Rooted - Identity in Christ: The Big Reveal

Welcome to South Sub Church. We are so glad that you've decided to worship with us today. Whether you're in the room right now or watching from home, wherever it is, we're just so glad that we get to spend this time together and worship the Lord together as one. Here at South Sub Church, we believe we are one church with two expressions of worship. But we have one mission to bring people to Jesus Christ and together become passionate followers of him. Another way that we worship is through our tithes and offerings. And here at Southsub Church, we believe that we give the Lord back what he gives us. And there's a couple ways that I want to invite you to do that this morning. One is giving online at southub.urch/give. Another way is by texting the number that's on the screen right now. Or there's an envelope in your seat back pocket. And here's what I want to invite you to do. No matter what gift you give, big or small, we believe that whatever we give, the Lord multiplies that and we are able to be the hands and feet of Jesus here where we are right now. If you're new, we invite you to fill out a connect card. We would love to get to know you, pray for you, and find a way for you to get more connected with our church. And if you're watching us online, make sure you leave a comment wherever you are. Maybe you're going to the mountains, maybe you have a soccer game to go to. Whatever it is, we're just so glad that you've decided to join us for worship. You picked a great week to be here. Let's jump into God's word together. Let's worship him today.

[Music]

[Music] [Applause] Well, good morning. You know, we probably should have edited that video. If you listen real closely, there's a part in there. Daniel says, "If you're watching online or you're going to the mountains, we probably should have edited today and said, if you're watching online but also watching the Broncos at the same time, we're glad you're here." So, here's what I want you to do. Hey, listen. If you're home and you're computer over here, but you're watching us online and you're watching the Broncos, just shout out on the computer, "Go Broncos." Okay. Um, for all those in here, if you're a guest here today, you may feel like in the next 30 minutes, this is more of a charismatic service. We're not a charismatic church. Here's what's going on. um the folks are listening and looking at the score on their phone. So if you hear a yelp or a yahoo every once in a while, um I'm not sure if that's the Holy Spirit leading them or that's the score of the Bronco game. But either way, we're here to have a good time today. And I am glad you guys are here in the room. Listen, um question for you. Have you ever woken up one morning and just looked in the mirror and just asked yourself the question, is this it? Like no matter where you are in life, you just look in there and you you've gone to school, you've got the degree, you've bought a house, you've got marriage, you've got kids, you might have even checked off a few dreams of your own that you've accomplished, but yet you still wake up and you're just going, "Is this really all there is to life?" And sometimes I think that question actually we think comes from an 18 or 19 year old, that individual, that girl or that guy that's about to graduate high school and they're trying to figure out the major and what college to go to and they're trying to figure out their purpose in life. But if we're all honest, regardless of what season we find ourselves in life, whether we're 20 year, 30, 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, we all ask that question sometimes. Sometimes when you're in your 20s, you ask that question. You're just starting out. Sometimes you're in your 40s and you look going, "Is this really worth it all that I'm putting into it?" Sometimes you're in the your 60s and you ask that question and you're wondering, "Has your life really counted?" Or sometimes you may even be in your 80s or older and you're looking back at your life going, you feel so not relevant anymore and you're asking what's your real purpose in life? You're asking that one simple question. Does my life have purpose? You know, if I said Greddy said go and I had everybody Google that question, does my life have purpose? Within a few seconds, here's what you'd find out. over 10 billion answers on the internet. Does my life have purpose? Or if you ask it another way, how do I find purpose? And we can listen to all the podcasts. We can go to all the seminars that we want to. We can s Google it online all we want to, but we still end up asking that question. Here's the internet has all the answers, but there's not enough answers to answer that question. Do we have purpose? And here's what I wonder. Maybe the reason that we struggle with that question, maybe is the purpose isn't something that we stumble across on some podcast or scrolling down the internet. Maybe it's not found on some help list. Maybe it's something your soul recognizes when the one who made you speaks into you. And so if you're here today and you're wondering that question, what is the purpose? you have come to a great day because we're going to explore that together. In fact, there we're going to explore together. There's a conversation between Jesus and his disciples and very specifically between Jesus and Peter. And they were asking, discussing and dissecting that question together. And Jesus helps Peter understand what his purpose is. And so, if you have your Bibles, if you want to look up Matthew chapter 16, if you're coming today for the first time, we're in a series called Rooted. It's the sixth week of a 10-week series called Rooted. And we're looking for how do we have depth in our life? How do we have spiritual depth that will allow us to bear the fruit that God wants us to to even have the life that we desire? And so in this this chapter, Matthew chapter 16, this conversation, we're going to begin exploring together what is the purpose of life. And here's what it says in Matthew chapter 16 verse 13. says, "When Jesus came to the region of Cesaria Philippi, he asked his disciples, who do people say the son of man is?" So, you can imagine Jesus is just sitting around the campfire, maybe sitting around lunch with the guys going, "Hey, I got a question for you. We've been walking and hanging out for two years now. You've seen me do the miracles. You've seen me make the blind see and the lame to walk. You've heard my teaching." So, there's a lot of buzz about who I am. So, who do people really say that I am? You know, if you went out into world today and you've asked that question, here's what one recent survey said. 52% of all Americans would say this, that Jesus was a great teacher and nothing more. So on this day, Jesus since his disciples down, and I I can't read Jesus's mind way back 2,000 years ago, I couldn't read his mind today if I wanted to. But you've got to believe he's hoping they're going to say, "Oh, the Messiah, the son of God, you're the one that came to rescue us, to save us." You're thinking that's what Jesus had put two years of his life into people knowing who he was the son of God. So surely that would be the answer.

