D-Now Prayer Night // Matthew 16:13-20

Join us as we prepare our hearts for D-Now!

Transcript

Journey To Caesarea Philippi

Why Jesus Chooses A Dark Place

Who Do People Say I Am

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Uh yeah. So D now is coming up, and uh we're super excited about that. And like we said earlier tonight, we'll be a little bit different. Uh I'm not gonna take too much of your time here because we want to leave some time to pray, a lot of time to get to small groups, but if you have your copy of God's word, if you'll flip open to Matthew chapter 16, uh, we're gonna be in verse 13 to start. Uh and as you're flipping there, we're gonna be talking about the moment that Peter confesses Jesus is Christ. And to give you a little bit of background on where this story fits in the Gospel of Matthew and really in Jesus' life as a whole, because this is mentioned in multiple gospels, is Jesus had been walking with his disciples for quite a while at this point. This kind of comes in like the halfway almost to the latter part of his ministry. And Jesus says, All right, boys, time to take a field trip. We're going up to this place called Caesarea Philippi. And if you look at a map uh and you look at Israel, Caesarea Philippi is way up here in the north. Jerusalem, the capital, ultimately where Jesus would be crucified, uh, where the temple was, all the big stuff's down here. And so Caesarea Philippi is actually the furthest away from Jerusalem that Jesus ever travels. And so, what is he doing? Like, why is he going the opposite direction? Like, what's going on here? Well, he wants to get his disciples away from the hustle and the bustle and the noise, away from the opposition, because this is going to be a very, very, very important moment for them. And so this place, Caesarea Philippi, uh, was a city that was built at the Mount, uh, or at the foot of Mount Hermon, and it was a little bit north of Sea of Galloway. Basically, it was this massive cliff, and into this cliff were carved these different caves and tunnels, uh, and there was water that came out of it. But this wasn't just some beautiful geographic location. This was actually one of the hot spots for idol worship. Pagan gods were worshipped here, uh, the god of Pan, which was like a fertility god, and so they would offer sacrifices at this temple, and they would do all sorts of terrible things uh that I can't tell you from stage at this spot. And so Jesus takes them not to just some random field trip to the zoo or to the park, but he says, Hey, we're going to one of the darkest places you can think of where there's this ritual sacrifice, idol worship, cult practices. It was just dark. Have any of y'all ever been to a place that just feels dark? A lot of us, right? Maybe a major city, maybe if you've ever been on a mission trip to a place that's very broken, like there's just this presence of darkness here. But that's on purpose. Jesus isn't just doing that because he's going to ask his disciples a very, very important question. So Matthew 16, verse 13 says this. When Jesus came to the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, Who do people say that the Son of Man is? So the Son of Man sounds like who's the Son of Man? Like, why is Jesus talking in the third person? What's going on here? The Son of Man was a title that the book of Daniel used for the Messiah. And so Jesus uses that to refer to himself a lot. That was one of his favorite things to call himself, uh, and it points back to this fact that he's the promised Messiah. More on that in a second. And then in verse 14, they replied, Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets. So