Matthew-051

 

We will study Matthew 16:13-20 in the Word of God today.

Here are some points to note about this passage before I begin to expound it. The Aramaic word bar means son. So Peter is the son of Jona. The Greek word for Peter is petros, and the Greek word for rock is petra. I mention the words petros and petra because these words do not come out in the English but are evident in the Greek.

Then verse 19b, “whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” applies not only to Peter but also to all Jesus’ disciples to whom exactly the same words are spoken in Matthew 18:18

Finally, many people are puzzled why Jesus told his disciples not to tell others that he was the Christ in verse 20. Quite simply, this is because the Jews had the wrong concept of Christ. They thought about Christ in terms of a political leader, who would deliver them from the power of Rome and establish Israel as a political force in the world; the Jews at that time had the wrong concept of Christ. And when you realize this, you will understand why the Lord Jesus told his disciples not to say that he was the Christ. It’s not that he didn’t want them to know that he is the Lord and the Savior, but he didn’t want them to misunderstand him as a political Christ.

 

What is the rock? On what is the church built?

Today, what I particularly want to study with you in this passage concerns this matter of Peter. We turn to Matthew 16:18 [NIV] where the Lord Jesus said,

Hades represents the underworld, the world of spirits, the world of the departed dead. So “the powers of death,” as the RSV has translated it, has rather limited the area. There is a Hebrew and a Greek word for “death.” If the Lord Jesus wanted to say death, He could use the word “death,” but he uses the word “Hades” to widen the sphere, the powers that relate to death. The powers of the underworld, the powers of spiritual darkness will not prevail against the church. Why? Because the church is built upon the rock.

The question is: What is rock? What is the church built upon? It is very important to understand. What does Christ build God’s church on? The Roman Catholic Church’s answer to this question is, the church is built on Peter. What a pitiful foundation for a church! Did Christ build God’s church on Peter? Do you see any teaching in the Bible that the church is built on Peter? No. Why the Roman Catholic Church was saying this was to justify their papal system; why there are popes. And in order to justify the papal system, they say, “The church is built on Peter. That’s what it says here: “You are Peter and I build my church on you.” Of course, it is a very great danger if you allow theological considerations to govern your exposition of the Bible.

The Lord Jesus did not say, “You are Peter and I build my church on you.” That is not what he said.

The church is built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus Christ as the chief cornerstone

When we compare elsewhere in Scripture, you will find, for example, in Ephesians 2:20, that the church is not built on Peter alone, he is just one of those “apostles and prophets.” Ephesians 2:20 says that the church is “built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone.” The church is built on those men of God who can rightly be called “apostles and prophets,” those leaders of the church who serve as the foundation of the church.

When you go to Revelation 21:14, you will find that the servants of God, the apostles serve as a foundation of the church. But the funda­mental foundation, as we read in 1Corinthians 3:11 is that Christ is the foundation and the cornerstone. (Eph. 2:20) So there is Christ, the fundamental foundation; there is the secondary foundation of the apostles and prophets on which the church is built.

But that is not my question when I ask: On what is the church built? The Lord Jesus’ reply here is that it is built upon the rock. So I am not talking about on who but on what is the church built in this question. And the answer is: it is upon the rock.

What does “rock” mean? The Lord Jesus told us to build our lives upon the rock in Matthew 7:24-25. The Lord Jesus says,

Now the Lord Jesus is not like many preachers who preach one thing and do something else. When he teaches us to build our life upon the rock, he himself builds his house, his church upon the solid rock.

 

Name change from Simon to Cephas (Peter), symbolizes character change

Before we begin to examine this word “rock” and what it means. Notice he said to Peter, “You are Peter.” What we need to know about this is that Peter was originally called Simon. In Luke 6:14 you will find that Peter was not originally called Peter, but the Lord Jesus gave him the name Peter. “Your name is Simon but now you shall be called Cephas (which is “Peter” in Greek)” (Jo. 1:42). “Cephas” is the Aramaic word for “Peter,” which means a stone, a part of a rock. A stone is a piece of rock; it comes from a bigger piece of rock, but it is of the same character and nature of that rock.

