Read and Believe in Jesus.

“There are some standing here who will not taste death until they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom.” Matthew 16:28

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REVIEW – Finally, alone with the Twelve, Jesus asked them who people thought He was, then, more importantly, who THEY thought He was. They repeated what they’d heard, then Peter spoke out,

“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”

Jesus told Peter that God had given him that special knowledge. On that TRUTH, Jesus would build His church. Satan & death would not be able to prevail against it. He then told Peter He would give him the “keys to the kingdom,” and the authority to permit or allow its principles. (Peter first ‘unlocked’ the door to Gentiles when God sent him to preach to the Roman centurion Cornelius.) .

The church was never “built” on Peter. He was not a Pope. He was a Christian martyr who was crucified by Nero in Rome. In his first letter, Peter pointed to Jesus as the foundation, the “cornerstone” of the Church.

(Later, Paul wrote in Ephesians 2:20-21 that Gentiles were permitted “into this household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord… into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.”

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Matthew 16:221-23.

After these lofty visions of what Jesus’ church would become, Jesus said,

“I must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes,

and be killed,

and on the third day be raised.”

Total silence.

Then Peter took Jesus aside, like a restaurant owner with a clumsy busboy.

“Far be it from You, LORD! This shall NEVER happen to You!”

Immediately Jesus pulled his arm from Peter’s grasp and nearly shouted,

“Get behind me, SATAN! You are a hindrance to me. For you are not setting your mind on the things of God but on the things of man”

WHOA!.

I can imagine Peter staggering backward at that point, almost to the ground, by the force of Jesus’ words. The other disciples turned and gaped at Jesus and Peter. From the heights of promised church leadership to being called in league with the devil. Peter was wordless. Shocked. Confused. Ashamed.

These disciples, these followers of the gentle, compassionate but powerful Messiah, had NO IDEA what awaited their Master – and them – in Jerusalem. Jesus was trying to warn them, to prepare them. He would say similar words on several more occasions, but it was as if they had earplugs in the ears of their understanding.

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Matthew 15:24-28.

Jesus continued with the dark description of what was to come for His followers.

“If anyone would come after me, let him DENY HIMSELF, and TAKE UP HIS CROSS, and FOLLOW ME.”

Whoa. What did these men think of this? A cross? That could mean only ONE thing: execution by the Romans in the vilest way possible. (Perhaps their skin began to crawl…) Jesus continued.

“For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.

“For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” Did he look into Judas’ eyes when he said that?

“Or… what shall a man give in return for his soul?”

Silence.

Then Jesus changes to a glorious picture. “For the Son of Man is going to come with His angels in the glory of His Father, and then He will repay each person according to what he has done.”

‘Well, that sounds more like it’, the disciples could have thought.

“TRULY, I say to you … there are some standing here … who will not taste death UNTIL they SEE the Son of Man coming in His kingdom!”

The twelve must have looked at each other with wide eyes. WOW!

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