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The Testing

   Written by on April 17, 2015 at 12:11 pm

Written on the bathroom wall of an Atlanta divinity school are Jesus’ words in Matthew 16:13, and following. “Jesus asked Peter, ‘Who do men say that I am?’”  Below it someone wrote, “And Peter said, ‘Thou art Tillich’s ground of our being. Thou art Emmanuel Kant’s categorical imperative.’ And Jesus said, ‘What?!’”

logo-crotts-stephenThe episode this joke is taken from in Matthew 16 is interesting. For some time now Jesus had been both teaching and testing His twelve disciples. He healed the blind, taught in parables, fed the 5,000, calmed the storm and exorcised demons.

Now Jesus walked the apostles 25 miles north to Banius, sometimes called Caesarea Philippi. He tested them on all they’d seen and heard. Banius can be called the Mount Rushmore of ancient deities for there is a long high rock cliff there filled with temples to all sorts of gods. The site was sacred to the Jews since one third of the headwaters of the Jordan River flows out of an underground spring at the base of the cliff. It was sacred to the Roman Empire because Caesar Augustus had built a gleaming white marble temple deifying himself for citizens to worship him. And it was sacred to the  god Pan and his nymphs as one of the caves there held his temple. Pan was part man and part goat, who chased young virgins and indulged in sensuality. His flute was seductive for women and the word panic comes from his name; young girls panicked when he approached. The deep cave from whence the spring rose and flowed was called The Gates of Hades. Ancients believed the water flowed from deep in the earth, Hades itself.

So it was here that Jesus tested the twelve. “Who do men say that I am?” And the disciples answered, “Some say you are a prophet. Others call you Elijah. Still others think you’re John the baptizer risen from the dead.” And Jesus must have looked at the religious “Mount Rushmore” of “deities” in the cliff. He pointed to the power of religion in the Jewish site where the Jordan River rises, He swept His hand past Caesar’s temple representing the power of government. He looked at Pan’s niche to the power of sensuality, and He looked into His disciples’ faces and pressed, “But who do you say that I am?”

It was Peter who first found his voice. He rejected the deification of politics, dead religion built on self-righteous achievement, and unbridled sensuality. Jesus had given him a new option. And Peter took it.

“Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living God,” Peter worshipped. And Jesus commended Peter. He called Peter’s confession a rock on which He would build His church. And Christ added, “Not even the gates of Hades can stand against it.” Not sensuality or governments or any dead or dying religion.

This text causes you to stand on Banius and stare into the religious options etched into our own society. There is the sensuality of Hollywood, the hope of rightwing politics, the religion whereof one earns his standing before God by one’s own good works. Then there is Jesus—the teacher, healer, feeder of 5,000, calmer of storms—and the one who will die for your sins and rise from the dead.

Who will you choose? Where will you kneel to worship? Who do you say Jesus is?

The Reverend Stephen Crotts is pastor of Village Presbyterian Church in Charlotte Court House, VA. He is also the director of the Carolina Study Center, Inc., a campus ministry, located in Chapel Hill, NC. Pastor Crotts may be reached at carolinastudycenter@msn.com.

About Stephen Crotts

The Reverend Stephen Crotts is pastor of Village Presbyterian Church in Charlotte Court House, VA. He is also the director of the Carolina Study Center, Inc., a campus ministry, located in Chapel Hill, NC. Pastor Crotts may be reached at carolinastudycenter@msn.com.

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