So what is the Lord Jesus doing when he tells Peter that his name will be changed? I have expounded this point before and I shall not expound it again in detail. It signifies that Peter’s character will be changed. In the Bible, the name signifies character. When we speak of God’s name, we mean his person, his character. A change of name means a change of character. The Lord Jesus is saying to Peter, “Your name is Simon right now, but it’s going to be changed to Peter, because I am going to change you completely. I’m going to transform you. I’m going to make a new person out of you. You are going to become a new person, but not just any kind of a new person. What kind of a new person? It is in that name, “Peter.” You are going to be changed from Simon to this new person who can be described as rock or stone.

Now you would say, “What a funny name to give to a person. What is wrong with “Simon”? You don’t call him Simon but you call him a stone. From now on, your name is going to be “Stone.” What’s nice about being called a stone? There is a reason for that if we are going to understand this passage.

 

“Rock” in the Old Testament

To understand that, we have to go into the Old Testament to realize what the meaning of rock is. I am sure when you read the Psalms, you would have come upon this expression “rock” many times, and you will find that “rock” is constantly applied as a title of God himself. There are so many references. In fact, there are two different Hebrew words, both meaning rock which are applied to God in the Old Testament. I will just give you the references from the Psalms. They are not limited to the Psalms and I cannot give you all the references as there are far too many. For example, the first word for rock, the Hebrew word, selah, you will find in Psalms 18:2; 31:3; 42:9.

There is another word for rock, the much more common one in modern Hebrew, the word sur, and this word appears in Psalms 18:31, 46; 28:1; 62:2.

In Psalm 18, “rock” occurs three times; and the two Hebrew words for “rock” are found in verse 2:

What a beautiful verse this is! So beautiful! God is my rock. Two times in this one verse, he speaks of God as rock.

 

God is “rock” for he is steadfast and unchanging

Now what impression does the word “rock” give you? Why is he calling God rock? What is so nice about calling God a rock? Of course, rock expresses stability. It expresses strength, an unchanging cha­racter. The earth moves, the sand moves, the trees collapse, but the rock is the picture of strength and steadfastness, of enduring quality. So the rock pictures God, who is “the same yesterday, today and forever,” and this character is also manifested by Jesus, his Christ (Heb. 13:8). This character does not change. This is the picture that is being expressed here. The steadfastness, the faithfulness of God, his power, his incorruptibility, all these elements are there in the rock.

Then in Psalm 18:31-32: [NJB]

Again, this expression of strength, steadfastness, power is present. Then verse 46:

Again, this expression of rock expresses the character of God, his power of salvation whereby God becomes our refuge and our strength, the rock in whom we can hide to be secure.

 

The church’s second foundation: Transformed men with God’s character

Once you understand this, what the Lord Jesus is saying in Matthew 16:18 is very clear: “The church will be built upon the rock.” So what is the rock? The rock of course, is God. God is the rock.

Pitiful is any church that is built upon a man, even a man like Peter. Do you think the Lord Jesus will build the church upon a man? And on one man, Peter? I repeat once more, it shows you the danger when you allow theological considerations to control your exposi­tion of the Bible because then, you are completely off the mark.

And here in spite of my great love for the brothers and sisters in the Roman Catholic Church, I’m sorry I have to point out this error. Don’t get me wrong when I point out some error. I point out errors also in the Protestant teaching, not only in the Roman Catholic teaching. The Lord Jesus is not going to build the church upon one person. Fundamentally, he is building the church on God, the rock.

He is also building upon the apostles and prophets. Why? Because they will become rock, too. That is why when we are transformed, we become rock-like, that is, we become partakers of the divine character. This is very important to understand. It is not only Peter who is a stone in the New Testament teaching, but every true Christian is a stone. Let me show you this from 1 Peter 2:4-5, so that you are very clear about this.

