Who Do You Think He Is?

Before you start todays devotional, ask the Lord to use it to grow you up in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

Before Jesus moves forward in His ministry, He wants to make two things really clear for His disciples: (1) who He is, and (2) what He is going to do. That’s no different for us.

The Pharisees and Sadducees asked Jesus for a sign from heaven, but they were only trying to trap Him. Boldy, He says, “Hypocrites! You’re good at predicting the weather but can’t recognize the signs of the times.”

The problem is they wouldn’t accept His signs. They called Jesus an imposter Messiah. The crowds thought He was John the Baptist, Elijah, or Jeremiah. Jesus asked His disciples, “Who do people say I am?”

He still asks this today. Jesus is the most controversial person who has ever lived. Some will say, Yes, Jesus was a great person and a great teacher. Some will call Him a respected prophet. History’s finest! But Simon Peter summed up the truth. “You are the Christ,” meaning, Messiah, the One predicted in the Old Testament. The Lord Jesus fulfilled it all. He is “the Son of the living God” —the highest, best confession that could have been said up till now. Jesus is all this—He confirmed it Himself.

Only the Holy Spirit can show us who He really is, Jesus told them. Only His Spirit leads us to the truth about Jesus as Lord.

Then, for the first time, Jesus introduces the idea of “His church.” Jesus said He will build His church on this petra; that is, on the bedrock truth of who He really is. And He will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven to those who make the same confession as Peter, those who know Christ as Savior.

With His mission established, Jesus tells His disciples for the first time He was headed for Jerusalem to die for the sins of the world. Peter blurted out, “But You are the Messiah. You cannot go to the cross!”

Jesus knew Satan was behind this. The enemy can cause one to deny Jesus that died on the cross for our sins, was buried and rose again from the dead.

Understanding their confusion, Jesus invites them—and any who will follow Him—to deny himself and take up his cross (16:24). This means to put Jesus in the picture and take yourself out of it. As His followers, we assume the risk of losing our lives. The opposite is also true. At Jesus’ second coming, all accounts will be settled and everyone will receive his proper rewards.

Jesus wants us to set our eyes on the future Kingdom, to see Him as He is. It happened on a mountaintop as Jesus and His disciples returned to Galilee after their Caesarea Philippi retreat. With His closest disciples, Jesus appears with Elijah and Moses and is transfigured with light. “His face did shine as the sun.” The light shone from within Him rather than like a spotlight. Jesus’ perfect humanity was transfigured. The Man Jesus glorified there is the kind of person every child of God will be someday (read 1 John 3:2). This glorious prospect of being like Jesus Christ is the future of every one of His own.

Jesus told the disciples to wait until after the Resurrection to tell what happened there.

When Jesus and His disciples came down from the mountain, they were met by a demon-possessed young man, the worst case ever seen. The boy’s father asked Jesus for mercy and healing for his son. “I brought him to Your disciples, but they couldn’t heal him.”

Jesus asks to see the boy. He rebuked the devil and he left and the boy was cured. Why couldn’t the disciples cast the devil out?

Because you didn’t believe, Jesus said. Nothing that is according to God’s will is impossible, but you must have faith—faith even as small as the smallest seed.

1. What is so important about our answer to Jesus’ question, “Who do you say that I am?”

2. How can the revelation of who Jesus is be the foundation for the church?

3. Why would Jesus let His disciples follow Him for so long before telling them for the first time that He came to die?

Additional Resource

Listen to Dr. J. Vernon McGee’s complete teachings on Matthew 16:1-28.