MATTHEW 16
Ques Why are the Sadducees introduced in this chapter?
CAC I suppose to show that they were equally incapable of discerning who was there, and also to show that they could work together with the Pharisees against Jesus. They were bitterly opposed one to the other, but could continue together against the Lord Jesus. They are two elements that we have to do with. What the Lord was looking for was some ability to discern. If there was no ability to discern what was of God when it was presented, there was nothing. Fancy asking Him to show them a sign out of heaven! The great sign out of heaven was there. They showed their utter blindness.
Rem Orthodoxy and unorthodoxy both failed to recognise the Person.
CAC Yes, so if people maintain today that Peter is the rock on which the church is built, they are only confessing their own moral incapability. If they had any moral discernment they would understand it to be an impossibility. So the Lord will not respond and will not reason with them, but declares they are a wicked and adulterous generation. They could discern the import of natural things, but could not discern Emmanuel when He was there in their midst, with every evidence that He was Emmanuel. The Pharisees and Sadducees were both on the same footing evidently. It lies at the root of any understanding of the assembly to see that it does not hang on knowledge of the Scriptures; it all hangs on an inward power of discernment, which the Scriptures in themselves will not impart. And people can build themselves up on Scripture, and feel that [p. 121] Scripture will carry them through — it will not! It is the Person of whom Scripture speaks that will carry them through. The Lord’s word to the Jews is very important, “Ye search the scriptures, for ye think that in them ye have life eternal”.
Rem “They it is which bear witness concerning me”, John 5: 39.
CAC It is the Person of whom the Scriptures testify. And He says, “Ye will not come to me that ye might have life”, John 5: 40. It is possible to study the Scriptures without any inward power of discernment — and so useless.
Rem There must be a moral foundation of God in the soul.
CAC That is very important, and we have to come to that. You may reason and argue with people, but without inward discernment of what is of God it leads nowhere.
Rem The Lord was pleased to say “flesh and blood has not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in the heavens”.
CAC It is evident that this wicked and adulterous generation provided no material for God, and it had to be cast out, and that is “the sign of Jonas”. What the Lord had in mind was that by their rejection of Himself they showed manifestly that they were cast out by God.
Ques What does the “sign of Jonas” present to us?
CAC It is really the casting out of a generation that was entirely out of harmony with God. Jonas was entirely out of harmony with God, and that necessitated his being cast out. It is the casting out of the Hebrew. Peter had inward discernment; he had not learnt from the Scripture that Jesus was the Christ.
Rem He would be confirmed by Scripture.
CAC He did not need the Scripture; he had the Person of whom the Scripture speaks. It was not the Scripture that convicted him of sin, but he found himself [p. 122] in the presence of God in Jesus — the “great multitude of fishes” overcame him. He was there in grace and goodness, so he discerns his state in the light of who was there. It was declared before that, I suppose, that he was a stone for the building; that is, the Lord discerned something in Peter that was suitable to be put into His new structure. The record of the Scriptures is most important, but the Pharisees at any rate were full of Scripture and could give Scripture for anything, yet they had no capacity to discern the Person of whom Scripture speaks and when He was presented as perfectly as the Scriptures present, they did not recognise Him.
Rem We see the difference between a very simple soul and one with ritual with a scriptural basis, who does not know the Person.
Rem We want the Spirit of the Scriptures.
CAC We want the Person.
Rem It needs the work of a divine Person in a man, so that he accepts the Scripture.
Rem The letter kills, the Spirit gives life.
CAC It is very simple; these people were full of the Scriptures, and made their boast in the Scriptures, but there was a complete lack of ability to discern Emmanuel in their midst.
Ques What does the leaven of the Pharisees mean?
CAC It says, “of the doctrine of the Pharisees and Sadducees” in verse 12.
Rem It only serves to inflate and such would have no appreciation of what is of God.
CAC And we find this same want of discernment coming out in the disciples; they reason among themselves, saying, “Because we have taken no bread”. It was great lack of discernment. He had shown quite recently that He could feed thousands of people!