God is the rock, and here, Jesus Christ is the rock, the living stone. It doesn’t matter which way you translate it. The word “stone” and “rock” is interchangeable. The Greek word, petra means both rock and stone. Then Christians are also living rocks, living stones which are being built into that temple of God, into a spiritual house.

 

The church is built on God’s character, and the powers of Hades cannot prevail

Do you get the picture? What is Jesus building his church on? I did not just say who, but what. Jesus is building his church upon the rock, and that rock is fundamentally God Himself and all those who participate in the divine nature. Once you become a true Christian, your character is going to be changed like Peter’s. Your character will be changed to rock, to “Peter” (petros). You become living stones that God uses to build his church on.

This point is truly wonderful and truly important to understand. All this is brought about through the transformation of character, when he changes you into rock, so that you share the divine character of being the rock, of being incorruptible, steadfast, faithful and holy. Incorruptibility is what holiness is about. It cannot be corrupted by sin and that is all pictured in this rock.

The apostle Peter, who has been changed into a partaker of divine character of rock, says in 2 Peter 1:4, “You have become partakers of the divine nature, just like me. I was changed from Simon into a living stone.” It’s very interesting that it is Peter who speaks about the rock, that not just he himself is a living rock or stone, but all true Christians are living stones like Christ, who himself is the living rock or stone.

Now once we understand this, we understand the church is built upon the character of God, built on God himself, and also all those who partake in that divine character. So what is the church built on? No wonder that is its strength. Because when you become partaker of the divine character, and you become rock, then the gates of hell will not prevail against the church. It may prevail against you if you are not careful, but not against the church as a whole.

That is why it is so important that we understand the teaching concerning Christ’s body (refer to Ephesians). It’s not that you survive as a living stone. No, but as living stones together, you are built into a spiritual house of God which itself is built upon Christ, who is the cornerstone that God established. Therefore, the whole structure is fundamentally, securely resting in God. So what is the church built on? The “what” is the divine character.

 

God’s Holy Spirit enters our hearts to change us to God’s rock-like character

How can Christ build God’s church upon the rock? How is it going to be accomplished? That he can build the house, the church upon God is not a problem. But this church is composed of people, how can that structure be secure? Of course, you can wipe out the top, but the foundation remains secure. The church is built upon God. God will remain steadfast. That is no problem, but will the remaining super­structure remain? That is the problem. Not unless the superstruc­ture itself is joined to that rock foundation, and the superstructure itself is rock. That is why it is by no means to deny that Peter himself is only part of the foundation. This is very important to understand. Peter is part of the foundation by virtue of his becoming a partaker in the divine character.

Now how do you take a man like Peter, who is anything but rock, and change him into rock? You know how weak Peter was. He was the loudest in protestations of loyalty. He was the one who led the cheer crowd and said, “Jesus, we will die with you. We will never leave you. We will stick with you to the end.” You remember all these loud protestations that Peter had made. And then there came a little woman, a maid servant and said, “Ah! You are one of the disciples!” All he had met was one servant girl in the courtyard, and the bystanders, and he denies the Lord Jesus three times. He had still not met one of the temple guards, and the mighty Peter completely collapsed. Do you mean that is a partaker of the divine nature?

Let us be a little kind to Peter. He had not yet experienced Pentecost. God’s Holy Spirit had not yet come upon them. He had not yet received the fullness of that divine nature. He had not yet been changed. How can he be changed without the Holy Spirit? God’s Holy Spirit had to come and change him first. That is why the Lord Jesus said to his disciples, “Don’t go out to preach the gospel because you have to be changed first. You have to receive power from on high first. Without power, how can you be a rock?” We saw that the very definition of rock is that it is the expression of enduring strength and power, and that comes to us only through God’s Holy Spirit. It is through the Holy Spirit, as Peter himself says, that we become partakers of the divine nature.

 

Practically, how are we changed to be rock-like?

