to me and who would have the kind of access to me to have reputable insights?"
Peter is the one who often rushed ahead and spoke, even though he was also known as the one who did not fully understand what he spoke about nor did he fully know his own cowardice.
Peter said, "You're more than John the Baptist's successor, you're more than a return of Elijah, Jeremiah or one of the prophets, you are more than the Son of Man, you are Son of God, and you are God's anointed, the One who is to change the direction of the history of the world."
And how does Jesus respond to the confession of Peter? He declares the source of the insight. "Peter, you didn't figure this out on your own, you received this insight from a higher source." You and these insights are going to be the succession of authority for the community which will succeed in this world after me. You and those who agree with this bedrock confession will be what will bind and constitute the church."
We know what has happened historically with the notions of succession in church leadership and in the guaranteeing of the succession of revealed or unveiled beliefs about Jesus. Good and bad things have happened within the communities proclaiming to have orthodox practice, leadership and belief. Sometimes the flesh and blood reality of swords in conquering battles have forced the so-called orthodox belief upon subjugated peoples around the world. And the world needs to be reminded that significance of Christ is only really known through the mystical insight of unforced conversion.
Today, we exist in a world that like the time of the community of the Gospel of Matthew that has many notions about who Jesus is. We have many communities which confess Jesus in ways that result in diverse communities with diverse names and institutions set up for the propagation of their communal visions of Jesus.
What should remain for us today is a holding to the event of mystical conversion. The experience which is not forced by the habit of the community or going along with the crowd or being passively assimilated into a church through infant baptism. What is orthodox is the unforced conversion to the love of Christ which changes our lives with an unforced authority and beckons us to bind and loose through our lives the converting grace of love. Let us ever return to the mystical conversion of the love Christ as the binding orthodoxy of our life practice with those who share the same vision of love. Amen.
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