Rem Last week we had that the Lord spoke of the [p. 123] great faith of the woman; here He says, “O ye of little faith”.
CAC You see the Lord felt it, that even His disciples had so little inward discernment of who He was that they should think He would find fault with them, because they had forgotten to take bread.
Rem He expects His people to understand; it is educational (c.f. verse 11). It is connecting it all again with the Person. Here He was Himself in Person with them, so they should have comprehended Him in a wonderful way. The chief of the Pharisees, ‘a Pharisee of the Pharisees’, was converted by the presentation of the Person.
Ques Is Caesarea-Philippi going into other territory?
CAC It was the extreme north of the land which is rather suggestive that the assembly was going to take its place chiefly in the Gentile world.
Ques The Lord asks, “Who do men say that I the Son of man am?” Peter says, “The Christ, the Son of the living God”. Why should that be?
CAC The Lord habitually spoke of Himself as the Son of man. He had come to take up everything on man’s side and behalf; it is also a title that extended beyond Israel. It was obvious that the Lord was taking up things on man’s behalf; His whole life and service showed that He was taking up man’s cause. They could not deny that, but did they really perceive who He was as to His Person?
Rem The Lord is touching the crux of the matter now — who He is.
CAC We find men had good thoughts about Him, but they did not rise above that. All could divine something wonderful there, but they could not discern who He was. But the disciples had an inward power of perception to discern who He was, and Peter declares it. The question is raised with them all, and Simon Peter is the spokesman for the rest.
[p. 124] Ques Would this help in the matter of asking for fellowship? It is a matter of what they can say as to Jesus, who He is.
CAC And I think it will become more necessary to raise the question, because there are so many who profess to believe on Him who have no true thought of His Person at all.
Rem The Supper is for intelligent persons, that is, intelligent as to the Lord.
CAC And those who hold any doctrine, whether of the Pharisees or Sadducees will, I believe, be found defective as to the Person; the root of the thing is that the Person is not known.
Rem Everything revolves round this, the accuracy of Peter’s answer. If he is right as to the Person, there will be very little wrong doctrine.
CAC Peter has a distinguished place here, but a representative place.
Rem This knowledge is the result of the working of divine Persons in our soul; it is what is wrought in us by God, not by the study of the Scriptures.
CAC There is stability about this. What the Father had revealed to Peter had the character of unshakeable stability.
Rem The rock is really the confession of Jesus as the Son of God.
Rem It is what was confessed — the truth that He was the Son of God.
CAC And it was known by the Father’s revelation; what was objectively presented in Christ was known subjectively in Peter’s soul by the Father’s revelation; so there is a stability about it that hades’ gates could not prevail against. ‘Gates’ is a kind of military figure. Christ’s assembly is an impregnable fortress, and when you think of the kind of material of which it is built, you find it must [p. 125] be so. It is built with persons who by the Father’s grace have come to a true apprehension of the Person of Christ as the Son of God, and those brought to it cannot be moved. It is difficult to realise it in view of all the failure, but we have to understand that Christ is building a structure that is impregnable. The one thing to have our minds set on continually is to understand who Christ is, that He is the Son of God. Each time we come together in assembly we should get a little deepening of the glories of Christ, the Son of the living God, and be more stable and fixed in our thoughts. We do not want to be carried about by winds of doctrine; we want to be stabilised. I am grieved to see how soon saints are carried away by influences that come along.
Rem The Lord enjoins on His disciples not to say that He was the Christ.
CAC I suppose that testimony in Israel was finished; that is, a new order of things was coming in, the assembly and the kingdom of the heavens, both depending on the Lord being in heaven. The testimony of His being the Christ had gone forth in Israel and had been refused. The assembly is here viewed in its completeness; “I will build my assembly” (verse 18) regards it as the work of Christ. The local assembly is in chapter 18 but the universal assembly in chapter 16.
Rem The keys stand in an assembly setting though it was said to Peter, “I will give to thee ..”. (verse 19).