How can we have God’s rock-like character? We must be changed by God. In order to build his church securely, God has to build it not only upon the fundamental foundation of the rock which is God, but also on the secondary foundation of human beings. That is insecure, isn’t it? Of course it is insecure. But how is God going to make it secure? By transforming these apostles and prophets and all of us into stones, into rocks, into “Peters.” That is the Scriptural teaching.

But we have not yet finished the answer to “how.” You say the apostles and prophets will be transformed and that is how God can make the church secure against attack, against the powers of Hades because it is built upon rock. But how is this transformation to be accomplished? That is important. It is very well to say they will be changed, but does this passage tell us anything about transforma­tion?

Peter believed, even knowing Jesus is the Christ, with little change in life

Notice at this stage how little is Peter’s transformation. He has not changed yet. Let us read verses 21-23 because this is how the transformation into the divine character, the participation in the divine character takes place.

He forgot his status as he began to rebuke Jesus saying, “Let it never happen, Lord!” As I have said before, this is the most self-contradictory statement I have ever seen. What kind of statement is “No, Lord”? If you say no to someone, he can hardly be lord anymore. What is he trying to say by “This shall never happen to you”? Is he trying to prophesy?

Alas! Peter! How little he did change! Here is something important to notice for the sake of your salvation. Notice it. Did Peter believe in Jesus? Of course, he did. Didn’t he have a revelation from God? Certainly! His eyes were opened, and he said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.” What a confession! Did he have faith? Certainly, he had faith. Did he have spiritual vision as a result of his faith? Certainly, he had spiritual vision. But was he an enemy of the cross? Answer it honestly. Was he the enemy of the cross? Of course, he was the enemy of the cross. He tried to stop Jesus from going to the cross. He opposed the cross. “Let this never happen to you! God forbid that you should go to the cross, Lord! Never!”

 

We can believe in Jesus and be an enemy of the cross as well

No matter what his motives were, that is not important for the moment. The fact was whatever his motive was, Peter was the enemy of the cross, and Jesus declares him as such. “Get behind me, Satan!” The word “Satan” means an enemy, an adversary. “You are my enemy because of what you are doing right now. You are the enemy of the cross. You are opposing me. You are standing between me and the cross. Get out of my way, Satan.”

If he had said, “You are not on God’s side but on the side of natural man, and if he put in the word “Peter,” that would have been bad enough. But you don’t find the word “Peter” here. “Get behind me, Satan!” And he addresses those words to Peter. “Get behind me, my enemy!”

This is why I say pay attention carefully for the sake of your salvation. Don’t congratulate yourselves that you, like Peter, believe in Jesus as the Christ, as the Messiah the king, as the Son of God, because you may, like Peter, still be an enemy of the cross!

That is what is frightening! This is what we are going to analyze for the remaining moments of this study in the Word of God.

 

Don’t let the cross be an offense to you and perish

Do you know what happens to enemies of the cross? Don’t take it from me. Let us read about the stumbling block of the cross in Galatians 5:11, that we may see what the Lord Jesus is saying to Peter.

Let us ask first, what is the stumbling block of the cross? What does the offense of the cross consist in? I wonder what you think. Peter opposed Jesus because he was offended by the cross. But what was it about the cross that offended him? What do you think? It’s very important for you to get this question very clearly because without your knowing it, as Peter was not knowing it, you will stumble because of the cross. Certainly, he did not deliberately want to be the enemy of the cross. He didn’t realize that whatever the motive, whatever he was saying, he was in fact, an enemy of the cross even if he did not intend to be that.

Paul warned the Galatians that if the cross is an offense to them, they are going to be in severe trouble. He says, “I do not preach the cir­cumcision because if I preached the circumcision, the offense of the cross would be removed. But you accept the circumcision because the cross is an offense to you. If the cross is an offense to you, you will perish.

