Genesis 1:1-5 1 In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. 2 Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters. 3 And God said, “Let there be light,” and there was light. 4 God saw that the light was good, and he separated the light from the darkness. 5 God called the light “day,” and the darkness he called “night.” And there was evening, and there was morning—the first day.
These are the very first words of Scripture. They reveal that God, our Creator, is purposeful in everything He does and with everything He says. When God speaks, He means to. When He creates, He means to. What God declares is what He intends. When He said, “Let there be light, He meant to say that, and He meant for light to be the result.” And there was light. God doesn’t have to formulate a plan. He knows the end from the beginning (Isaiah 46:9). He doesn’t hesitate when He moves or creates. He doesn’t have to weigh pros and cons before speaking. He isn’t unsure about some part of His creation, wondering if He did the right thing by creating what He created or by creating it the way He created it. He never takes His words back. He never has to.
God knows the end from the beginning for all of history, so when He speaks it is with confident authority. He means what He says, and He says what He means. I personally like that about Him. I like knowing where He stands. I like knowing where the boundaries are. I like knowing that I can count on what He says and that I can have confidence in what He says.
I never have to question God’s intent because it is always perfect, and it is always good. He called everything that He created, “good.” That gives me a whole lot of security. I can trust everything God says, and I can trust the motive behind everything He says. God isn’t sneaky. He isn’t trying to trick us or trap us. He doesn’t talk trash. He doesn’t play games when He speaks. He doesn’t use words to manipulate us. He speaks to reveal who He is, what He can do, and what His plans are for everything He has created.
I posted recently on Facebook that God’s will, will never contradict God’s Word. Someone commented on my post and said this: “Let’s not assume to limit God’s will to what was recorded by the inspired hand of men centuries ago. Our God is not limited. God continues to live and speak.” I know where this person stands on some topics, and it is different from where I stand and where the Word of God stands. Instead of reading God’s Word as God’s intent and understanding that everything God declares is right and good, he interprets the Word of God through current cultural trends and adds to the Word of God, twisting both its “good”-ness and intent. That, my friends, is a perversion of the Word of God. My response to Him was simply this: I agree that God is still speaking, but what He says will never contradict what He has already said. Never.
You can rely on what God has declared. You can trust what He has said. You can lean on His promises. You can build your life on His Word. You can act with confidence on what God has declared. Have I driven my point home yet? When we doubt His Word, when we question it, when we view it as one of many options, when we forget about it, when we neglect it, when we disobey it, there will be chaos and confusion. We won’t know what is right or what is good, and they are always the same thing.
Fall in love with the Word of God. Commit to reading it. Spend time meditating on it. You can’t get too much of the Word of God. You can’t overdose on the Word of God!
Take the Word in because once you do, it will take over in you. It will undergird you and direct you. You will instinctively begin making right and good choices. Oh, how we need God’s Word to be a lamp unto our feet and a light unto our path (Psalm 119:105). The Word will protect you from your feelings. Oh my, how we need it to protect us from our feelings! Our feelings are fickle. They are up one day and down the next. They will betray us and lead us astray. Our feelings are informed by our circumstances and by other people. Why do we allow our circumstances and other people to override the Word of God? Which is more reliable? Which will give us better perspective? The Word will protect us from the devil! Oh, how invaluable is the Word as it makes us wise to the devil’s schemes. The Word will enable us to overcome temptation. Oh, how we need to have power to resist temptation, to see it for the trap that it is.
There is only one person who wants to pervert the Word of God. There is only one person who wants us to doubt God’s Word, to doubt God’s intentions, to doubt God’s “good”ness. It is Satan. Satan doesn’t want there to be order from chaos. That is what happened in the beginning of time. God brought order to chaos through Creation. He did that in and through His Word. Satan wanted to bring chaos to order by twisting the Word of God. Satan doesn’t want us to view God as the authority on what is good or right. He wants us to think we should be the ones to decide what is good and right. Satan is always at work to set us up for a fall. Satan wants to keep us from our best life. We see it in the way he twisted the Word of God to deceive Adam and Eve. He comes at us in those moments when the fight or flight instincts have kicked in, those moments when feelings overwhelm us, and fear takes over. He wants to elevate our feelings and our circumstances over what God has said.
When we are afraid, that is the moment to trust in the Word of God. Psalm 56:3-4 says, 3When I am afraid, I put my trust in You. 4In God, whose word I praise—in God I trust. I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?
When we are overwhelmed by unwanted circumstances, that is the moment to trust in the Word of God. Turn to your neighbor and tell them, “In every situation, trust the Word, and especially when you are confused or afraid.” Don’t let your feelings make you forget or doubt God’s words or His goodness. His character backs up His words and His words back up His character.