In verse 14, the disciples said, "Well," they replied, "Some say John the Baptist, some say Elijah, and others say Jeremiah or one of the other prophets." Those are all important religious figures. So, it sounds like to me people's answers today in America is not a lot different than people's answers 2,000 years ago. They recognize him as something. They recognize him as more than what they think most people are, but they don't really recognize him for who he is. And so then verse 15, then it says, "Then Jesus asked them, but who do you who do you say I am? So again, Jesus is sitting in this campfire. He's sitting at lunch with his disciples and they're giving their answers of who everybody says he is. But then he looks at him and says, "But who do you say I am?" It was a question asked to group. He wasn't trying to pinpoint one person, but he's going, "Guys, you've been the closest, so who do you say I am?" And then in verse 16, the Bible says this, "But Simon Peter answered." In our rooted series, we've been looking at this idea of how do we have deeper spiritual roots and we're using the apostle Peter, Simon Peter to help us understand that. And so in this moment when Jesus asked the group, the Bible says, "And Peter answered, he's got the answer. He'll tell you who he thinks Jesus is. He's been with him from the very beginning. Jesus called him. He was a fisherman at one time and Jesus called him to follow him. He's been right there front row view." And Peter answered and I believe his answer is going to help us today understand what is the purpose of life and to help us to explore that more. I've actually invited um Kenan our student ministry director to come. He's going to help us explore this passage a little bit deeper and then I'll come back up and we'll wrap it up. But would you please just welcome Kenan as he comes to lead this next part everybody. I am very excited to be able to share with you this morning, especially because I get to share about such a significant moment in scripture and in history. Uh I will even dare to say that none of us would be in this room if it weren't for this moment. And I'll explain why in just a minute. So, like we just said, Jesus turns the question on the disciples. Who do you say that I am? And Peter takes the leadership role of answering. And what he says is that Jesus, you are the Messiah, the son of the living God. He knocks it out of the ballpark. And if you think that's a pretty easy answer, remember he didn't have the Debbie Donese of the world to teach him who Jesus was. He was relying on the message that he had heard God preach. Sorry, Jesus preach. and the miracles he had seen Jesus perform and he knew that Jesus was special. So why is Peter's answer better than the people's answer? I think there's three reasons. The first reason is that Jesus is more than a messenger. The people did not recognize that. They said he's like Elijah. He's like John the Baptist. He's like Jeremiah. And to the people's credit, Jesus did have a prophetic message to share about turning away from sin toward God. But that's not all he was. He was more than a messenger like the prophets. Elijah, John the Baptist, Jeremiah, they had two things in common. They were all prophets and they were all dead. So, it's kind of crazy when the people say Jesus is Elijah. He is Jeremiah. He is John the Baptist. That means that Jesus was weird enough, strange enough, impressive enough to say that he is those prophets reborn. People have compared my preaching to Billy Grahams before, but they've never said I am Billy Graham. Okay, just kidding. They've never compared my preaching to Billy Grahams. Maybe, maybe after today. We'll see. Yeah, if you know Jesus's story, you know that he does have the power to be resurrected and to resurrect himself, but he's not just a rehash of the prophets. He is more than a miracle. Jesus is more than a miracle. He's more than just a resurrected prophet. Elijah specifically was a miracle worker. And so he drew specific parallels. People were like, "Hey, Jesus is a miracle worker. That reminds me of Elijah." But Jesus is more than a messenger. He does more than just miracles. And Peter recognized that his purpose was greater. That he was going to save the world. That's why he says, "Jesus, you are the Messiah." If you don't know, the Messiah is an Old Testament term. God had revealed in the Old Testament to the Israelites that there would be a person titled the Messiah who would come and save the world. The Jews had been waiting about hund a few hundred years at this point to see this fulfilled. But Peter remembered he thought of those prophecies and then he saw Jesus and he said, "You are the one." And he was right. We know that Jesus took our sin upon himself. He died on the cross and he rose from the dead to save us. So Jesus is more than a messenger. He's more than a miracle. But Peter goes further and he says, "You are more than a messiah." Jesus