Context and Church

Preacher: Jeff Davidson

Scripture: Matthew 16:13-20

Context matters. There are a lot of different things that can go into making up a context. The physical setting. The history of a place or a people. Who it is that is saying or writing something. Who it is that they are saying or writing it to. The medium that is being used.

Imagine that I go to a worship service someplace. Imagine that when I get home Julia asks me how many people were there and I answer her, “You wouldn’t believe it! The sanctuary was full!” If the service was at our Washington City sanctuary, that probably means there were a couple of hundred people. If it was at the church I grew up in back in Ohio, it means there were around 100 or 120. If I was at a worship service at the Hylton Chapel in Woodbridge it means there were a few thousand. In the summer months Washington City used to have their worship services in the chapel, in what is now the music space. If that was the sanctuary it means there were 40 or so people. My answer means nothing to Julia if she doesn’t know the context of where and what I’m talking about.

Context can also matter when we’re thinking about God. A little while back Bryan gave an excellent presentation on theology from the perspective of Black folks like James Cone and Drew Hart and Otis Moss III. Your views on God and the church can be different depending on your own life circumstance and history. Groups and people that have traditionally been on the outside of power structures often see God in a different way than groups and people who have been at the top of power structures. When I was in seminary the theologians we studied were predominantly white, Protestant, and German, and were deeply affected by the rise of the Nazis and World War II. None of them are necessarily right or wrong. It’s a matter of different perspectives caused by different contexts.

Let me talk a little about the physical context of our reading from Matthew. Jesus and the disciples are at Caesarea Philippi. Herod the Great had built a huge complex of buildings, and there was a spring in front of a cave. The spring and cave and a temple near them were dedicated to the Greek god Pan. Among other things, Pan was the god of desolate places. The mountain that the Cave of Pan was in had a lot of little niches carved into it, and in each of these niches was a little shrine or a little icon for some other god. The Roman Empire was fine with all kinds of religions as long as people who believed in them participated in Rome’s civic religion, from which Jews were exempt. Here’s a picture of what it looks like today.  https://images.app.goo.gl/HD2XuQjhtDPYRnPH9  And here’s another picture that shows those niches I mentioned a little better. https://images.app.goo.gl/WtypGmiTcVXbS1EG9  The Cave of Pan itself was sometimes used for sacrifices, and these sacrifices were sometimes human.

So that’s the physical context for our reading from Matthew. Put a pin in all of that for just a minute and we’ll come back to it.  

There are a few things in this passage you could preach on. The discussion about who people say Jesus is thought-provoking. Likewise, sometimes in this passage people get caught up in Jesus changing Simon’s name to Peter, and then saying of Peter, “…on this rock I will build my church…” For Roman Catholics, this is Jesus appointing Peter as the leader of the disciples and essentially as the first Pope. Protestants don’t necessarily agree with that interpretation or that application. Once again, the context affects how you read this scripture and what it means to you.

I don’t want us to get caught up in that debate this morning, although there are a whole lot of sermons that you could preach on that particular part of our reading too. I wan