In this week's text Jesus says to confront a brother or sister who sins against you. If that doesn't work, bring someone with you. If that doesn't work, bring it to the church. If that doesn't work, treat the person as an outsider. It would be easy to misinterpret this passage as a "three strikes and you're out" pattern for church discipline, but that is unlike the Jesus we know in the Gospels. Jesus is giving us personal and persistent patterns for healing the conflicts that inevitably arise among Christians. Unity among believers is as important as health to a body, because when one part hurts, we all suffer.
Jesus is the center of every little thing that happens here. Only Jesus shines like the sun on the mountain. Moses and Elijah speak with him. They are the law and the prophets. They are the Messianic promises rolled together. And when God speaks to Peter, James, and John, he doesn’t say, “Listen to them,” but “Listen to him.” God himself testifies that Jesus is the fulfillment of all things. When Jesus reaches out his healing hand to lift up the disciples, they see no one but Jesus. And that is the point that keeps on coming up in this passage: No one but Jesus … are we ready to listen to him?
Last week we saw Jesus praise Peter for recognizing that Jesus is the Christ, and now moments later Peter gets Jesus completely wrong. Peter recognized the victorious Christ, but he completely missed the need for the suffering Christ, including his death. The two can’t be separated. As we celebrate communion this week, we embrace the sacrifice Jesus made for us on the cross. We must also hear Jesus’s call: “If any of you wants to be my follower, you must turn from your selfish ways, take up your cross, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it.”
Matthew 16 is the first time Jesus presses his disciples to say out loud who they think Jesus really is. Peter gets Jesus right: “You are the Christ, the Son of the Living God.” Jesus grabs that testimony and makes it the foundation for his people – the Church. If as the Church we don’t get Jesus right, we lose our foundation and our identity. May we see Jesus this week as we open his Word. Next week we’ll look at the second part of this scene where Peter gets Jesus all wrong.
This week we are looking at Jesus’ encounter with a Canaanite woman. This woman approaches Jesus with great faith that he will heal her daughter, but Jesus defies our expectations by ignoring her, ostracizing her, and even insulting her. The woman, however, persists in her request. Her actions prove an understanding of Jesus that goes beyond the surface level of his words, and Jesus praises her faith. May we listen beyond the words so that we truly hear the God who speaks.