is even more than a messiah. Why? Because he doesn't stop there. What he says next is that you are the Messiah, the son of the living God. How many of you have had a Jehovah's Witness knock on your door before? Yeah, I grew up in a small town in Arkansas, but even we had Jehovah's Witnesses who would walk around door to door and share their faith. Um, you know, they were great people. They were brave, but you they were usually met with a uh no thank you, close the door. but not at my house. Uh, if you were here a couple weeks ago, you got to hear my dad preach. And if you heard him preach, you might not be surprised to know that when Jehovah's Witnesses knocked on our door, my dad welcomed them in into a trap of a biblical debate. Jehovah's Witnesses and Christians differ on one big thing. There's a few things they differ on, but the biggest thing is that Jehovah's Witnesses believe that Jesus was just a man. He was not God. So that's what my dad would debate with him on. Jehovah's Witnesses, they believe that Jesus is a messenger. They believe that he is a miracle. They even believe that he's a Messiah, the savior of the world. But he's just a man. Christianity disagrees. We say Jesus is the son of the living God. Peter was right. Peter was being literal here. Jesus didn't just save the world, but he resurrected himself and rules in heaven. Now, Jesus is God. Now, Peter, I don't know if he would be able to say that Jesus is God, but he's also the son of God the Father. And when you add in the Holy Spirit, we get the Trinitarian God. A God and one God and three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We've been thinking about that for 2,000 years, and we even have trouble saying it. But I do know that Peter saw Jesus as divine. He knew that Jesus was more than just a man. Jesus was not just a messenger from God because he was a messenger who is God. Jesus was not just a miracle, a resurrected prophet because he is a prophet who resurrected himself and he was not just a messiah, a savior of the world. Because after he died for our sins, he rose from the dead and he rules in heaven now. Jesus is God. That was Peter's answer. And that's why Jesus was so proud of him. Let's look how Jesus responds right now. Jesus replied, "You are blessed, Simon, son of John, because my father in heaven has revealed this to you. You did not learn this from any human being. Now I say to you that you are Peter, which means rock, and upon this rock, I will build my church, and all the power of hell will not conquer it. and I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you forbid on earth will be forbidden in heaven and whatever you permit on earth will be permitted in heaven. Some of your translations might say bind and loose there. It's kind of a complicated passage. So I want us to simplify it to three things. First of all, Simon receives a new name. If you don't know the Simon, sorry, the Peter that we've been talking about for the past few weeks is not his original name. He was originally Simon, the fisherman from Galilee and the disciple of Jesus. But in this moment, he receives a new identity from Jesus. Because when Jesus when Peter recognizes Jesus's true identity, Peter receives his new identity. When Peter recognizes Jesus's true identity as the Messiah and the son of God, Peter receives his new identity. Second thing, Peter is the rock upon which the church is going to be built. Peter means rock. I like to call Peter Rocky to remind myself of that. And Jesus knows that any good building needs a firm foundation. A couple weeks ago, I got to go on the Tijana trip. We got to build a house for a family and that was such an amazing experience. But we weren't a part of the first construction step. Before we got there, men had showed up to lay the concrete foundation. Any architect is going to tell you, you need a firm foundation in order for your building to stand. And Jesus knew that. Peter was going to be that founder. Peter was going to be that rock. That's why I said that none of us would be in this room if it weren't for this moment because this is the moment when Jesus commisss Peter to become the founder of the church. Without him, the church would not be here in the US today. And then the third thing that Jesus does, he gives Peter the keys of the kingdom and the ability to l uh permit or forbid things in heaven and on earth. So that we don't get into the weeds too much on that. Suffice it to say, Jesus hands Peter heavenly authority. Think about it. Peter is about to found the church. He's about to be the leader. That is a big role. He's going to have a lot of responsibility. He's going to have to make some hard big decisions. And Jesus says in this moment, you have my backing. You have my authority. Why, Peter? Because Jesus knows that he's the right man for the job. If Peter recognizes who Jesus is and changes his life because of it, then he's the right man for the job.