that was that was the reply from the disciples. And then Jesus asked, But you, he asked them, who do you say that I am? And again, this moment in Jesus' ministry is a major turning point. Because like we said earlier, Jesus had been walking with the disciples for a long time, and he'd been doing a lot of miracles, a lot of signs and wonders. He'd been healing the sick. He'd been uh just, I mean, he'd been raising the dead, been walking on the water. Like Jesus has been doing all these things, but it's not just so that he can be like this trick pony, right? Like, let me show him some cool like party tricks, like let me do a magic trick. Oh, like got your robe. Like, that's not what he's doing here. But all of these signs and wonders were to tell people about his identity, the power and the authority that he had. And ultimately, he was giving his disciples and everyone around him time to uh to check him out, to ask the question Hey, who is this guy? And you see that. We talked about this on Sunday a few weeks back when Jesus in the boat, Sea of Galilee, the storm comes up, and the disciples are freaking out, they're losing their mind, and Jesus basically like stands up and says, Hey, chill, and everything goes calm. How do the disciples respond? Who is this dude? Right? Because they didn't have the full picture yet. But see, the time had come for them to answer that question. Because he takes them far away to the darkest place imaginable and he asks them, Hey, who does everybody else say I am? Like, who do all the people, the crowds? Because there have been a lot of crowds. They're like, oh, you know, John the Baptist, Elijah, Jeremiah, some prophet. They're all wrong answers. Right? And he presses in. He says, Who do you say I am? Who do you say I am? I'm not worried about the crowds. I'm not worried about what everybody else says, but I want to know who do you say I am? Time's up, time to decide. What is your view of me? Who am I to you? And that's such an important question because it's a question for each and every single one of us. We live in a world in a town where you ask somebody who is Jesus, there's a whole lot of answers that fly around. A lot of answers somebody will tell you, but then when you ask somebody who is Jesus and you look at their life, there's a whole nother set of answers there. And so that question's the one I posed to you tonight. Who is Jesus to you? And you know, you might be tempted to give me the Sunday school answer. He's the Son of God, fully God, fully man, third person of the Trinity. But I want you to be honest with me. Who is Jesus to you? Is he how the rest of the world views him? You know, he's some historical figure, George Washington, right? Like I read about him, I believe he existed, but that's about where it stops. He doesn't really have any effect on any other part of my life except I go to church twice a week. If I'm supposed to. Is he a nice guy who like cares about you? He loves you, but he just wants you to be happy. Like he's there for you. I want to live my best life, I want to be fulfilled, I want to be popular, I want to be healthy, and like Jesus helps me feel better about myself. Or is he like a get out of jail free card? You know, he he loves me, so like when something happens in my life, when I screw up, when I make a mistake, like I'm gonna run to him and he'll forgive me. And you know, then we just complete this song and dance over and over again. The reason I ask you that question is because that is the most important question that you're ever gonna be asked in life. Because your view of God shapes everything about who you become and how you live.