 

People who found the cross offensive turned to “circumcision”

Let us look a little further back to Galatians 5:2-4

This was exactly Peter’s problem. You remember that earlier on in Galatians, Paul had rebuked Peter because Peter still somehow tended to find a little bit of offense in the cross. It’s so hard for the natural man to accept the cross. But what is the offense of the cross? So beware though you believe in Jesus, what Paul said to the Galatians, “Your faith may be in vain.” Did the Galatians believe in Jesus? Surely, they believed in Jesus. But he warned them if the cross was going to be an offense to them, and they turned away from the cross to circumcision, they would be cut off from Christ, and their faith would be in vain. He did not reject the fact that the Galatians believed in Jesus and that they believed Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God. In spite of their faith in Jesus, if they rejected the offense of the cross, their faith would be in vain. They would be cut off from Christ.

I have to preach to you the whole counsel of God, whether it is pleasant or unpleasant. The truth must be said.

Look again at Matthew 16 and bear carefully in mind the important teaching that the Lord Jesus is saying here. The Lord Jesus completely accepts the faith of Peter, that he believes in him as the Messiah. Try to let this sink deeply into your mind. He accepts that and says, “Blessed are you, Peter, that you have seen that I am the Christ. But that is not enough Peter. That is not enough.” And you will say, “That’s not enough?! How much do you need?” What then do we need? That is what we are looking at.

 

What is the offense of the cross?

Continue to consider, what is the offense of the cross? Is the cross offensive because Jesus was crucified on it? In the First Century, many were crucified by the Romans, the enemies of the Jews. That is very important to bear in mind, and being killed is no reason. The manner of your death is quite unimportant. Socrates died by taking poison. Does that dishonor Socrates in the eyes of the Greeks? No, it didn’t at all. He was forced to take poison. He was declared an enemy of the state by the Greeks. But they honored him all the same thereafter. The manner of one’s dying does not discredit anyone. The fact that it was death by crucifixion does not make it dishonorable as such. Don’t make this kind of assumption and so preach wrongly.

When we look into the Old Testament, is the fact that some person dies for another person a stumbling block? That is scarcely a stumbling block to anyone. The Jews knew that someone would die for the salvation of the nation. They had read Isaiah 53. Why should anyone’s death be a stumbling block? If the crucifixion, the means of death, is not a stumbling block itself, then why should the fact that someone dies for you be a stumbling block? I have not seen that should be a stumbling block to anyone, least of all to the Jews.

So let us get away from these pat and superficial answers, and get to the root of the matter: What is the stumbling block of the cross? And I point it out because through their whole sacrificial system, the Jews were quite familiar with someone dying for someone else, or something dying for someone else. This “substitutionary death” was with them their whole life through. They saw animals dying for them, and it was no strange idea that a person should die for them as Isaiah 53 had prepared their minds for this.

Or take another example, Zechariah 12:10. There, the prophet Zechariah said Yahweh God said, “…when they should look on him whom you have pierced.” Again, the Jewish commentators don’t know who this “him” is. They don’t know the person whom they pierced will one day be their Savior. At least that much is clear without even a technical knowledge of Zechariah.

But to the Jews, even less is the fact that someone who died for them is a stumbling block when we read that one of the Jewish high priests in John 11:49-51 prophesied that someone would die to save the whole nation:

The Jewish chief priests were gathered in this council of the Sanhedrin, discussing what to do with Jesus, and the high priest, Caiaphas, rebukes them. He prophesied without knowing the full consequences of his prophecy that Jesus would die for the nation. So you see, the fact of a person dying for the nation of the Jewish people was not at all foreign to the thinking of the Jews.

When we strictly examine this matter, and when we put away this pat answer that people found it offensive to believe in someone crucified, which is simply not true, we are still left wondering. Take even a Roman slave, Spartacus. Spartacus was only a slave, and he was crucified for a rebellion against the Romans. But Spartacus was still honored as a great hero even if he failed in his revolt. Can you see that this kind of reply is simply invented to cover the embarrassing question of what is the offense of the cross? What is it?

