Let me pose a hypothetical situation to you this morning: Let’s say I was to make an offer to you. I would offer to give you two free plane tickets to anywhere in the world. Would you take it? Well, there’s one catch – what if I didn’t tell you where you were going before you got on the plane? You wouldn’t know where you were going until the plane touched down wherever I sent you. NOW how many are willing to take me up on this? Nobody? Well, I guess we like to know where we’re going before we go there. And that’s not a bad thing. I sincerely believe that we should be going through life with a purpose and an idea of where we want to go in life and what we want to do with what God’s given us. Unfortunately, too many people aren’t doing this. Many people are just kind of wandering through life aimlessly, without any sense of purpose, going wherever the tide takes them. They don’t have any idea of where they want to go, so how will they know when they get there?
On the other hand, we as believers are called to live lives that are filled with a sense of mission and purpose. We have been called to a radical obedience that will compel us forward to the completion of our mission. Please turn to Matthew 16…
JESUS UNDERSTOOD HIS MISSION (v. 21)
Up until this point in the gospel of Matthew, Jesus has been doing some wonderful things. He has given a powerful sermon on the mount, he has taught the people new and wonderful things, he has healed the sick, made the deaf to hear and the blind to see, and has even raised the dead to life. And while these things were necessary for Him to do, they were not His ultimate mission. While these signs had led Peter to declare that Jesus was the Messiah (v. 16), it was now time to define what it meant for Jesus to be the Messiah. The disciples didn’t understand Jesus’ true purpose because of their preconceived notions about what the Messiah should be. While they may have understood that He was the Messiah, they needed to prepare to follow Him and to be loyal to Him as he suffered and died. So Jesus began teaching clearly and specifically what they could expect so that they would not be surprised when it happened.
Contrary to what they thought, Jesus had not come to set up an earthly kingdom. He would not be the conquering Messiah that they were looking for because He first had to suffer many things and be killed. For any human king, death would be the end, but not so for Jesus. Death would only be the beginning, because on the third day He would be raised to life.
This was what Jesus had come to earth for. He had come to redeem a sinful people. This had been God’s plan since the beginning of time. If you read through the Old Testament, there are many prophecies that point to this. Psalm 118 speaks of the stone that the builders reject that will become the cornerstone, while Isaiah 53 speaks of the suffering servant by whose wounds we will be healed. But God also knew that this suffering would lead to ultimate glory, and we see this prophesied in Daniel 7:13-14…
The point is, God had a plan from day one, and Jesus was very careful about sticking to His mission. It would have been easy for him to get sidetracked in His mission – He could have just spent the rest of His life going around healing people and raising the dead. Every day would have been a banquet with Him around! He could have lived a good and easy life and avoided all of this suffering. But Jesus understood His mission and why it was necessary for Him to carry it through, and so He continued it. And in the same way, when we have been called by God to carry out a certain task or ministry, we must also pursue it with this determination. And sometimes that will mean ignoring negative influences around us.
JESUS IGNORED PETER’S REBUKE (V. 22-23)
After hearing these words, Peter was overtaken by the tragic thought of Jesus’ suffering and death. He completely ignored the triumphant ending of His resurrection. He had just realized that Jesus was the central figure toward whom all history pointed. And suddenly, there was all this talk about the Messiah enduring suffering and death. Peter had never considered this aspect of the Messiah. He had only been able to see the triumphant side of the prophecies.
And so Peter took Jesus aside and said “Never!” In the Greek, the word that is translated as “never” means “may God be gracious to you.” Peter’s rebuke wasn’t out of opposition, but rather it was out of concern for His master. He was trying to protect Jesus from the suffering that He had prophesied. But if Jesus hadn’t suffered and died, Peter would have died in his sins. This is why it was necessary for Jesus to ignore Peter’s attempt at detracting from His mission.
Jesus also recognized the true source of the distraction – He said to Peter, “Get behind me, Satan!” At the very beginning of His ministry, Jesus was led into the wilderness and tempted by Satan for forty days. One of the temptations that He was faced with was the opportunity to bow and worship Satan, and if He did, Satan would give Him the entire world. This would have made all of the suffering completely unnecessary. Satan had tempted Jesus by trying to give Him the easy way out by avoiding the cross. And here, Peter is doing the same thing – trying to discourage Jesus from taking the long and hard road to the cross. Satan had taken the same temptation and simply repackaged it under the disguise of a concerned friend. But Jesus was able to withstand this rebuke because He had a clear sense of the calling of His mission.
And this is the attitude that we need to have in dealing with people who would try to discourage us from the ministry that God has called us to. A few years back, I actually had someone tell me point blank, to my face, that I was worthless and would never make it in ministry. Now, such a comment could have destroyed me, and I’d be lying if I said it had no effect on me. I can look back now and see it for what it really was – a deliberate attempt by the enemy to take me out. But I was able to look at that comment and realize that God has called me to where I am – not that person. The calling on my life and my sense of mission does not come from any other source. No human being can give it to me, and no human being can take it away from me.