unknown 7:13

Right?

Miracles As Signs Of Identity

Who Do You Say I Am

Peter’s Confession And Its Weight

SPEAKER_00 7:13

If you don't think there is a God, if you think all of this is pointless, well, that's how you turn into someone who's willing to do horrible things, right? Who's willing to walk into a school, right, and kill innocent kids, innocent teenagers, students, teachers. That's how you go and kill protesters in the street. That's how you rob people, that's how you take from people who are vulnerable if you don't believe there's a God who actually cares. Or if you believe God's just about making you happy, you might follow a set of rules, but anytime that someone else's well-being comes up against your happiness, you're gonna take them out every single time. Right? I I'm gonna get mine. I have to take care of me. Nobody else is gonna take care of me. So even if this hurts you, too bad. How you view God will shape who you become every single time. If you think God cares about you being wealthy, you're gonna become a greedy person. If you think God cares most about you being popular, you're gonna become vain and prideful. Right? And so ask yourself, who do you say Jesus is? And this is Peter's answer. Simon Peter answered, You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God. And verse 16, verse 17, Jesus replied, Blessed are you, Simon, son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades, or some translations, will say hell will not overcome it. And I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven. Then he ordered his disciples not to tell anyone he was the Messiah. And so so Jesus asked, Hey, who do you say I am? And Peter, right? He's the if you read the Gospels, Peter's the fiery one, like he always chimes in, like he's always like the first one to answer gung-ho, like he cuts a dude's ear off in a couple of chapters. It's wild. He's always the first one. He says, You are the Messiah. Let's, moment of honesty here. Uh, how many of you have heard the term Messiah and really don't know exactly what that means? Probably a good share of us. That's okay, right? That word is actually really, really loaded with a whole lot of historical, biblical, all sorts of things, right? That word Messiah was the word for this promised savior that all of the Jewish history and the whole Old Testament has been looking forward to this entire time, right? They knew that the world was broken, things weren't as they were meant to be. And so God was promising this Messiah to make it all right. Because you go back far enough, God created the world. He created humanity, he placed humanity in this garden, everything is perfect, right? Humanity, we were his uh image bearers. We were meant to show the world what the invisible God looks like. Just like a child looks like they're kidding. Like if you see Michael running around, Michael will tell you and show you what I look like because he's my he bears my image as my son. We were supposed to do that with God. We were supposed to be loving and kind and create art and beautiful culture, and and we were supposed to live in submission to God, but in submission to God, we found true freedom and love. But at some point along the road, we decide, hey, I want to be my own God. I don't want this whole God thing. I want to make the rules. I want to decide why I'm wrong. And so what happens when you have a bunch of people running around who all think that they're God? Well, what happens when I want something and you want something else? Well, I'm God, I make the rules, so boo you, right? And that's where you get murder, that's where you get theft, that's where you get all of these horrible things because people decided, hey, I'm gonna do it my own way. And evil and sin and brokenness entered into the world. And God didn't want evil and sin and brokenness in the world. And God is perfect, He's just, right? Meaning He created the world perfect and He punishes evil. He doesn't let people off the hook. If you do something wrong, you face the consequences for that. And the thing is, we all want that, right? We want the person who does terrible things to an innocent person, or we want the someone who takes advantage of a child or does whatever. Like we want that person to face punishment. But the problem is uh Jesus' standard, God's standard is not the same as our standard. Our standard is like, I'm good as long as I'm better than someone else, right? I'm better than that guy. But that's not God's standard. God's standard's perfection. He wants a world without sickness, without brokenness, without murder, without stealing, without pride. And the thing is, we're we're the problem, right? We're the sinners, we're the broken ones. And because of our sin, we deserve punishment. And our punishment, because we've chosen to go away from God, is to lose the source of life, eternal separation from him. But God didn't want that to be the case. And so even from the moment that Adam and Eve sinned in the garden, even before that, God had a plan from the beginning of time, came and wrap our head around it that he would one day send a solution. And all of the Bible points to that solution one day. You read the Old Testament and you're like, man, all of these guys are idiots except this one guy named God. Like no one else has their acts together. And it's just failure over failure, mess up after mess up. Every time you think somebody's, maybe this is the guy, maybe this is the guy, it's not him, it's not him, but it's all pointing to something in the future. And then one day that future is born in a manger, and his name is Jesus. And Jesus lives a perfect life. He doesn't do anything wrong, he does everything he should do, right? He heals the sick, he perfectly