 

Jesus crucified on the cross for us is deeply moving – it’s not offensive

To answer this, let us get back to Peter. What did Peter find so offensive about the cross after all? What is the problem for him? Do you think that Peter found the cross offensive because he found it difficult to believe that one person would die for all? That is hardly his problem. Peter also knew Isaiah 53. He also knew Zechariah 12:10, Psalm 22 and so on. That is hardly his problem. So what was the offense of the cross? I have left you to struggle with this question for a time because I don’t like to rush quickly to answers. Let us just eliminate the possibilities and then we are down to a very small area of possibilities. What did Peter find offensive?

Do you find the cross offensive? Let’s think back. When you were not a Christian and someone preached to you that Jesus died for our sins, did you find that a stumbling block? Was it offensive? Did you find it difficult to believe that someone who got crucified is worth believing? That was not my problem. That was not the Jews’ prob­lem. That was not the Greeks’ problem. Was it your problem? I doubt it. Isn’t the fact that someone dies for all very touching to our hearts? Far from being a stumbling block, in fact, it has a powerful emotional appeal, doesn’t it? You have heard preachers preach on the cross. I have also preached on the cross. People have wept to listen to the preaching of the cross. Far from finding the preaching of Christ dying for us offensive, even the non-Christian finds it very, very moving indeed.

That is why I have been at pains to stress to you that this pat answer that people in those days found believing in someone crucified difficult, is simply not true. That is hardly a difficulty because of the powerful appeal. The worse death that he suffered, the more it touches my heart that he died in this way, that he should have suffered such agony even if he died for no one else. Do you find it shameful that even the thief was crucified? Don’t you feel a sense of pity that he suffered on the cross? The ancient peoples were no different. They also felt the agony of such sufferings. They suffered a great deal, and perhaps, they could sympathize with suffering even more than we, who have not suffered as much as they did.

No, those are hardly the reasons. That Christ should die for anyone is not a stumbling block to anybody. Why should that be? It has a powerful emotional appeal, as I say. So then we are left with still no answer. And this would be a good point for me to finish my exposition here and walk off. If I will be here next week to continue, I leave you the whole week thinking, “Well, what is the offense of the cross?”

 

Preachers of circumcision are not persecuted for the cross of Christ

Ask yourselves honestly: What is the offense of the cross? Paul said in Galatians 5:11,

How is it so? He was talking to Christians, not to non-Christians, who already believed in the death of Christ.

But the cross was still an offense. Get the amazing situation very clearly in your minds: You can believe that Jesus died for you, and the cross is still an offense to you. That is what happened to the Galatians. They did believe in Jesus. They were Christians. If they did not believe that Jesus died for them, they could not be Christians. And yet, somehow, the cross was still an offense to them. Why? Let us look at Galatians 6:12 to begin to see the answer. Never forget that Paul is speaking about preachers preaching the gospel to the Galatian Christians.

Think carefully on these words: They want you, Galatian Christians, to be circumcised so that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. Have you understood that? If they are not Christians, how could they be persecuted for the sake of the cross of Christ? But these Christians were rather willing to preach circumcision than the cross of Christ because they did not want to be persecuted by other Jews and other people, for the sake of the cross of Christ. But Paul said, “I am being persecuted for the sake of the cross of Christ because I do not preach circumcision.”

 

The cross is objectionable to people who like circumcision, external religion

Now what is circumcision? Did Paul preach circumcision? He did preach circumcision, but not circumcision in the flesh. What did Paul preach? Paul preached salvation through the cross. So what is cir­cumcision? Why should that be opposed to the cross?

Circumcision symbolizes everything that has to do with religion. Remember, the persecutors were not unbelievers, but religious people, believers. We constantly forget that. Paul was not being persecuted by non-believers but by religious people who were enemies of the cross preaching in the churches. So how would they be preaching in the Galatian churches for example?

Remember that the letter to the Galatians was not written to one church but to a whole group of churches. You only need to read Galatians 1:2 – to the churches of Galatia. And in all these churches, there were these people who found the cross of Christ offensive, and preached the circumcision: external religion.

