Thoughts from Luke 9

Luke 9:18-22

Jesus asks the disciples… “Who do people say I am?”, and then yet another question, “Who do you say I am ?"

He did not reverse the order. If he had, would they have answered the same? We all need a context for our answers. We process information contextually. It is relatively easier for us to report and find answers within the context, or our individual frames of reference. That leads often to many answers. 

There were many answers to the first question, starting from the most recent John the Baptist, to the most distant assumption of being a prophet. Our assumptions are also contextual, as we try and relate current to past experience and attempt to make meaning of it. As far as the disciples were concerned, they were reporting theory. Theorising about God is easy. 

There is report of only Peter answering the next question, which stripped both context and theory away, and leaves every individual stark in the light of their individual answer. The answer is the central answer  for subsequent life. Who is Jesus to me?

Peter says he is the Messiah. That was a moment when heaven parted and angels sang in resonance. A revelation that unveiled Jesus as Him for whom Jews had waited for centuries. Simply expressed in two words. Jesus commends Peter acknowledging the hand of heaven in this revelation. No one can say this with conviction without heavens hand. This knowledge is a revelation. It has no other explanation. It is not an intellectual insight, but an experiential revelation. It makes a difference to the one who confesses it. All other answers and  opinions, regardless of their variance from the truth had not the slightest impact on the true nature of Jesus. He was unmoved by all explanations, being beyond them, but the confession of His true character changes and impacts our lives through our confession. Revelation cannot remain shrouded, but needs to be confessed for its work in us.

If advertised, this revelation could have led to  a premature exaltation by humans.  That would turn the Messiah on a road that led away from Golgotha. Mans path often leads to advertisement and exaltation, which was not where Jesus was headed. So he instructed them not to let this be known. Revelation can be personal at any time, but public revelation has a God ordained time.

And then he went on to tell them how He would suffer many things, be rejected, be killed and be raised.

The consequence of this revelation has to lead us to the cross where He was crucified. It is His death that brings us life. He was the master of the universe, yet, chose to permit his hands that flung stars into space to be nailed to some wood. For a time. He permitted it.

We will be able to follow Him only when we understand what it meant for Him to permit it. What He was doing for us. We could distort the meaning of all of Christian life if we do not understand the centrality of verse 22. For so often, the cross becomes our circumstances, those we have to put up with, our troubles and our problems, which actually makes mockery of the cross and His death. It is not about us. It is about God on a cross for us. Often, we climb up on that cross and become martyrs distorting the gospel, for the gospel is not about us. It is about Him. 

God with us. God on a cross, God ascended into heaven, God who is to come again.