CAC There is evidently a distinction between the assembly and the kingdom of the heavens. Mr. Darby said that to confound the assembly and the kingdom of the heavens had the worst possible moral effect on the soul; if so, it is a serious thing. Is that sound doctrine, Mr. B.?
Rem Please explain.
CAC You could not think of any foolish virgin in [p. 126] the assembly, could you?
Rem The mysteries of the kingdom recognize something that is spurious.
CAC That is helpful, I think. I suppose sometimes the Lord speaks of the kingdom of the heavens in its spiritual reality as that which has come under His own rule in heaven; yet there is a dispensational setting in which it has taken the place of Israel on earth and there may be that come in which is not perfect. I was thinking that Peter had the keys of the kingdom of the heavens, not of the assembly. He could not let anyone into the assembly as Christ’s building. Peter opened the door to the Jew in Acts 2 and to the Gentile in Acts 10, but it does not follow that all the people he opened the door to were converted. In this chapter it is the assembly in its universality and each stone is a living stone. Peter was a living stone because he had a true apprehension in his heart of Christ, which is what makes one.
Ques Why was Peter tested by this question?
CAC We are all tested by what we think of Christ. “What think ye of Christ?” is a good question, and our place in the assembly is determined by what we think of Christ. What the Father has wrought in human hearts is what makes material for the assembly; nothing else has any value. Paul says, “God ... was pleased to reveal His Son in me, that I may announce him as glad tidings among the nations”, Galatians 1: 15, 16. He had the same kind of revelation as Peter but it was entirely God’s work.
Rem Here the Lord claims Peter as a stone for the building.
CAC It is after all the assembly viewed in a provisional aspect. It is a position in which the assembly stands in the presence of hades’ gates; they are not going to stand for ever; it is hardly an eternal relation of the assembly. It is one unit here — “My assembly”. It is by the Father’s grace if any soul gets a true and divine apprehension of Christ as the Son of God, and nothing — not all the powers of darkness — can overturn what is accomplished by the Father’s grace.
Ques Would you say a word as to binding and loosing?
CAC I suppose that was personal to Peter. There is no hint that that particular power would be passed on to any other. The Pope pretends he has the keys now. In John 20 the disciples are set up with the power of the administration of the forgiveness of sins. The commission to remit sins has been given to the assembly.
Ques Where would we get Peter binding?
CAC When he said to Simon, “Thy money go with thee to destruction”, Acts 8: 20. He was binding him.
Ques That soul was lost then?
CAC Yes. This commission is not continued; when he had opened the door to Jew and Gentile there was nothing more for Peter to do — nothing more to be done. The Lord has committed Himself to Peter and He has committed Himself to the assembly in that way, so there is no appeal against an assembly judgment.
Ques In Galatians everything Peter does does not stand?
CAC He was the very man who denied the Lord; but when He said this in Matthew 16 it did not mean Peter was going to be absolutely perfect as an individual; but He spoke of his commission with reference to binding and loosing in the kingdom of the heavens. It was given to Peter to give a most wonderful declaration of Christ’s resurrection on the day of Pentecost. John could not have gone to the house of Cornelius and let the Gentiles in. It is the Lord’s appointment and we have to accept it; we recognise the wonderful place the Lord had given Peter. It was the divine appointment that Peter should let in the Jew and Gentile and he did it. There is always a selected [p. 128] vessel for an appointed service; no man could get into it voluntarily. I might pray to be an apostle for fifty years; it would not be the slightest use. I would rather pray that I might be a brother; I think the Lord might help me on that line. It is good to accept what the Lord appoints. The disciples all had to accept Peter’s appointment.
Scripture makes provision for the assembly sinning. Then it will be made known and they will come with their offering. It is very rarely the assembly is wrong. The old saint, when the Pope watched Peter’s pence being counted, said, ‘The Pope cannot say now, “Silver and gold I have not”, neither can he say, “Rise up and walk”’, Acts 3: 6.