Here we begin to get the clue to the answer. The cross is always objectionable to people who trust in external things, external religion, who trust in the flesh. In other words, the cross of Christ is always objectionable to the natural man, to the unspiritual man. Bear that in mind. It is always objectionable to the unspiritual man. The unspiritual man does not like the preaching of the cross.

You see exactly that in the Corinthian Church. The unspiritual man does not like the preaching of the cross. Now remember what happened with the Corinthians, and why is Paul speaking to them about the offense of the cross there? Did the Corinthians believe in Jesus? Surely, they believed in Jesus. Did they believe in Jesus dying for them? Of course, they believed that. How could they be Christians if they didn’t? Yet Paul said to them in 1 Corinthians 3:1, “You are unspiritual.” That means for them too, the cross was an offense. That was why he was talking that he himself would preach nothing but the cross, even if the Corinthians did not like it. (1 Cor. 1:17-18)

Jesus points out why Peter is the enemy of the cross

Now we are beginning to get to the root of the matter. I wonder if you begin to see what is the offense of the cross? If someone dies for me, why should that be an offense to me? I would say, “Thank you. You died for me, I’m so grateful to you.” There is no offense in that.

Why is the cross offensive to Peter? We don’t have to guess. The answer is given by the Lord Jesus. Look at Matthew 16:23-26:

In verse 23, Peter was opposing Jesus’ cross, his saving ministry, and was Satan to Christ, that is, as an enemy to Christ. Notice the connecting word “then” which follows that incident in verse 24, and Jesus said, “If any man would follow me …, not just believe that I am the Christ, the Messiah.”

What then was the offense of the cross? Do you see it now? It is when the Lord Jesus told Peter that he stood as an enemy of the cross in verse 23, that the Lord Jesus also told him why he was an enemy of the cross in verse 24. This connection between verse 23 and 24 comes out even more strongly in the parallel passage in Mark 8:33-34, where instead of “then,” there is the word “and, which shows that the passage goes straight on:

What then is the offense of the cross? The offense of the cross lies in our taking up the cross, not in our believing in the cross. That is where the offense of the cross is.

 

The unspiritual man does not want to take up the cross

I would like you also to remember one important thing. The Lord Jesus never uses the word “cross” in relation to his own death. He uses the word “cross” several times, but always in relation to the disciples, not in relation to himself. The offense of the cross is an offense in their own taking up of the cross. Do you understand the offense of the cross now?

To believe that Jesus died for me is no stumbling block. It’s not a stumbling block even to a non-Christian. As a non-Christian, believing that Jesus died for me really touched my heart, even when I did not believe it. It still has an emotional appeal even though you do not believe that this is actually historically true. But the offense of the cross really becomes an offense when Jesus says, “You take up the cross and follow me.”

Why is it an offense? Because that is what the natural man cannot stand! The natural man does not want to die. The natural man does not want the cross. The cross does not appeal to the natural man if he has to bear it. If somebody else bears it, that’s no problem. It is all right that Jesus bears it: “Thank You, Jesus. Thank you. I will remember and I will shed a tear when I think of you dying for me because it really tugs at my heart strings.”

But Jesus is not here to tug at our heart strings. He said, “I am going to die, and you, if you want to be saved, you will take up your cross and follow me, right there to the cross.” That is the point where most of the disciples say, “You ask me to believe in you? That’s fine. Thank you. But do you ask me to follow you and take up the cross? Come on, I thought you were the one who was going to do all the dying. Don’t also ask me to die. You die for me so I don’t have to die. And now you say you die for me and I also have to die? No, Lord. So, what do you die for me for? You died for me so that I don’t have to die. Isn’t that what the preachers say? You died so I don’t have to die. Now you say you die, and I have to die, too. Then why did you have to die for me? I thought your whole purpose of dying is so that I don’t have to die. And now you tell me I have to take up the cross? Oh no!”

The offense of the cross begins to set in. This point will perhaps take you a little time to digest: the cross of Christ means your death and mine.

