Proper 16 -- Isaiah 51: 1-6; Psalm
138; Romans 11:
33-36; Matthew 16:
13–20
A homily by Fr. Gene
Tucker, given at The
Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Springfield, Illinois on Sunday, August 24, 2014.
“ANTICIPATION…REALITY…CHANGE”
(Homily text: Matthew 16: 13-20)
This past
week, we took some time to go to Nebraska to see some of the sites where I grew
up. One of the things we did was to
retrace the route that we used to take to go see my mother’s parents, who lived
in a small town in the east-central part of the state.
I thought
back to those wonderful days, and especially about the anxious expectation of
getting to go see Grandma and Grandpa.
My sisters and I would count down the days until it was time to go.
And then,
our expectations were fulfilled as we made our way to their house. What we had waited for became a reality.
The time we
spent with our grandparents made for wonderful memories, and, in retrospect, I
have to say that those experiences changed each of us significantly for all
time.
Hopefully,
each one of us will have one or more fond memories that are similar to the one
I’ve outlined here: Life experiences
that we anxiously waited for, that came to be, and that changed us forever.
Anticipation,
reality, change: Each of these things
are present, either explicitly or by inference, in Peter’s confession of Jesus
as the Christ. Leaving aside the weighty
matters about “binding and loosing”, and the concerns about exact role of
leadership that the Lord assigned to Peter,[1]
let’s concentrate this morning on Peter’s confession itself.[2]
Anticipation
was keen among many of God’s people in Jesus’ day, as many Jews expected that
God would provide a Messiah, a Christ,[3]
who would come to deliver His people.
And in the
incident that is before us in our gospel reading for today, Jesus affirms that
this anxiously held hope has become a reality with His arrival.
If we put
ourselves in the disciples’ place, the interchange between Peter and Jesus must
have been earthshaking. Imagine being
told that the very person you had been waiting for is now present, that the
Christ was standing there in your midst!
What sorts
of thoughts must have raced through the disciples’ minds? Did they think about what this person, this
Jesus, would do as the Christ? Would He
bring the ancient kingdom of David back into being, with all of its glory and
power? Would He conquer the hated Romans
and throw them out of the Promised Land?
Would there be a new and wonderful era of prosperity for God’s people?
Those
thoughts and perhaps many more may have gone through their minds. We can’t be exactly sure, but the
possibilities that have been mentioned here are certainly plausible ones.
However, we
can be sure that all these thoughts carried with them the promise of permanent
change.
As time
went along, Jesus’ followers gradually understood that a new and glorious
kingdom had, indeed, come into being. Of
course, the nature of that kingdom and the scope of it couldn’t be grasped at
the time. It is safe to say, however,
that this new kingdom of heaven wouldn’t be confined to the area of the
Promised Land itself. Nor would this new
kingdom be a kingdom that would last for the lifetime of the Christ, the
Messiah, and His successors…..this new kingdom would last for all eternity, and
it would be worldwide in its scope, encompassing not only God’s chosen people,
but all peoples everywhere.
Gradually,
the disciples understood that they were caught up in this wonderful, vast,
divine drama, which Christ had brought into being.
You and I
today are now caught up in this wonderful kingdom of heaven. We have become citizens of a vast kingdom,
numbering millions and millions of people who have come to faith in Jesus, the
Christ, down through the centuries. We
see only a portion of the kingdom, the part that is made up of those who are
living now. But there is another, unseen
part, made up of those who have gone before us, those who were marked with the
sign of faith.[4]
And so,
armed with this wider understanding of God’s eternal purposes that have become
a reality for us, may we await with anxious longing the coming of the Christ to
each of us, day by day. May we expect to
find Him in our prayer life, and in our Eucharistic worship as we receive Him
in the bread and the wine of Holy Communion.
May we find Him in the pages of sacred Scripture as we read and study
God’s Word written. May we find Him in
the acts of Christian love that other citizen of this eternal kingdom do in
response to the Lord’s commands.
And as we
do all of these things, may we ourselves be changed for today, and for all
eternity.
AMEN.
[1] Peter’s leadership role has been debated
down through the centuries. Roman
Catholics base their belief that Peter was the first Pope on Jesus’ statement
that is found in verses 18 and 19. Other
Christians maintain that the Lord was affirming the reliability of Peter’s
confession, and nothing more. The
gospels and the Book of the Acts of the Apostles affirm that Peter had a unique
leadership role in the Church, at least in its very early years.
[2] This gospel text is also heard on the major
feast of the Confession of St. Peter, observed on January 18th each
year.
[3] The title “Messiah” and “Christ” are
equivalent ones. “Messiah” comes from
the Hebrew, while “Christ” comes from the Greek. Both mean the “Anointed One” of God, the one
upon whom God’s favor rests, the one whom God has appointed for a specific
work.
[4] Traditionally, the part of the kingdom that
is living on earth today is known as the “Church Militant”, while the part of
the kingdom which is made up of those who have died in the Lord is known as the
“Church Triumphant”.