Ques Is the opening statement of this section consequent on His rejection?
CAC What belonged to His presentation to Israel as the Christ was now to be in abeyance (verse 20), this new thought having been introduced as to the assembly.
Ques That He would be “killed, and the third day be raised”; would you connect that with the securing of the assembly? What is the thought of showing it to His disciples?
CAC He was bringing it out as a great present necessity, the cutting off of the Messiah and His having nothing. It was most important for them to understand that if they were to come into the new structure, was it not? It really meant the suspension of all the hopes of Israel connected with the flesh.
Rem I suppose it was so important that the Lord took this way that they should understand the import of it. He showed that everything was based on His death and resurrection, so that everything was ensured for the assembly and for Israel.
CAC Yes, and the attitude of Peter showed how necessary it was for them and for us. Peter was so in the [p. 129] dark about it that he took upon himself to rebuke the Lord, a most unseemly attitude to take up, showing that his soul was not formed in the truth of what He had confessed in the Father’s grace that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. It was a genuine thing in his soul but he was not formed in it one bit. How much we know and confess — real as far as it goes — but we are not formed in it. We have the light of Scripture and ministry and confess it and are prepared to stand by it, yet are not formed inwardly by it. If Peter had been he would never have thought of rebuking the Lord. We are, many of us, not spiritually formed by what we know of the truth. It raises the question whether we are in correspondence with the truth that we know. The secret with Peter was he was not prepared to give up Christ after the flesh, which shows he was not prepared to give himself up. If he had been prepared to deny himself he would not have had any difficulty about Christ going into death.
Rem It is important, this matter of formation which is so slow in us.
CAC It does not come quite so quickly as the revelation. It becomes a reality in the soul, and then the formation begins; it is the beginning. Formation does not come so quickly as the light of the revelation which we are prepared to receive and perhaps confess.
Ques Is light given in advance as encouragement?
CAC Yes, and of course, the Lord’s rebuke comes in; it was a very severe rebuke. I do not know that the Lord ever addressed any other saint as Satan. It is to impress the immense importance of it. If we do not apprehend the necessity of Christ going into death we are simply a mouthpiece of Satan — even with the very best intentions — to express what is opposed to the present mind of God. “Thy mind is not on the things that are of God, but on the things that are of men”, the Lord says, and that when Peter [p. 130] has been speaking very kindly to the Lord! So there is the imperative necessity of denying oneself. The root of the matter in Peter’s soul was that he did not deny himself; he wanted to retain himself. That is, we must come into correspondence with the death of Christ, there is no other way to come into the assembly.
Rem “If any one desires to come after me”, that is attraction to Christ.
CAC That is very beautiful, and is the way that the power comes in. There was attraction to the Lord with Peter, but a good deal of Peter still. It is really worth while when the Lord according to grace becomes more attractive to us than ourselves. There is that in the Lord that surpasses self in the heart and there is power to say ‘No’ whatever form it takes, and self takes many forms; that involves the cross; I cannot refuse myself without suffering.
The death of Christ was a necessity because of what we are — not because of what He was! The Messiah was cut off because of Israel’s terrible condition and they will have to learn that; and we all have to come to it, that our nature is such that the death of Christ is an absolute necessity. Then we can move after this wonderful Person who has been made known to us by the Father’s grace.
Ques Do we accept the fact that the death of Christ as the cutting off of self was an absolute necessity?
CAC And that we should live in another life, that it is possible to live the life of One who lives to God. Through the death of Christ we can live in His life, a new kind of life in which self has no place. That is He becomes the true self — the choicest object of the heart. It is good to keep out of the things that are of men; the world is full of them and we must have fins and scales to go through without being contaminated by human thoughts. Is it not delightful to see that though the Lord rebukes Peter it does not alter Peter’s place in the new structure? We see the [p. 131] character of the new structure in chapter 18 — persons He can trust without any question, showing that the Lord can bring about what is in His own mind in spite of the poor material that He starts with. So it is a question of which life we want to save. If a man desires to save his life he will lose it, that is, all that belongs to himself as a man living here; but if Christ has become the life of the believer, it is Christ he wants to save, not himself. It is a wonderful triumph when we give place to the life of Christ at some very real cost of suffering to ourselves — and even in a small way it is a good point gained. To be able to consider for Christ and be able to retain Him is a great victory, and there is no other way of being in the assembly. What a company of people the assembly really is!