 

We die with Jesus on the cross in order to become a new person

Let us go back to Galatians 6:14 where the apostle Paul says,

He says, “I’m not going to boast about anything except one thing only – the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

But notice, what does the cross of Jesus do to Paul? It crucifies him:

What does the cross of Christ do? He died for me so I don’t have to die? Sorry, no. He died for me so that I die with him. I took up my cross and walked with him and I got crucified with him. That is what happened to me. Now that is the offensive part. Little wonder why so many preachers only want to preach about one section but not the other. But that is not truth. You must preach the whole truth.

Let us go on to verse 15:

What is the connection of verse 15 with verse 14? The connection lies in the words “a new creation.” It’s very important to understand this. How can I become a new creature so long as I am still an old creature? How can I become a new creature if I have not been crucified with Christ? How can I be born again? That is what a new creation means. Born again means you become a new creature. How can I be born again except I be crucified with Christ? And how can I be crucified with Christ if the cross is an offense to me? How can I be crucified with Christ if I don’t follow him to the cross? He is standing over there, and I stand over here, and I wave to Jesus saying: “Hi, Jesus, I thank you for dying for me over there.”

Paul says, “Don’t you stand over here because you are not going to become a new creation. Walk over there, take up your cross, and get crucified with Jesus. That is how you are going to be saved.” But if the cross is an offense to you like it was to the Galatians, then he warns them, “Your faith will be in vain.”

 

By taking up the cross to die, God’s power saves to become a new creation

Now we have completed our cycle, and I hope you can follow the cycle. Let me refresh your memory.

What did Jesus build God’s church on? On the rock, on God’s character. But the church must be built not only on the rock which is God, but also on the secondary foundation of people who constitute the church, and that also has to be rock, so the people must be transformed into rock, into participants of the divine nature.

But how do you become the participants of God’s nature? Through the cross! As we just read in Galatians 6:14-15, only through the cross are we crucified to the world, we died to the old way of life. And because we have finished with the old way of life, God can make of us new creatures. Circumcision counts for nothing, uncircumci­sion counts for nothing, but only a new creation counts for anything.

You are not saved by believing only. Remember, you are saved through the power of God which makes you to become a new creature. Your faith does not save you unless your faith results in your becoming a new person. And you will not become a new person unless your old person has been crucified with Christ; unless you are willing to die with Christ and do die with him. You have finished with the old way of life. You take up your cross. And the Lord Jesus says in that same passage, “Except you lose your life, you cannot gain your life.” The only way to save your life is through losing your life. The only way to become a new creature is through being crucified with Christ. There is the complete cycle.

Only by being crucified with Christ, do you become a new creature, you become a living stone, you become the rock. And when you become the rock, you become part of that church which is built upon God, the rock. I hope, brothers and sisters, that you well understand this message.

Today, we live in a very superficial world, where preachers, like these Galatian preachers, are peddling a religion which doesn’t preach the offense of the cross. They don’t preach that you must take up your cross and be crucified with Christ, that you must die in order to become a new creature. That, of course, is total commitment; that is utter commitment. Nobody is prepared to give up his life unless he is totally committed to be crucified with Christ.

Paul was not dealing with imagery and pictures that had no meaning. When Paul said, “I am crucified with Christ,” he meant just that. He is utterly finished as far as this world is concerned. Dead!

Now he is living totally and only for God. If you are crucified to the world, the world is dead to you. What do you do? You live for God! In whatever job or profession you do, you belong to him, you live for him.

 

Take up your cross to walk on the path of salvation!

Don’t think that any preacher who gets up and says Jesus died for you is necessarily a man of God because that is not the offense of the cross. Remember that carefully. Believing in someone who was cru­cified has never been an offense. Do you refuse to believe in someone because he has been shot to pieces with a machine gun? What a gory, terrible death! His manner of death is no offense to anyone. In fact, it is more glorious that he died so terribly. That is not the offense. Always remember: The offense of the cross is you must take up the cross – die to the self. That is the path of salvation.

Let us be quiet before God in prayer.