obeys. He does everything that humans were supposed to do, but at the end of his life, he died on a cross. Right? And on that cross, scripture says that Jesus became our sin, that he took our place, that we talked about how we deserve death because we decided to be our own God, and we're gonna hurt anybody that gets in our way, and we did all these evil and wicked wicked things, and we deserve punishment. Jesus took that punishment. So God's not just sweeping your sin under the run. Your sin has to be punished. Either you're gonna pay for it or Jesus paid for it on the cross. And Jesus taking that on on the cross is him making a way so that we can become children of God once again, that we can be forgiven, that we can be redeemed. And you hear about Jesus isn't just some uh you know good guy who lived a really good life and then took our punishment. That doesn't work. All humans are broken. Jesus was God in the flesh, that he was fully God, fully man. And so when you talk about what Peter's saying here, and he doesn't even completely understand what he is saying, he's saying, hey, you are God. And see, that's the thing I want to focus on tonight. Jesus is not just some self-help grandpa. Like Jesus is the God of the universe. He made the stars, right? You go outside and you look up at that fiery, burning ball of gas a bajillion miles away. He made that. We go to Colorado in the summer and you look at these mountains that are 14,000 foot tall. They rise in the air, they're snow capped, it's beautiful. He put them there. You go to the ocean and you see these waves and you look out at something bigger than you can even imagine. Right? He's the one who put that there. You look at the beach, all the grains of sand. He knows exactly how many every single one of those grains of sand are. He put the color in your eyes, he put the color in your hair, he knows how many hairs are on your head, and he is the God of everything, the God of the universe, and he made you. And that matters. Right? And you see here in the text too, you'll see that Jesus says, Yes, I uh he said, Blessed are you, Simon of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. So he's saying, Yes, Peter, you are correct. And you didn't come about this on your own. God showed it to you. And then he says, On this rock, talking about this confession of him as Christ, I will build my church, and the gates of hell were not overcome it. So what do you guys know about gates? What are gates meant to do? Did somebody say jump over? Gates are meant to be jumped over. Sorry, I heard that wrong. Yeah, keep people out, right? They're defensive, right? You're right. I'm sorry, I just misheard it. I'm deaf. You're cool. It keeps people out, right? And so if I'm saying the gates of hell will not prevail, is that Jesus standing on this mountain being like, hey man, Satan's gonna do his worst, he's gonna try real hard, you know, but our defense, we're gonna have a goal line stand. Like he's gonna, he's gonna, he's gonna, you know, we're gonna make it through. Like Satan's gonna do a lot of damage, but we'll survive. No, he's saying, look, I took you guys to the top of this mountain in the most broken place that I could possibly imagine. We're looking at a pagan temple where they're sacrificing goats and humans and doing all sorts of horrible things. And I'm telling you that we're gonna charge the gates of hell and those things aren't gonna stand. He's saying this whole me as Messiah thing is so much bigger than anything you can imagine, right? I'm the promised solution. You look around at all the brokenness and all the death and all the sin and all the cancer in the world. I'm the fix. And that's what he's trying to get his disciples to see here. You need to have a correct view of who I am. It's not a good teacher, it's not a guy to help me out, it's not a name to put on my college resume. I am the God of the universe who put on flesh and came to earth to make a solution for your sin and to draw near to you so that you can actually have a way to draw near to me. And so you have to ask yourself, is that how I see Jesus? Because if that's true, it changes everything. If that's real, nothing else really matters that much, does it? You know, that that that team that you've been trying so hard to make, not to say that it's not important, but like, is it really that big of a deal? If the God of the universe wants you, made a way to come close to you, knows everything about you and loves you all the same. And and you have to ask yourself, is that how I view God? And one way you can tell this is ask yourself, what do my prayers look like? Your prayers tell you a lot about God, or tell you a lot about how you view God. Do you pray? If you don't pray, there's a good chance that I don't I don't have this like big view of God. Or what am I praying for? Right? I was talking this about this with my boys uh this morning at Mary's. It's like, hey, like if we pray, hey God, will you give me uh the spot on this team? God, will you give me the spot on this team? God, will you give me the spot on this team? Like, that tells you your priorities. Or God, will you give me uh, you know, just give me, give me that boy, right? He's really cute. Can we just can we date? Can you give me a boyfriend? Just any boyfriend, really, at this point, just anything. Like, just give me a boyfriend, right? Please, God. Like that reveals somebody, somebody like, ooh, I prayed that this morning. That reveals your heart, right? And so when we think about, man, if I truly believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that the God of the universe cares about me and that he is sovereign, he is over all things, he is all powerful, man, we should be praying some big prayers.

