Proper 16 (Pentecost 13) August 27, 2023

IS GOD A MYSTERY
Matthew 16:13-20

Is God a mystery? That is the title I have given the sermon this
morning that is based on the gospel from Matthew. Religion is the attempt
of man to come to grips with and find some answers to the mystery of
human life. We look at ourselves and our existence and try to make some
sense out of the unpredictable, strange, and baffling mixture of things that
we call life. What kind of a world is this, what kind of a person am I. Is
life good or bad? Is my life good or bad? What is it that we hope for?
To be sure, there is goodness in the world. There is also indescribable
badness. Both are real. And both can be said of my life. I love and I
hate. I hope and I despair. I believe and I doubt. I can be kind and
generous, but I can also be dreadfully cruel. I build and I destroy. So also,
in creation itself and all of your lives there is goodness and signs of hope.
But the deep mystery of evil is also present. The ancient people knew very
well the great powers over which they had no control. It was not always a
sure thing to them that good would triumph. It is that way today as well.
Things continue to happen to people--frightening things, cruel things, even
damnable things, read the newspapers if you don't believe me. How does
a thing like rape happen? Or perhaps we could try to explain drive-by
shootings. On the other hand tremendously good things happen. People
fall in love; people care for each other and help each other without
expecting repayment. The good and the bad are mixed together in this
thing we call life and often seem like unexplainable accidents.
When ancient people came face to face with evil, they often spoke
about things as devils and demons and demon possessions. The New
Testament speaks in these terms. Nowadays we regard the language of
devils and demons as old-fashioned. Yet, for all our sophistication, we
wrestle with the same issues. It is just that we use different words like

heredity, environment, alienation, brokenness or accident to explain the
events, but the reality is the same. Within me too there are powerful drives
at work. When the bad drives get a hold of me, I am afraid of what I may
do, say or become. That, if you please, may be our form of demon
possession.
We could go on and on with the puzzle or mystery called life. Think for
a moment about death. It is the final puzzle and the final sign of our
insignificance. "Ashes to ashes, dust to dust" our burial liturgies say.
That is just about right. For what, after all is a person's life but a series of
events that lie between one’s birth and one’s death. After our life is over,
we might be missed and mourned for a while, but a hundred and fifty
years from now, neither you nor I will be much more than a name on a
cemetery marker or a few sentences in a family genealogical record. The
Psalmist is matter of fact in his description of life:
In the morning it (life) flourishes and is renewed;
In the evening it fades and withers...
Our years come to an end with a sigh.
A week from Monday is Labor Day. What is the purpose of celebrating
the labor we do. The preacher in Ecclesiastes lays out the same ideas we
have been going over thus far in the sermon.
"Meaningless! Meaningless!" says the Teacher. "Utterly
meaningless! Everything is meaningless." What does man gain
from all his labor at which he toils under the sun? Generations
come and generations go, but the earth remains forever. All things
are wearisome, more than one can say. The eye never has enough of
seeing, nor the ear its fill of hearing. What has been will be again,
what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under
the sun.
But the passages that were read to you from the Old Testament, the
Epistle of Paul to the Romans, and Matthew's gospel speak a radically

different message. It is a message of great hope. You heard the story of
Peter's confession and Christ's reply. He assured Peter that he would build
a fellowship against which event the gates of hell would not prevail. You
heard too the words about the "keys of the kingdom" and about binding
or loosing so firmly that heaven itself would honor the decision. These
were in the gospel. Gospel means "good news,

" an announcement of fact

that is to cheer up and encourage its hearers.
You heard in the Old Testament that God tells us to look to the rock
from which we were cut. Look to Abraham the father of our faith. God
will indeed rescue, he will take our ruins and make them like Eden. He
will bless us with joy and gladness. God will bring about his salvation
speedily and it will last forever. He revealed his name to us so that we
might know him. More fully he revealed himself in a Savior Jesus so that
we might see in him who our God is and what he is really like.
"I will be your God and you will be my people."
"The Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and
truth; we beheld his glory."
Notice that Israel will not only be known by God, but will also know
him. The New Testament assures us that in seeing Christ's glory we see
the heart of God himself. That means that God is here among us and that
he is radically, intimately, and completely involved in man's history. In
your life, in all its diversity, mystery and its beauty as well as its ugliness
God refuses to be hidden. He wants to be and is involved in your life
whether you recognize that fact or not. The announcements in these texts
for this morning is so that you might know who God is and what we are
called to be so that we no longer have to rely on our pious guesses or our
sentimental hopes. We do not have to resign ourselves to accepting the
universe as a mystery with no answers.
Peter is allowed to see Christ as the manifestation of the Father and in
seeing that he sees into the very heart of God. The Spirit that gave Peter

the eyes to see Jesus for who he was is the same Spirit that calls gathers
and enlightens the whole Christian church on earth and keeps it in the one
true faith. In that faith and fellowship known as the church on earth Christ
promised that God will be known by his good and gracious rule.
Those who see Jesus for who he is, The Christ, the Son of the Living
God, are given the keys of the kingdom. What they loose on earth will be
loosed in heaven and what they bind on earth will be bound in heaven.
What does that mean?
That certainly does not mean that some extraordinary power has been
given to the church to manipulate God or allow the church to unlock
heaven in the face of God's "NO." Neither is this word a word to terrify
people and tell them that if the church so chooses it can or will refuse to
forgive the misdeeds of the repentant sinner. Nor does it mean that the
church has such power that it could call good what God calls bad and vice
versa.
It means simply that the church is built on the confession that proclaims
Jesus as the Christ the Son of the living God. The church already now can
speak the word which God himself will speak in the last day. The church
can tell us that our sins are forgiven. And then it can add: "Where there is
forgiveness of sins there is also life and salvation." Therefore too, it can
say that you as God's people are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a
holy nation, God's own people.
The keys of the kingdom of heaven open those doors that let us see light
instead of darkness, give us clarity instead of unsolvable puzzles and point
us, to Jesus who is the beginning and the end. Life with Jesus is not a
mystery. Jesus came to this earth to reveal not to hide the secrets of
heaven and earth. We know that we will live forever with him because he
told us so and like Peter, we believe it.
We are weak. We stumble and we fall. We go from dust to dust. Yet,
our God endures forever. He invites us, together with Peter to deal with

every word and promise of his. He sends his Spirit to convince us and
give us faithful hearts and obedient lives. By the witness and joy of our
own lives we let others in on the secret so that they might join us in our
confession that Christ is Lord to the glory of the Father. Therefore, our
future is not a future of sin and death, but the future of life and fellowship
with one another and with him who assures us: "I will be your God, and
you will be my people."
Our response to this good news about our Salvation in Christ is the
response of Paul in the Epistle. Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom
and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths
beyond tracing out! "Who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has
been his counselor?" "Who has ever given to God, that God should repay
him?" For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be
the glory forever! Amen.

Sermon Read by John Cox (Elder)