When Peter recognizes Jesus's true authority, he receives his new authority. In some, Peter recognizes that Jesus is more than a messenger. He's more than a miracle. He's more than a messiah. He is the son of God. And that means that Peter will become more than a disciple. Jesus isn't going to be around forever. Jesus is not going to be there for Peter to walk around and watch him do ministry. Peter must become more than a disciple. And by Christ's power, Peter is going to become the founder and the leader of the church so that Jesus and his sacrifice and his salvation are never forgotten. Thanks.

You know, this past week as I've been meditating and thinking through and just this whole passage, there's sometimes I like to place myself in the story as if I was there to see if I could kind of understand it better. Never to put more into scripture than what scripture says, but yet to really understand it. And so this week, I put myself in the place of Peter. Now, let me just make sure we're all on the same p page on Peter. Peter was one of the first disciples that ever began to follow Jesus. He actually left what many historians and theologians believe was a very successful fishing business. And so you might say before G Peter ever followed Jesus, he had a purpose in life. It was a successful career. And we also know this as we read more of the New Testament that Peter was actually married because there's at one point that Peter visits Peter's or Jesus visits Peter's mother-in-law. And so he had checked off the box. I'm married. We don't know if he had kids or not, but because just just procreation was a big deal. When you got married, you try to have kids. there's a good chance he might had kids. So, Peter might have checked off a lot of boxes of purpose, purpose, purpose, purpose. Yet, for some reason, when Jesus said, "Come follow me. I'll make you fishermen of men." There was something inside of Peter that says, "I need to leave my successful business. I need to not even be with my family every single day. I need to some of these commitments that I'm involved in, I need to put them aside because I'm trying to find my purpose in life." And the Bible says he took up his stuff and he followed Jesus, but yet he was still looking for the purpose of life even in following Jesus. I wonder if Peter story is really our story that we've checked off the boxes. We we we think we're going after the purpose of life, but yet we still wake up sometimes and we look in that mirror and ask that same question. What is the purpose of life? And here's the beauty of this story. The beauty of this story is when Jesus when Peter recognized who Jesus was, he received his identity. And here's what I wonder, church. Some of us been sitting in the same seat for years and years and years. Some of us have been doing the same career for year after year. Some of us have checked off the boxes of success, but we still look in the mirror and we're going, "But what is the purpose of life?" That we feel just still a little bit empty. And and here's what I wonder. Could it be that we've been following Jesus, but we've never really received our true identity in Jesus? Can you imagine Peter?