Now, let me preach this message. We’re going to Matthew 16 in a second. Get there on a hard copy or on your Bible app. One day, Jesus asked the disciples what they believed about Jesus’ identity. They told Jesus what the word on the street was about Him. They told Jesus that some people thought Jesus was John the Baptist. John the Baptist brought a message of repentance. Repentance was certainly an element of Jesus’ message. You could see why some people would confuse Jesus and John the Baptist. Some thought He was like Elijah who worked miracles. No doubt Jesus did amazing things, things that couldn’t be explained apart from the Divine power of God. They were bonified miracles. Others thought He was like Jeremiah or one of the other prophets. Jesus spoke with a prophetic voice for sure. But He was more than a messenger like John the Baptist. He was more than a miracle worker like Elijah. He was more than a prophet like Jeremiah.
Then, in a dramatic and pointed moment, Jesus locked eyes with Peter, and He said, “Peter, what about you? Who do you say that I am?” And without hesitation, without flinching, Peter boldly said in Matthew 16:16, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” 17 Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon (Peter) son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven.
What a declaration! What a proclamation! Wow! God had revealed to Peter who Jesus was. He had been given special, divine grace to see that Jesus wasn’t just a miracle worker, or a simply a prophet or a wise, spiritual teacher, but He was the Messiah! He was the very Son of God. Peter had been choking that back for some time. He had been holding that information in. He had been chomping at the bit to say it out loud. It was like graduation day for Peter. He was graduating “Magna Cum Laude” from the first class of disciples.
I wonder when it had been revealed to him. I wonder how long he had known about Jesus’ true identity. I believe he shouted it with great joy and conviction, and what I want you to see is what immediately follows. It contains the words of Jesus, words that Peter shouldn’t forget, words that should shape Peter, words that should embolden Peter, words he should be able to cling to in any situation because when Jesus speaks, He means what He says, and He says what He means.
Here they are: 18 And I tell you that you are Peter,[b] and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades[c] will not overcome it. 19 I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be[d] bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be[e] loosed in heaven.”
In response to Peter’s proclamation about Jesus being the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, Jesus spoke words of intent, words of declaration over Peter. Jesus’ response showed His commitment to be at work in Peter. The name, “Peter,” means “rock.” Impetuous Peter, impulsive Peter, was an unlikely rock, but Jesus could see something in Peter beyond where Peter was in that moment and even beyond where he would be just a bit down the road. Jesus’ intent was that Peter would become a solid Christ-follower, someone that would be reliable and could be counted on, someone who would not only proclaim Jesus’ full identity in front of the disciples, but someone who would preach it to the masses.
Jesus declared that it was Peter’s profession of faith in Christ as Lord, as the Messiah, as the Son of God, that profession was the building block for His Church. Peter, the “rock” would become a “living stone” in the Kingdom of God. That’s how I Peter 2:4-5 puts it. Every believer becomes a living stone, a building block in God’s Church. Peter may not have viewed himself that way, but the words had been spoken. Listen, when God speaks a word, He doesn’t take it back. It doesn’t go under review. It doesn’t have be approved by someone else. It cannot be canceled. It is done. What God declares, He will accomplish, and He not only said that Peter’s assessment of Jesus was accurate, but He was saying that Peter would have authority to be a building block in God’s Church, that Peter would have authority and power to bind and loose whatever needed to be bound or loosed here on earth as Jesus gave him the keys to do so. Peter’s assessment had been approved by Jesus and Peter’s authority could now be accessed because of Jesus’ words. Listen, what Jesus approves and what Jesus gives us access to cannot be limited or stolen by anyone. Not even Satan and all of the powers of Hell can stop what Jesus sets in motion when He gives approval and access!
Jesus would build His Church as people embraced the same declaration as Peter did, and He would build His Church using living stones like Peter. Peter had a Kingdom role to play. Jesus said it, and Hell itself couldn’t undo what Jesus had spoken.
Are you with me this morning? Jesus was promising to work in Peter, to build something using Peter as one of His building blocks. He declared it because Peter declared Christ as Lord and Messiah.
When Jesus handed Peter the keys to bind and loose, He was imparting to Peter that the world’s systems and the world’s people, and the circumstances of the world and even threats from Satan himself weren’t supposed to rule over Peter. Peter was to live with the authority of Heaven from that day forward.
Fast forward to moments just before the crucifixion. Jesus was arrested by some soldiers and a mob sent from the religious elite and was being questioned by the Sanhedrin. We read this in Matthew 26:
69 Now Peter was sitting out in the courtyard, and a servant girl came to him. “You also were with Jesus of Galilee,” she said. 70 But he denied it before them all. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he said.
