Matthew 16:17-19(NKJV) 17Jesus answered and said to him, “Blessed are you, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 18And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it. 19And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth £will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
In Matthew 16 we have been looking at the experience of Peter. Jesus asked two questions of his disciples. The first involved what men thought about Jesus’ outward ministry. In other words, what does sense knowledge, that which is gained by hearing and seeing in the natural, say about Jesus. The answers to this question were anything but spiritual.
We live, for the most part, on the basis of sense knowledge. Western society has made a god out of sense knowledge. Anything that cannot be proven by logic or intellect is discounted. However sense knowledge alone cannot lead us to spiritual conclusions.
Yesterday I described how Peter answered Jesus second question and how Jesus pointed out to him that the source of what Peter had come to understand was not sense knowledge. Peter had received something that would become the foundation of biblical Christianity. He had received “revelation knowledge.” God had revealed this truth to Peter by the Spirit.
Peter had seen what Jesus did and heard what Jesus preached with his senses. He had sense knowledge of Jesus and could have concluded from what he heard and saw that Jesus was the Messiah, but that was not the source of his answer to Jesus. He knew Jesus was the Messiah the son of God at a deeper, more profound level. This truth had been revealed to him by the Father.
How did Peter come to this revelation? What was the process God used to reveal the truth about Jesus to him? I believe it goes right back to what God told Joshua.
Joshua 1:8(NKJV) 8This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate in it day and night, that you may observe to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.
How had Peter meditated on the Word. I believe that he would have been aware of the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. I also believe that Jesus was the Word of God made flesh. (John 1:14) Jesus said his words were spirit and life, so that everything he said was the bible. As Peter saw and heard Jesus he began to think about what he was experiencing. He kept it in his heart. He spoke it with his mouth. The truth of what he was seeing and hearing placed a seed in his heart that grew the more he thought about it.
I do not believe that Jesus simply picked a random time to ask these questions. I believe that Jesus could see that something was happening in Peter. When he asked, “Who do you say that I am?”, it became a catalyst in Peter that released the revelation that Jesus was the Messiah, the son of God. That revelation had been building as Peter meditated on the Word of God.
This is the process by which we all receive revelation from God. It often seems to be a momentary event, but it is not. As we meditate on the Word, the life in the word grows in us until the truth explodes in our hearts and we really “see” what God wants us to know. At that moment our lives are changed.
Jesus tells Peter what changes occurred through the release of revelation knowledge into his life. First, Jesus gives him a name change. The name Simon means “reed.” A reed is a thin plant that is easily blown by the wind. It waves one way then the other depending on how the wind is blowing. In that way it is unstable. Jesus says I am not going to call you Simon anymore. I am going to call you Peter.
The Greek word translated Peter is “petra”, which means stone. Jesus is telling Peter that this “revealed knowledge” has made Peter stable in a way he was not before. When we begin to walk in knowledge that has been revealed to us by God it will cause us to be stable and consistent. It will firm our whole life because we will know things that the knowledge of the natural world cannot challenge.
Second he says “upon this rock I will build my church.” The word translated rock is “petros” not petra. He is not saying he will build his church on Peter as one denomination teaches. He is saying that the rock of revelation knowledge is the foundation upon which the church is built. When we are walking in revelation knowledge we will be able to build the church of Jesus Christ in the earth.
Third he tells Peter that the gates of hell will not prevail against the church built on revelation. Gates represent the power and defense of a city. Jesus is telling Peter that those who walk in revelation knowledge will be able to defeat the enemy. They will win wars over the Satanic kingdom by this knowledge.
Finally he says, “I will give you the keys of the of the kingdom, what you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and what you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Revelation knowledge gives us the keys to walk in power and authority in the earth. We will be able to bind, or tie up, the forces of darkness and release the power of God into earthly situations.
We have been given the ability to live by revelation knowledge. God wants to reveal the truth of his Word to you and me. He wants to give us keys that will lead us to victory in every area and circumstance of life. If you are a Christian you can receive the same kind of revelation that Peter did. He was a common man. He was not overly educated. He was not a priest or a king. He was a believer who gave himself to meditation in the Word of God and as a result God was able to reveal something to him that changed his life forever.
There were other struggles in Peter’s life. At the time of Jesus’ arrest, Peter denied knowing Jesus, however I do not believe he ever doubted who Jesus was. He doubted his ability to stand with him. He was confused as to how the “Christ the Son of the Living God” could have been arrested at all. Nevertheless, I believe he never again doubted who Jesus was.
As you look at your life and see the challenges before you right now, I encourage you to find some promises in the Bible and begin to do what God told Joshua to do. Put these promises in your mind. Speak them with your mouth. Picture the action with your imagination. You will find that, at some point in time, you will know God has revealed something to you at a deeper level than before. You will find some keys and you will break down some “gates of hell” in your life. You will no longer be “Simon the reed”, you will become “Peter the stone” at least in that area.
On that “rock” of revelation knowledge, Jesus will be built in your life and together we will build his church in the earth.
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