Folks, please understand that when you begin to undertake the work that God has called you to, that there will be adversity thrown your way. Sometimes it will be blatant, as it was in my case, and sometimes it will be more disguised, as it was here with Jesus. But I am encouraging you to find your identity and your sense of mission in Christ. One of my seminary professors once said that you need to make sure that God has called you to where you are. Because if someone else has called you, or if you have called yourself, then you will be setting yourself up for heartache and failure. By looking to God as the source of your calling, you will be able to withstand these attacks that the enemy will throw at you.
So what is our mission?
WE ARE TO FOLLOW CHRIST (vv. 24-26)
Peter had recognized and confessed his belief that Jesus was the Messiah, but this was only the beginning of discipleship. Jesus says that to be His disciple, you must first deny yourself. To deny oneself means to surrender immediate material gratification in order to discover and secure one’s true self and God’s interests. It is a willingness to let go of selfish desires and earthly security. This attitude turns self-centeredness to God-centeredness. Jesus is not saying that we need to create pain or deprivation for ourselves, but that we need to be prepared to let go of anything that competes with His kingdom.
Jesus then tells His disciples that they would need to take up their cross and follow Him. This would have been very unpleasant to hear; as the cross was seen as a way that Rome would execute dangerous criminals. A prisoner carried his own cross to the place of execution, signifying submission to Rome’s power. Following Jesus, therefore, meant identifying with Jesus and his followers, facing social and political oppression and ostracism, and no turning back. For some, taking up the cross might indeed mean death. But Jesus’ words meant that His followers had to be prepared to obey God’s Word and to follow His will no matter the consequences.
So what does that mean for us here in 21st century America? We are not all called to undergo death for Christ. There have been few martyrs in America. We are called to the far less heroic task of following Christ in our everyday lives. Rather than being prepared to die for Christ, we need to be ready to live for Him. Romans 12:9-18 spells out some of the challenges… Paul describes what comes across in Jesus’ description of discipleship as heroic, unusual action in terms of the life we live. The imitation of Christ governs our every action, great and small, heroic and humdrum. We become, as Luther put it, little Christs to one another, in ongoing self-denial and sacrifice after the one whose sacrifice claimed us for God.
Jesus then says that whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever is willing to lose their life will find it. Jesus was talking about saving one’s life, but his focus was on life’s fulfillment in the next world. His point was profound: if we spend all our energy focusing on this life here and now, we will lose the entire point of this life, which is investing in the life to come. If we try to protect ourselves in this life, we squander the opportunity to increase our reward in the life that really matters – the eternal kingdom.
This is the mission that we have been given – to value the things that will matter in eternity. When we don’t know Christ, we make choices as though this life were all we have. In reality, this life is just the introduction to eternity. What we accumulate on earth has no value in purchasing eternal life. Yet how willing we are to sell our eternal values short for earthly security. It is foolish to seek worldly comfort and wealth and ignore the issue of our soul’s eternal salvation How important would a lifetime of pleasure seem when compared to an eternity separated from God and all the blessings of life with Him. This is why we need to make it our mission to evaluate everything about our lives from an eternal perspective. When we do, we will find our values and decisions changing.
So why should we make this our mission?
BECAUSE WE ARE PROMISED AN ETERNAL REWARD (vv. 27-28)
Jesus explains the wisdom of following and accepting the suffering and loss implicit in following Him. He foretells the day when all the losses of His obedient followers would be abundantly compensated. In contrast to His first coming to the earth in humility, the next coming would be in His Father’s glory with His angels. My version (NIV) says that when He comes, He will reward everyone according to what they have done. The Greek word here actually means to repay or recompense, which means to me that people will receive the fruits of what they have sown, whether good or bad. Scripture is very clear on this point. (Colossians 3:23-25)
Jesus also gives His disciples a vision of things to come in order to motivate them to follow Him and be His disciple. He promises that many of them would get to see the Kingdom come before they died. Indeed, many of them were around to see Jesus’ resurrection and victory over death, as well as the coming of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost and the widespread ministry that followed. Likewise, we also have this promise, that if we will follow after Christ, we will also be able to experience the Kingdom.
This is why we can make following Christ with full confidence our mission – because we know what it will mean to follow Him and we also know where He is going. Earlier, nobody seemed too keen on the idea of getting on an airplane without knowing where it was going. But Jesus has told us where He is going, and we are able to follow Him with a clear sense of purpose. Yes, this will mean others may scoff at us, and it also means we will need to forsake the things that the world tells us are important. But as we press on toward the goal that Christ has called us to, we will find that there is nothing better than being a disciple of Christ.
