The statement that accomplishes Matthew 1:1...Matthew 16:13-20...Original languages are crucial

 


The Ptarmigan Towers towering over Lake Nanita on the Lake Nanita trail off of the North Inlet Trail in the RMNP.  To think I was thinking of climbing up there by just looking at a map!  It looks so easy on the map but when I got to the saddle I realized that reality was much different.  I had read in books about others coming from the other way, another trail, but this seemed so much shorter.  Now I know why they wrote of another route.  Here is another shot of just the first tower.


The original languages of our passage help us to see reality.  Without them we can go down a different road that leads away from Christ alone and unto interpretations that elevate a man over the God-man, Jesus Christ.  I was never really good at applying the rules of the English language.  Some of them didn't make sense.  I actually did better understanding the rules of the Spanish language.  So when we dive into the Greek language the use of genders for nouns and them matching up helps me to keep the subjects together.  

Away from a focus on the original languages, this passage would be inconsistent with the rest of the teaching of the Bible if you take it as a man being what the church is built upon.  God's people are given spiritual leadership throughout the Bible but they never take the place of the Messiah, they always point to Him.  The logical answer points to what Peter said rather than Peter himself and especially after what Jesus supplied about where what Peter said came from.  The focus was not on Peter but the God who gave him the answer to Jesus' question of who He was.

2 different words, 2 different definitions, 2 different genders, 2 different subjects that the genders match up with.  All of this is allowed for us to see when we understand the Greek language and how it operates.  Petros (Peter, masculine, small stone connected to the subject "you") and petra (rock, feminine, foundational stone connected to the subject "church").  Whatever "this rock" (feminine) is is not connected to "Peter" (masculine).  "This rock" (feminine) is related to the other subject "church" (feminine) and then you need to find out what "this rock" (feminine petra) is and by gender it can't be Peter (masculine petros).  What is left in the passage is what Peter said that Jesus tells us came not from him but from God.  

I think this is another time that we want to make the words of the Bible about us and take the light off of Jesus.  Jesus is the hero, not us.  We only have what we have because of something done by someone else.  We have responded to what has been done.  Even the opening of the eyes of our heart to see Jesus as the King of kings and the Lord of lords is not of our doing.  As Jesus said, "...for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven." (Matthew 16:17).  We are truly blessed (favored by God because we have received something from Him) but we are not to take credit for it.  

How supreme is the sovereignty of God?  How far does it reach?  These are questions that man on this level will struggle with until the consummation of all time.  We will also struggle with explaining it to His creations.

Adam (sermon link below) 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4iVHVRqhScw&t=932s

A simple man serving a great God and the local pastor of Stillwater Community Chapel (stillwater-chapel.org). We are in our 39th year of full time ministry. God directed us to this local body of believers on the Western Range of the Rockies to grow with them in mission and mindedness of Christ.

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