On This Rock I Will Build My Church
Matthew 16:13-20
“When Jesus came into the region
of Caesarea Philippi, He asked
His disciples, saying,
“Who do men say that I, the Son of Man, am?”
14 So they said, “Some say John the Baptist, some Elijah, and others
Jeremiah
or one of the prophets.”
15 He said to them, “But who do you
say that I am?”
16 Simon Peter answered and said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the
living God.”
17 Jesus 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.
18 And 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.
19 And 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.”
20 Then He
commanded His disciples that they should tell no one that He was Jesus
the Christ.”
The Catholic Church has long declared from this passage in Matthew 16 that Peter was the rock on which Jesus built His church and that the apostle was the first Pope. Do you see the problem with that view in the text itself?
In the Lord’s word picture there are two opposing cities: the church Jesus would build, also called the kingdom of heaven, and Hades or the realm of death, from whose gates would come the opposition to the kingdom built on the rock.
Why don’t we think he rock on which the church is founded is Peter? Because in the figure of the city he is the keeper of the keys of the kingdom, not the foundation on which it is built. The one who is the key keeper (as were all the apostles in 18:18-20, not just Peter) cannot also be the rock on which the kingdom is built.
That only leaves one thing that can be the rock. It is the truth which Peter confessed to Jesus: ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ That is the foundation, the rock, on which the church of Christ, or kingdom of heaven is built. “For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Corinthians 3:11).