unknown 17:31

Right?

What Messiah Really Means

SPEAKER_00 17:31

Like we should be praying, like, hey, God, I want every single person at my school to get saved. I pray that there would not be a single non-believer at Bernie High, at Voss. Do we believe God's that big? God, I want you to bring revival, right? I want you to eliminate pornography addiction from my generation. God, I want you to eliminate nicotine addiction from my generation. Like, do you view God as that big? And then let's bring it on a micro level. And this is where it all ties into D now, and we're about to land the plane, and Aaron can come out. Do you have a big enough view of God to wrap your head around the fact that if you're going to D now this weekend, that he has something for you? You might not even know it yet. You might be coming in thinking, hey, we're gonna have some fun. I'm gonna stay up till 3 a.m., right? I'm gonna be with my friends, gonna eat a bunch of junk food. It's gonna be great. Or do you view God to say, hey, I'm about to have a whole weekend to learn about how God loves me, about who God is? Like, guys, I love D now, but this is not supposed to just be this thing we do to you know have another social event on the calendar. This is a weekend to draw near to the God of the universe who loves you, knows everything you ever thought, said, or done, that thing you've tried to get rid of a million times in your life, that habit, that addiction, that shame you carry around, how you hate the way you look. He knows all of that and he loves you. And he has something for you this weekend. And so my challenge for you is to go into this weekend. Man, maybe you don't even know if it's Jesus things for you. Maybe you're like, hey, I'm here because, you know, it's something to do, I'm bored during the week. Man, what would it look like to show up with D now and just say, hey, maybe God has something for me? Maybe this is legit. Would you view God as big enough to free you from that addiction? Would you view God as big enough to give you the courage to actually step out in your faith in your school and your family? Would you view God as big enough to heal you from that hurt that happened to you that you feel like you might never get free from? To fix that thing about you that you wish you could just shove down in a closet. Because what I'm telling you is he is that big. Like you could experience life change this week. And you can experience life change anytime we come in here and we worship the Lord and we read the Word of God. But how often do we just come in ready to check the box? Go through the motions. And so, real quick, you can go ahead, everybody, bow your head. And I just want to give you some time between you and the Lord. And we're gonna spread out and do a little bit of prayer here just in a short moment. And I just want you to start. I just want you to pray about your own heart, your own mind, and take a little bit of time. Pray that you would be open to whatever God has for you this weekend. Maybe it's you've got some sin in your life that you need to be convicted of, that you need to be set free from. Maybe you know that, but you just haven't ever had the courage to bring it into the light and repent and change directions. Maybe you need boldness. Maybe you need encouragement in the face of guilt, in the face of shame. Maybe you need freedom from addiction. Maybe you need healing from trauma. I don't know what it is, but God does. And I can promise you that He wants to meet you in the middle of that. Tonight. And not just tonight, this weekend. So would you pray for that? I'm gonna call a little bit of a pivot here because we were gonna pray in groups in here, but we're about to do that in our small groups, and I want to leave time for that. So I'm just gonna ask you as individuals to pray right now as well. Would you pray for salvation? Would you pray a big prayer that every single person who comes to D now that is not a Christian, that does not have faith in Jesus, would not leave that way. That we would see countless eternities, lives, and hearts changed. People get saved. Maybe you have a friend that you invited, but you're like, man, I really, really they need some Jesus, right? Like, I want to see this person get saved. Pray for that friend. Pray for him by name. Say, God, will you save him? Will you save her? Will you set him free? Would you pray for our homes and our leaders? That God would give us all the peace and rest and the energy. That God would protect us. And Lord, would you pray for or Lord, I'm praying as I'm telling you what to pray for. Would you pray for the speaker and would you pray for the band? That they would lead us well, that they would just stand behind the word of God. That it wouldn't be about performance or an event, but it would simply be about lifting the name of Jesus high. That it's all about Him. Here in a moment, we're gonna stand. We're gonna respond in worship. And I just want you to take this time to thank the Lord. Thank the Lord that we get to do this, that we get to know Him, that we get to have weekends to set aside and grow close to Him. Maybe you want to continue praying. Maybe you're like, hey, Garrett gave us a really short amount of time to do that. Just sit where you are. You don't have to stand. Maybe you want to go off to the corner of the room. Maybe you'll find a group of guys, a group of girls, right? You've been doing life together, and like, hey, we want to pray for this event together. We're all in the same grade. Do that. And we're gonna sing a song of worship. We're gonna praise the Lord, and then we're gonna go to groups and we'll have some more time to pray, and we'll have some specific topics you'll move through and whatnot. But I just want to leave you with that question. Who do you say that Jesus is? And if you say that he's God, do you have a big enough view of God that he could change everything for you this weekend? That he's bigger than your biggest hurts, fears, that he could set you free from anxiety, he could set you free from shame, guilt, sin. Because he can. And I want you to trust him for that this weekend. Let's stand and respond in worship.