Ques Only what is of Christ goes into the assembly, so it is a question of formation really.
CAC Yes. So that it is an exercise, all the time, that we do not suffer the loss of our souls. This is a continual exercise — not once; “For what does a man profit, if he should gain the whole world and suffer the loss of his soul?” It is to lose it in the sense that place is not given to Christ. If I do not give place to Him I lose my soul. It is so important in view of the assembly. What makes all the trouble is that something comes in that is not the life of Christ, not the new life but the old life, and what we gain on that line is not gain but loss. God generally allows His people to have what they are after naturally in order that we may learn that when we have got it, it is not worth having. Mr Stoney used to rub it well into us that it is all instruction for the assembly, and, of course, it has in view the day of manifestation. It says, “the Son of man is about to come in the glory of his Father with his angels”.
Rem It is in view of what is ahead; the glory of Christ is ahead.
CAC And everything is coming out. He will render [p. 132] to every man. One who is diligently giving place to Christ will not be much thought of in the world, but it is all coming out by and by. The Lord was pleased that they should have the prospect of His kingdom, and He allowed them in a remarkable way to see His kingdom. That is like the other side of the cross. While there is suffering on the one hand, there is the glory. There is a system of glory, of which He is the centre, and all that is spiritually real in us will come out in that scene of glory. It will all come out, so hypocrisy is not worth much after all; and really we have to do with Him glorified. It is a present reality that He is glorified.
Rem I suppose Peter profited by this.
CAC Yes, and He could only enter into His glory by passing through death.
Ques Would you explain the difference between the cross of Christ and the death of Christ?
CAC The cross involves suffering, “He that hath suffered in the flesh hath ceased from sin”. In a sense the cross is all the week.
Rem Paul said, “I am crucified with Christ”.
Ques Is it the passover side of things?
CAC Well, I suppose that is the solemn fact, the lamb roast with fire. It is very solemn. Perhaps, we do not dwell upon it in private as much as we ought to.
Ques Do we have to come to this balance of things, the whole world and a man’s soul?
CAC Yes. Why does He speak of coming in the glory of His Father? That seems to be additional to the Son of Man coming in His kingdom. His bringing the Father into this matter of glory is very striking. Really, He comes as invested with the glory of the Father.
Rem The Son of Man is a universal title, so the Father is to be universally known.
CAC Yes, it seems to suggest that, and I suppose we could hardly see the glory of the Son of Man apart from the [p. 133] glory of His Father, could we?
Rem It says, “About to come”.
CAC It is the kingdom in prospect in Matthew, in Mark it is the kingdom in power, and in Luke the kingdom in pattern. What we see in Matthew is a different aspect of it, that is, we are to be powerfully affected by what is yet future. And the glory of the Father would be in contrast to all worldly glory; it means the setting of all that aside if He comes in the glory of His Father. There is an order of things from which every other glory is excluded. It is the glory of His Father. The glory of the Father is all that is of the Father is brought into display. When the Son of Man comes all that the Father is will actually shine forth in display.
Ques. Why the angels?
CAC Are they not connected with God’s providential ways? So that what is now secret will be in display. The providence of God is largely hidden from our eyes now, but what God has been doing in a secret way all through time through angelic service will all come out then. I think that is why angels have a place in it. What do you say?
Rem I was thinking that the beneficence of God will come out, and they will be the bearers of it to carry it around.
CAC And there will be no veil on providence in the world to come. The angels will be visible then; they are invisible now. We do not know what they are doing now, but God’s providential ways entrusted to angels will be publicly known and recognised then.