71 Then he went out to the gateway, where another servant girl saw him and said to the people there, “This fellow was with Jesus of Nazareth.” 72 He denied it again, with an oath: “I don’t know the man!”
73 After a little while, those standing there went up to Peter and said, “Surely you are one of them; your accent gives you away.” 74 Then he began to call down curses, and he swore to them, “I don’t know the man!”
Two servant girls and a few bystanders, people without any real authority became a threat to the guy who had been given the special, authoritative keys by Jesus. As I read this, I think of how I might react if I was watching it in a movie theater. I could see it as a movie in my mind. Can you picture it with me? The first servant girl comes up to Peter and says, “I saw you with Jesus.” Peter starts to hem-haw and stammer. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. You can see the instant nerves on his face, and very quickly he caves by saying he doesn’t know what she is talking about. I’m sitting there, in the theater, with my popcorn, extra butter, thinking, “Where are your keys, Peter? Have you forgotten what Jesus said, Peter?”
Peter distances himself from the heat of the moment by moving out to the gateway, but another servant girl sees him and tells those around him that she had seen him with Jesus. Peter looks down and starts to wring his hands, a bead of sweat forms on his brow, and as I take another bite of my popcorn, extra butter, I whisper out loud, “Peter, get your keys out of your pocket! Have you forgotten that Jesus has given you binding and loosing authority and that He wants to use you to build His Church?” Peter takes an additional step with his second response, and he said he didn’t know Jesus. In disbelief, I take a drink of my biggie Diet Coke and toss back another handful of popcorn, extra butter, as I stare at the screen in disbelief.
In the third scene we see a few people gathered around Peter, accusing him of not only knowing Jesus, but of being one of his followers. I nervously shove a handful of my popcorn, extra butter, into my mouth, but I can’t take it anymore, and I jump to my feet and spit the popcorn out of my mouth shouting, “Peter, where are your keys? Jesus gave you keys. Did you leave them at home? Did you lose them? Where are your keys, Peter?” After I apologize to the people sitting around me for spilling my popcorn, extra butter, all over them, my blood feels like it is draining from my body, and I sit down slowly because it didn’t take long for me to realize that I’m often just like Peter.
Often, in the heat of the moment, when fear begins to seize me, when people seem to be coming at me, when circumstances seem to be overtaking me, when the world and the opinion of other people starts to feel like pressure, when it might seem that my back is to the wall, I sometimes forget what God’s Word has said. I forget the authority I have been given as a Christ-follower. I forget that when I got saved, I was also handed a set of keys. I forget that God holds my future in His hands. I fail to acknowledge the presence of the Holy Spirit who is there to help me. I sometimes forget to turn to the ultimate Rock and Refuge in prayer. Like Peter, I sometimes drop my keys.
God’s Words are the keys we need in every situation. We can open doors and shut doors by declaring and standing on the Word of God. Peter listened to the world instead of to the Word. He let fear speak louder than His faith in Who Jesus is and in what He had come to do.
Have you been there? Have you been caught off guard by an accusation or temptation and forgotten that you have spiritual authority? Have you given your feelings the credibility that is reserved for God’s Word? Have you let the world shape your responses instead of allowing the Word to give you the courage to stand?
Jesus had spoken over Peter. His words prophesied His intent for Peter’s life. He had proclaimed that Peter would proclaim Christ as Lord and that the Church would be built up through that proclamation. Peter didn’t need to fear a couple of servant girls. Peter didn’t have to cower to a few antagonists. Peter didn’t need to question what his future held because Jesus held his future and had spoken as much in Matthew 16.
Good thing for Peter, and us, that God doesn’t have a “three strikes and you’re out” rule. Good thing for Peter, and us, that God anticipates our moments of failure and weakness. Good thing for Peter, and us, that Jesus doesn’t give up on those who confess Him as Lord. Peter was restored and went on to preach powerful messages that saw thousands of people coming to believe in Jesus. He went on to become the living stone that Jesus had said he would become.
What does God want you to take away today? You can trust God’s Word because what He declares, He intends. What He declares is good and right, and you can trust it. What He declares becomes an invitation for you to be used of Him when you lean on and obey what He has said.
When we choose the world over the Word or when we choose our feelings over the Word, we are going against what God has declared, what God intends, against what is good and right and away from the opportunity to be used of Him. Jesus sees something in you that is beyond where you are in this moment. It might even be beyond where you find yourself just down the road. Don’t take your cues from culture. Don’t let your feelings inform your faith. Trust what God says and watch Him fulfill every Word He has spoken.
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