He's sitting around the campfire. He's at the dinner table. He and the disciples, Jesus there, and they're having this question. And he never said out loud, "I don't know my purpose in life." But it was gnawing and nagging at him from time to time. But he keeps on going through life like we do. And Jesus looks at Peter and he said more than correct answer. He spoke into his heart and he said, "You get me?" And then he said this, "Yes, your name was Simon, but I'm going to give you a new name." When Jesus changed Simon's name to Peter, it was more than a new way that he would sign his checks. He truly gave him an identity. And he said, "Your name is Peter the rock."

And church, here's as I prayed this week. And I said, "God, what does South Church need to hear? What do your people need to hear? And here's what I believe God wants us to hear. And I say us because I'm right in there with you. If you believe in Jesus and you follow Jesus and you can claim the same good words that Peter did, Jesus, you are the Messiah, the son of God. Here's what God Jesus wants us to get today. Our new name. He wants us to get our new identity. And so many times we go to church and we've been learning since Miss Debbie Dona taught us and we're learning now and we can say all the right stuff but somehow it hasn't sunk in because the world plays all these messages in our mind. We get all these other thoughts and somehow God's identity that he wants to place on us doesn't land in us. It lands around us. It lands lands in front of us, but somehow it just doesn't grab hold of us. So today, God wants you to know that you have a new name and you have a new identity as a follower of Jesus that claim that claims Jesus as the Messiah, the son of God.

I want you to do me a favor. Won't you take your hands and hold them out like this? The reason I say there's nothing magical, nothing special, nothing super spiritual. This is just it's an act of receiving. And I want to call out your identity. And I call out your identity. I want you to receive it.

You're forgiven.

Let that be more than words. You're forgiven. You're forgiven of stuff from yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

You're accepted.

God's not waiting for you to get better to accept you. You are accepted just as you are right this moment.

You're unconditionally loved. [Music] You don't have to measure up for what God has for you. You are unconditionally loved.

As a follower of Jesus who claims Jesus the Messiah, the son of God, you are his child.

And those of you with kids, is there anything you wouldn't do for your kids? You're that kind of child.

You are shameless. The world comes in through Satan and the biggest lie he has is shame, shame, shame. You are shameless.

And lastly, you are his. Now you're holding your hand out. Now close those hands and hang on to those. And I trust today that there's one of those identities that you needed to hear today.

It's funny. You can read scripture when Peter was given the name Peter after after it was changed from Simon. You don't see him going back to the name Simon. He took that name and he held on to it and he said, "God gave this to me and it is mine and it is for no one to take."

You take that identity of forgiven and accepted and shameless and his and you hang on to it, church, because that's your identity.

And then here's what happens when we know who we are. Then we can know what we're to do. You see, we spend all of our life trying to do something so we can know who we are. We let our what we do determine who we are.

It's when we know who we are, then we'll know what we're to do.

So Lord Jesus, we come to you today.

Jesus, I sense what we need to happen is just your spirit speak these words of truth. And God, would you put them deep inside of us, [Music] God? The words from your word today, Jesus, the words you spoke to Peter, Jesus, the words that you speak to us today, so be it. Amen. And amen. And God, we pray this that the words that we hear today will not be for just those in this room. Jesus, may your words of who we are live through us in a way that the generations that go beyond us will know who they are.

Amen. And amen and amen. [Music] church, will you stand with me? We're going to wrap up in that song again that we sang earlier. And here's my my my challenge to you. Sing it out like you've never sung it before because God delivered. God said, God delivered. We grabbed hold of it. And therefore it is. Lord Jesus, our worship comes to you today because of your presence here with us. We don't worship a feeling. We don't worship a service. We don't worship anything. We worship you, holy God, in your presence and your spirit. And Jesus, you are here. So be it. And amen.